The layout of the MSI K7T Pro2A is very well done. There was only one gripe I had and that was with the placements of those big caps near the CPU socket. Those caps made the installation of the CPU cooler a bit difficult. Mind you the caps are far enough away from the CPU socket that it won't interfere with the installation of really big heatsinks like those from Alpha or Global Win. You will just have to be extra careful. The last thing you want to do is break off a cap while trying to install the cooler.
With the exception of the caps, I really can't say enough about how well laid out the K7T Pro2A is. The power connector is placed high up on the motherboard and doesn't interfere with anything. The three DIMMs are right next to the IDE and floppy connectors. The board is a pleasure to work with.
Ahhh yes! No more ISA! The K7T Pro 2-A gives you six PCI slots. More than enough for even the most demanding gadget guy. It's also good to see MSI has moved the Modem Riser slot to the bottom. The AGP slot has an additional bracket attached to support extra long AGP cards. That would have been useful for the next Voodoo card but since nVidia now owns 3dfx, oh well.
While the Pro 2-A's younger brother, the Pro2, was released too early to incorporate ATA100, the Pro2-A wasn't. Built in ATA100 support is a great feature to have, especially if you don't want to purchase a separate controller card.
The MSI K7T Pro 2-A comes with two main diagnostic tools. The first is the Smart D-LED which aids the user in identifying problems by speaking to them, in either English or Chinese, through the PC Speaker! While this is very useful, the more sophisticated solution to a problem would be to use the built on Diagnostic LED system, a group of four lights that are either green or red. The patterns of green and red can be checked with an included information table to determine the problem. This single device makes finding and solving initial system problems extremely useful. All green means you're ready to rock!