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MSI's FM2-A85XA-G65, an inexpensive start to a great HTPC

Subject: Motherboards | April 26, 2013 - 03:32 PM |
Tagged: msi, FM2-A85XA-G65, socket fm2, amd

Compared to most current Intel boards, MSI's FM2-A85XA-G65 is very clean looking, especially around the CPU socket.  This particular board benefits from LucidLogix's Virtu MVP in addition to hybrid Crossfire present on FM2 boards and will handle proper Crossfire as it does have a pair of PCIe 16x slots.  You could build an agile HTPC with this motherboard, with 8 channel sound available and D-Sub, DVI-D, HDMI and DisplayPort output all present.  The board is currently available for $110, a full review can be found over at X-bit Labs.

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"MSI mainboards look great, have very convenient layout and use only high-quality components. These boards are energy-efficient, fast and work well with default settings. However, there are quite a few things in their BIOS that could use some extra work and the boards do not keep the power-saving technologies up and running during overclocking. Everything we have just said is true for the main hero of our today’s review."

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Source: X-bit Labs

BioStar's inexpensive Hi-Fi A85W is one BIOS update away from greatness

Subject: Motherboards | November 26, 2012 - 03:16 PM |
Tagged: amd, a85, socket fm2, biostar, Hi-Fi A85W

Biostar's Hi-Fi A85W is a low cost way to start building a new AMD system, currently after MIR it is $85 on NewEgg and comes with 8GB of free G.SKILL RAM.  You get a board that supports Hybrid CrossFire and sports a pait of PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (only one is full speed), two PCIe 2.0 x1 slots and a pair of legacy PCI slots.  It has eight SATA 6.0 Gb/s, eight USB 2.0 ports and four USB 3.0 ports to give you a lot of flexibility for drives and peripherals as well as DVI, HDMI and VGA outputs and a feature dubbed "PURO Hi-Fi"; a sheild for the better than average onboard audio codec.  TechPowerUp were impressed with the wide variety of overclocking options in the UEFI BIOS, until they tried overclocking and found a variety of issues with TurboCore and other overclocking settings.  Hopefully Biostar wil release a BIOS update to fix what is otherwise a solid choice of FM2 motherboard.

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"Biostar is at it again with a mid-range entry level product, the Biostar Hi-Fi A85W. Ready to rock out with AMD's new Piledriver FM2 APUs, the Biostar Hi-Fi A85W comes with an audio-oriented theme that's usually reserved for high-end products. Did it play sweet music, or is it a bit out of tune?"

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Source: TechPowerUp

Gigabyte thinks Trinity looks best in basic black

Subject: Motherboards | October 25, 2012 - 02:46 PM |
Tagged: amd, gigabyte, F2A85X-UP4, socket fm2, trinity

Gigabyte's socket FM2 F2A58X-UP4 looks unique in that the colour scheme is a basic black and grey with none of the flashy colours common on today's motherboards.  All seven SATA ports and the eSATA are 6Gb/s so you don't have to worry about which ports to use, the three PCIe 16x slots can run at 8x/8x/1x when fully populated and with the half dozen USB 3.0 ports you end up with a lot of choices on a fairly inexpensive board.  [H]ard|OCP had fun when overclocking this board, a new chipset means new settings and tricks to learn in order to coax the most out of your processor, though the A10-5800K does top out fairly quickly regardless of the motherboard used.  Check out their full review here.

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"GIGABYTE's F2A85X-UP4 brings AMD's "Trinity" APU to the desktop arena with a new chipset and a solid feature set at a nice price. But is that enough to make it compelling for enthusiasts?"

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Source: [H]ard|OCP

AMD teases us with their upcoming 2nd generation of APUs

Subject: General Tech | September 24, 2012 - 02:57 PM |
Tagged: trinity, A10-5800k, socket fm2

Apart from the model numbers the only solid information of when we will start to hear about AMD's second generation of Trinity APUs is the date, October 2nd is when the NDAs start to expire and we might see some results.  Many of the model numbers are relatively familiar, with the A10-5800K, A10-5700, A8-5600K, A8-5500, Athlon X4 750K/740, A6-5400K and A4-5300.  New to the chipset family will be the the A55, A75 and A85X, all with Socket FM2.  SemiAccurate posted the news here; keep your eyes peeled next week for the actual release.

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"Two more interesting tidbits appeared in the news letter, “…platform longevity with FM2 motherboards for future upgrades” and, “AMD Memory Profile Support for automatic performance.” You can read into these statements as far as you’d like, but it appears that AMD is planning on keeping its FM2 socket around for a bit longer than FM1 lasted. Additionally, AMD may finally be rolling out it’s own version of Intel’s XMP predefined RAM overclocking profiles next month."

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Source: SemiAccurate

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