Motherboards
BIOSTAR has launched its AM5-based A620MS motherboard today, bringing a new low-end option for PC users on a budget. Though BIOSTAR has not disclosed what MSRP it the A620MS motherboard will carry, the specifications of the board make it clear that it targets the lowest-end segment of the market, though it makes use of the regular A620 chipset instead of the even less expensive A620A chipset. The A620MS sports some features typical for mATX A620 boards (which make up the vast majority of current models): two DDR5 DIMM slots that support up to two 48GB sticks, an M.2 PCIe 4.0 slot for SSDs, four SATA III ports, and a PCIe Gen4 x16 slot. The motherboard also has four debug LEDs for diagnosing CPU, RAM, GPU...
Gigabyte Z77X-UP4 TH Review: Thunderbolt Times Two
Now that the exclusive license Apple had for Thunderbolt has expired, since Computex 2012 we have seen a number of motherboards destined for PCs with a Thunderbolt connector. ...
15 by Ian Cutress on 9/17/2012Gigabyte X79S-UP5 WiFi Review: Ultra Durable 5 Meets the C606 Chipset
As part of the Computex 2012 show, Gigabyte demonstrated to us their new version of Ultra Durable. This fifth iteration of their power delivery combines their previous features...
16 by Ian Cutress on 9/6/2012ASRock X79 Extreme11 Review: PCIe 3.0 x16/x16/x16/x16 and LSI 8-Way SAS/SATA
The end of summer marks the start of the X79 refresh line. We are, at best estimates, coming up to half-way in the Sandy Bridge-E life as the...
62 by Ian Cutress on 9/3/2012MultiCore Enhancement: The Debate About Free MHz
If you have been keeping up to date with any of the AnandTech motherboard reviews lately, there has been one topic that has been hot on my lips, and...
66 by Ian Cutress on 8/29/2012Two New Z77 mITX Announced
Over the past couple of days, two new Z77 mini-ITX motherboards have been seen on the radar. The first is Gigabyte's Z77N-WiFi model, to be released alongside the...
43 by Ian Cutress on 8/23/2012Four Multi-GPU Z77 Boards from $280-$350 - PLX PEX 8747 featuring Gigabyte, ASRock, ECS and EVGA
With only sixteen PCIe 3.0 lanes available on a Z77 motherboard paired with an Ivy Bridge CPU, when we get to three or four-way GPU solutions these GPUs are...
24 by Ian Cutress on 8/22/2012The AnandTech Podcast: Episode 1
Last Friday, Brian Klug, Ian Cutress and myself took an hour to discuss a lot of what was on our minds lately. At a high level we discussed building...
59 by Anand Lal Shimpi on 8/13/2012ASUS P8Z77-V Premium Review: A Bentley Among Motherboards
In the car industry, there is a large variety of cars to choose from - both the cheap and the expensive will get you from A to B, but...
43 by Ian Cutress on 8/13/2012ASUS Republic of Gamers and X79 ROG Review – Rampage IV Gene, Formula and Extreme
The Republic of Gamers (ROG) brand has been on the radar for a good five years now. Initially in the form of motherboards, the ROG brand aimed to...
34 by Ian Cutress on 8/3/2012Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD5H Review: Functionality meets Competitive Pricing
The motherboard scene contains around fifty shades of grey – whatever size, whatever feature set, if a user cannot get what they exactly want, something similar should be available...
70 by Ian Cutress on 7/25/2012Biostar TZ77XE4 Review: Dichotomy by Default
Biostar have always been on the radar for motherboard builders, occupying that niche of ‘bang-for-buck’ if your wallet is looking a little empty this month. In the grand...
28 by Ian Cutress on 7/21/2012EVGA Tease mini-ITX sized Z77
Followers of EVGA media man Jacob Freeman may have noticed something rather interesting from his Twitter feed and the EVGA Facebook page recently. If small is the size...
23 by Ian Cutress on 7/20/2012ASRock Z77 Extreme6 Review: Legacy Bites Back
ASRock are not afraid of the legacy connections. Not merely content on having both a floppy drive header and an IDE connector on the Fatal1ty Z77 Professional, they...
35 by Ian Cutress on 7/13/2012Computex 2012: Some more FM2 Motherboards, including Zotac, ECS and Biostar
Having had a chance to visit most of the motherboard manufacturers in Computex so far, I popped from the Zotac booth into the AMD booth on my way to...
8 by Ian Cutress on 6/7/2012First look at an AMD Brazos 2.0 Motherboard
Sapphire showed us its Brazos 2.0 motherboard based on AMD's E2-1800 APU with Radeon HD 7340 graphics. The Pure Mini E2-1800 uses SO-DIMMs (8GB max) and features both a...
5 by Anand Lal Shimpi on 6/6/2012Computex 2012: ASUS Motherboard Technical Showcase - ZEUS with dual GPU onboard
Producing concept boards is common in the automotive industry. Every year, companies such as Ford, Audi, Jaguar or Volkswagen will produce a concept as an indication of 'this...
16 by Ian Cutress on 6/6/2012Computex 2012: ASRock's New Motherboards: X79 Extreme11 with LSI SAS and Z77 OC Formula
ASRock have now gone slightly mad. You could argue that within that madness lies some semblance of innovation, as they are going to release a mad product with...
5 by Ian Cutress on 6/6/2012ASUS' Thunderbolt EX Upgrade Card for 7-series Motherboards
Only two members of ASUS' Z77 stack feature integrated Thunderbolt support: the P8Z77-V Premium and the P8Z77-V Pro/Thunderbolt. As the interface is still fairly new and the controllers still...
21 by Anand Lal Shimpi on 6/5/2012Thunderbolt on Windows Part 2: Intel's DZ77RE-K75 & ASUS' P8Z77-V Premium
Quad-core mobile Sandy Bridge, 2.5" SSDs and Thunderbolt together have allowed me to use a notebook as my primary work machine. I get all of the portability benefits of...
116 by Anand Lal Shimpi on 6/3/2012Gigabyte GA-Z77MX-D3H Review – Z77 and MicroATX
In the first of our non-full-size Z77 motherboard reviews, we are today getting to grips with the Gigabyte GA-Z77MX-D3H. Currently retailing at $135, the Z77MX-D3H offers more performance...
25 by Ian Cutress on 5/24/2012