mATX Roundup

[rexian96]

Originally posted by: chucky2
Even if he had started the 300 hour burn at 12:00 AM this morning, that'd be 12:00 PM on the 26th that the burn would be done. Then the rest of the testing on it would need to take place.

Yeah, that burn time ... wonder if he'll make an exception for this board. I assumed it's an Intel board and was excited about it, but looks like this 7050 board is an AMD one.

 

[tomatom]

" Unfortunately, I have to order my new board on Monday. If the roundup isn't available by then, it will be too late and useless to me. I'm sure it will be useful to a lot of other folks, but useless to me. I'd much rather have seen parts of the roundup released as they became available instead of waiting for every board and every bios revision to test. "

Yeah , I couldn't wait either , so I ordered the cheapest 690G < NewEgg $55AR >
to play with knowing I'll prolly dump it later and reuse everything on the next one
I choose based on Gary Key's report and the posts you guys add >

 

[pollyp]

I have been checking this tread for weeks now and is amazed how little useful information has been discussed. Sure, we are all waiting for the review but can't we discuss other things than saying hurry up !
(I also hope it is good, caus expectations grow for each week delayed)

I have googled a lot to find other reviews and try and choose my own favorite. Unfortunately there aren't that many other reviews out yet what I have found.

I also found some discrepancies between different ones, eg Sapphires PI-AM2RS690MHD board seems to be a good overclocker according to techPowerUp! (beta bios) but doesn't overclock at all with the released bios according to (translated page) http://translate.google.com/translate?u...d%3D344&langpair=es%7Cen&hl=en&ie=UTF8 . If so, it is off my list...

Not much info on the Abit AN-M2HD except for Cebit reports... Anyone heard the release date on this specific board ?

 

[adnoto]

Originally posted by: pollyp

Not much info on the Abit AN-M2HD except for Cebit reports... Anyone heard the release date on this specific board ?

For that specific board? Not a peep - and trust me, I have been checking. Heck I even tried emailing the Abit sales dept. but of course got no answer. I know they are hesitant to disclose such things but what I would appreciate is if Abit would simply come out and say: The AN-M2 boards will be out "around" this date and it will be replacing the nView board. That way I would at least have a better feeling for whether or not I should wait. As it is, they are going to lose a customer simply because I don't have that minimal amount of info. The rumor (supplied by "The Inquirer") is that the nvidia MCP68 boards will launch the 19th. I will be looking on the 19th and if there is still no word I will more than likely be buying a 690G.

 

[Skott]

Last week I thought the AN-M2 might be here soon because no one had the NF-M2 in stock lately. Then towards the end of the week online stores had it back in stock again. It would be nice if we knew for sure which month the mobo will go on sale but it doesnt look like they are going to tell us yet. I dont trust The Inquirer. Even if they are correct half the time (which is the best % many readers will give it credit for) its not something thats reliable.

 

[rexian96]

Anybody know anything about those 630i boards with 7050 gfx? I think this 19th they are releasing the AMD version 630a. Any idea about Intel counterpart?

 

[maglito]

None of the AMD 690 boards I have tested (MSI and Asus -- even with the graphics core overclocked) can do 1080p from HD-DVD or BluRay (VC1 and H.264) without dropping frames (although overclocking the graphics core does help). I want to know if the 7050 boards do any offload or can simply output VC1 and H.264 protected HDDVDs or BluRay without dropping frames. I still want to do more testing with overclocking the DDR2 memory in conjunction with the graphics core clock but my gut is the 690G graphics isn't going to be able to do "fullHD" (much to my discontent).

In summary, I am looking for the over clocking performance of boards that do HDCP and their performance of 1080p output from HDDVDs and BluRay using PowerDVD 7.1/7.2 (7.3 doesn't seem to recognize the 690G core).

Also, I still need to test the output of 1080p/24/48/72hz output (for judder free 24fps movie output).

Thanks!!

 

[BlingBlingArsch]

Gary must be dead or he got married...sumthing terrible must have happened to him

 

[PokerGuy]

Yeah, what's up with this roundup, any updates on ETA or the issues with testing?

 

[chucky2]

Originally posted by: BlingBlingArsch
Gary must be dead or he got married...sumthing terrible must have happened to him

I don't know Gary and am just a long time lurker, so not sure if I should say...

...but you'd be correct.

The review I believe should be up next week...you can be sure that Gary would not be taking this long if there weren't overwhelming reasons...just be patient everyone, it's not like we pay for these reviews afterall.

Chuck

 

[adnoto]

Originally posted by: chucky2

Originally posted by: BlingBlingArsch
Gary must be dead or he got married...sumthing terrible must have happened to him

I don't know Gary and am just a long time lurker, so not sure if I should say...

...but you'd be correct.

Er... That doesn't sound very good... not very good at all. I am a complete newcomer and enjoy this site for all the quality info but I couldn't care less about a motherboard review if something bad has happened. Best wishes to Gary.

 

[rexian96]

Good to see this thread is still going strong I think that 300 hrs burn time is causing the delay. May be none of the boards survived that test We already know 1 F-I90HD died after 168 hrs. If I end up getting this board, I'll make sure that I don't run it more than 6 days straight

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: rexian96
We already know 1 F-I90HD died after 168 hrs. If I end up getting this board, I'll make sure that I don't run it more than 6 days straight

Haha, good idea, but may not work. I have an Abit NF-M2 nView board that was working fine. I shelved it for a few months, then went to use it again... no POST. Same parts as before, tried other parts, tried all parts with another board (worked), cleared BIOS, everything outside case... nothing.

 

[Heidfirst]

Originally posted by: adnoto

For that specific board? Not a peep - and trust me, I have been checking. Heck I even tried emailing the Abit sales dept. but of course got no answer. I know they are hesitant to disclose such things but what I would appreciate is if Abit would simply come out and say: The AN-M2 boards will be out "around" this date and it will be replacing the nView board. That way I would at least have a better feeling for whether or not I should wait. As it is, they are going to lose a customer simply because I don't have that minimal amount of info. The rumor (supplied by "The Inquirer") is that the nvidia MCP68 boards will launch the 19th. I will be looking on the 19th and if there is still no word I will more than likely be buying a 690G.

the BIOS has gone onto the ftp so I would say that it's imminent

 

[Skott]

And another week has passed once again and not a peep out of Gary or an update of the round up. This does not bode well I fear. I hope Gary is okay. I remember something similar happening last year he was in the middle of a big roundup and his father or someone in the family became very ill.

Speak to us, Gary! :brokenheart:

 

[Gary Key]

Hi,

Sorry about the delays... I am back now. Let's just say that between losing a family member , having strep throat turn into pneumonia, and having part of our roof blow off the house it has not been a good two weeks.

I am writing again finally, actually had to retest the 690G boards for the fourth time. The Biostar and Sapphire 690G boards with the latest BIOS updates are getting around 270HTT now stable, AMD still has some BIOS work to do between the IGP/PCI/PCIe locks to get them above 300. I doubt the Asus and MSI boards will do more than 235 as they were designed a little differently. The latest drivers are suppose to support 1080P, testing that tonight.

In the meantime, our first 7050 boards arrived this week, will have the Biostar board in the roundup now. I will post a couple of pictures later today. Performance is not any different than the 6150/6150SE boards, feature update only.

Intel was kind enough to send us a retail 6420 for this review so we will have the E4300 and 6420 going against the 3600+, 3800+, and 5200+, will follow up later with the 5600+ since it costs the same as the 6420. Overall, very impressed with AMD price to performance now and think their boards are a bit more mature than the Intel boards.

More information later today.

 

[BlingBlingArsch]

glad ur back, gary.

 

[FireTech]

Glad your back and hopefully feeling better & happier

 

[Skott]

Wow, I was getting worried there, Gary. Glad you are feeling better. Is there any new developements with testing on the F-I90HD mobo? Last we heard one unit died during the test. I assume the other survived fine? Near as anyone can find out ABIT is maintaining no significant problems with this board on their end. A new BIOS was just released too.

 

[najames]

Rule of thumb, health first, job second. Glad you're back.

I have not installed the 3/27 "deleted missing string" BIOS for the Biostar TA690G yet, but as shipped mine seems to stop cold at 264 no matter what I do. I was trying to test it at 270 last night and temps were going up just sitting locked up in the BIOS so I said enough, screw it. I'll likely run it near stock or might even leave it undervolted. This thing is will even run undervolted and overclocked. I am curious to see what BIOS you used.

My only real gripe is no firewire chip. I have not tested video and audio outputs yet though. I originally inteneded to simply do a few benchmarks on this board with WinXP and install Linux, but am still trying to sort out the 10million BIOS settings. Hopefully you'll provide them ALL in your review!!

 

[adnoto]

First: Best wishes Gary. Hope things are at least a bit better for you now.

Originally posted by: Gary Key

In the meantime, our first 7050 boards arrived this week, will have the Biostar board in the roundup now. I will post a couple of pictures later today. Performance is not any different than the 6150/6150SE boards, feature update only.

This question isn't for Gary necessarily (I am sure he is busy) but, for any one else that cares to respond... The quote above would imply that if one was concerned about the performance of the IGP and not so much about the features of the newer Nvidia chipset then there is no reason to wait on a 7050 board then correct? That is to say that, performance wise, the 690G has been shown to be at least a bit better than the 6150 and if the 7050 chipsets are no better performance wise than the 6150 then the 690G is the way to go with regard to IGP performance? Is that how you guys take that statement? Are there other considerations I am not thinking of?

 

[avi85]

Originally posted by: adnoto
First: Best wishes Gary. Hope things are at least a bit better for you now.

Originally posted by: Gary Key

In the meantime, our first 7050 boards arrived this week, will have the Biostar board in the roundup now. I will post a couple of pictures later today. Performance is not any different than the 6150/6150SE boards, feature update only.

This question isn't for Gary necessarily (I am sure he is busy) but, for any one else that cares to respond... The quote above would imply that if one was concerned about the performance of the IGP and not so much about the features of the newer Nvidia chipset then there is no reason to wait on a 7050 board then correct? That is to say that, performance wise, the 690G has been shown to be at least a bit better than the 6150 and if the 7050 chipsets are no better performance wise than the 6150 then the 690G is the way to go with regard to IGP performance? Is that how you guys take that statement? Are there other considerations I am not thinking of?

That's how I understood it.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Gary Key
AMD still has some BIOS work to do between the IGP/PCI/PCIe locks to get them above 300. I doubt the Asus and MSI boards will do more than 235 as they were designed a little differently.

In the meantime, our first 7050 boards arrived this week, will have the Biostar board in the roundup now. I will post a couple of pictures later today. Performance is not any different than the 6150/6150SE boards, feature update only.

Overall, very impressed with AMD price to performance now and think their boards are a bit more mature than the Intel boards.

I guess then for a better IGP, the AMD boards. For better overclocking, Nvidia boards.

I had suspected that the AMD boards were more mature than the Intel boards. *SIGH* I wanted to build a good overclocking (400MHz FSB +) mATX C2D setup.

 

[PokerGuy]

Sorry to hear about the loss of a family member.... and a damaged roof along with step and pneumonia makes for a pretty bad few weeks! Anyhow, glad to see you're back. Still looking forward to the review, though I went ahead and ordered my asus 690g board. Hopefully that's the right choice.

 

[Gary Key]

Here are a couple of crappy snapshots of the Biostar 7050 board.

7050 Board

7050 Box

We noticed about a 1% performance improvement with the board over the 6150/6100 series, have a new BIOS coming that is overclocking friendly now.