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Gigabyte 890GPA-UD3H Motherboard

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890GX and the SB850

Lets take a closer look at AMD’s new chipset, the 890GX. The 890GX is made up of the 890GX northbridge, and the SB850 south bridge. This new chipset offers integrated ATI 4290 graphics, support for up to 14 USB 2.0s and increased SATA 3 and USB 3.0 bandwidth. SuperSpeed USB 3.0 is made possible through the new NEC uPD720200 host controller; this controller also provides better power management and an increased bus power for more power-thirsty devices. The new SB850 offers native SATA 3 and an possible bandwidth of 2GB/s.

— New Chipset Serves as the Foundation for 2010 Client Platforms Featuring ATI Radeon™ HD 4290 Graphics, Advanced SATA 3.0, and USB 3.0 Connectivity for an Outstanding Out-of-Box 3D Graphics and HD Entertainment Experience —

AMD’s focus with the 890GX is to offer a versatile and affordable platform that also provides users with high definition playback capability in both movies and games. AMD is thinking “High Fidelity at an affordable price” and they may be right on target if our experience at CES is anything to judge by. With many manufacturers pushing 3D technology and more fantastic visuals on the screen it is only a matter of time before your average consumers are no longer content with Intel GMA graphics or lackluster performing graphics. Your gamers as well will want their screens to explode with intensity and AMD is right on track there with Eyefinity which offers gamers just the experience they are looking for.

All told the 890GX is exactly what AMD needs to enter a cost conscious market right now.

Key Features of the new 890GX:

  • USB 3.0
  • SATA 3.0
  • HyperTransport 3.0
  • PCI Express Generation 2.0
  • Support for up to  two Radeon cards using Crossfire X

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Integrated Graphics

The 4290IGP (Integrated Graphics Processor) offers a complete package when it comes to home entertainment. With it’s 128MB of SidePort memory it’s great for those looking to create a home theater PC,  someone looking to do some like gaming, or needs decent graphics on a budget. Gigabyte says that with an overclock (YES! It’s overclockable!), the 4290 is capable of of a 3300+ 3DMark06 score, though standard configuration varies (see my benchmarks; Gigabyte says an overclock of 700MHz to 1150MHz was necessary to achieve this number. That’s almost a 40% increase in speed!). Hybrid Graphics Technology is available to those looking for a bit more than the standard IGP. This will allow you to get added performance out of an ATI5000 series card (ATI 5400+).

Key features of the new ATI Radeon 4290:

  • Direct X 10.1 support
  • Support for Blu-ray 1080p playback
  • Dual Graphics performance by adding HD 5450 video card
  • Support for MPEG2, VC-1, and H.264 formats

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RAM

This board supports up to 1866+ DDR3 RAM, giving you the highest possible speed in DDR3. Notice the plus sign? This board is also designed to reach higher frequencies and use a lower voltage (that’s the Ultra Durable 3 right there) to bring your RAM to incredible speeds.

New Processors

Also being announced today, are AMD’s new Phenom II x6 processors code named Thuban. Guess what? This board supports it! (Though, had you read this entire review word for word you would have noticed that this was mentioned earlier.) AMD hasn’t sent out reviewing samples of these processors yet, so keep in touch for our follow-up review of the new Thuban processors.

Those of you out there still using dual core processors would do well to keep your eyes open for Thuban (Phenom II X6) and reduced prices on Phenom II X4 as this would be an ideal time to move to quad core and six core AMD processors. With AMD making the leap into six core processors ahead of Intel the new Phenom II X6 represents the first six core consumer level processor to hit the market. Big news for AMD and their fans as we expect this will be yet another AMD first.

Enthusiasts can expect the 890GX to be but the first of more chipsets from AMD that will support the new Phenom II X6 and more importantly on the gaming front we would expect to see adoption of the Phenom II X6 into gaming machines very quickly. Most integrators will want to be able to offer six core gaming machines as most gamers will want them in their rigs. The jury is till out of course on the impact that the new Phenom II X6 processors will have on gaming. Should the extra CPU’s tip the gaming scales Intel could have a very real problem on its hands.

The new 890GX is the first platform that AMD has put out to support the new Phenom II X6 which given its low price point really says a lot about the potential that the platform and the Phenom II X6 may have when combined.

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