Reviews - Gigbyte GA-F2A85XM-D3H

[HEXUS]

Premier AMD APU chipset on a £55 board.

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[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks,for reviewing one of the cheaper A85 motherboards!!

[iamlorro]

indeed. was not aware there were such good smaller size & price options for Trinity.

Thanks.

[owlx]

Are you sure that the pcie slots operate at x8/x8 when two discrete cards are being used? I'm currently looking for a new a85x board and all the online retailers list the board as x16/x4. Of course, I'm kind of hesitant to buy an FM2 board with more than one pcie slot anyways. The biggest appeal for me is the onboard graphics being so good already and then being able to do the hybrid crossfire with one discrete card if I want a little extra boost. You don't need two pcie slots to do that. Unless Richland will enable 3-way crossfire hybrids (onboard + two discrete cards) I don't really see much value in that second pcie slot. Has there been any word on if 3-way crossfire hybrid will be possible with Richland?

[darcotech]

Nice review,
my question is more in genreal though. Why would you need 8 SATA ports anyway?
This doesn't look as a NAS motherboard nor a server board, can't use it with ESXi (RAID controller is probably software based as usual). SO in normal use, why you would need eight SATA ports on budget PC?

[iamlorro]

Nice review,
my question is more in genreal though. Why would you need 8 SATA ports anyway?
This doesn't look as a NAS motherboard nor a server board, can't use it with ESXi (RAID controller is probably software based as usual). SO in normal use, why you would need eight SATA ports on budget PC?

because 8 is better than 3 or 4 = normal itx provision.

Bitfenix prodigy see here has room for 5x 3.5 drives or 9x 2.5

It's not a server class motherboard, yes, but as a storage place with the random HDD's i have lying around it'll be alright.

[shaithis]

Nice review,
my question is more in genreal though. Why would you need 8 SATA ports anyway?
This doesn't look as a NAS motherboard nor a server board, can't use it with ESXi (RAID controller is probably software based as usual). SO in normal use, why you would need eight SATA ports on budget PC?

Media Center.

Wish my HTPC board has an extra 2 ports..

[Tarinder]

Are you sure that the pcie slots operate at x8/x8 when two discrete cards are being used? I'm currently looking for a new a85x board and all the online retailers list the board as x16/x4. Of course, I'm kind of hesitant to buy an FM2 board with more than one pcie slot anyways. The biggest appeal for me is the onboard graphics being so good already and then being able to do the hybrid crossfire with one discrete card if I want a little extra boost. You don't need two pcie slots to do that. Unless Richland will enable 3-way crossfire hybrids (onboard + two discrete cards) I don't really see much value in that second pcie slot. Has there been any word on if 3-way crossfire hybrid will be possible with Richland?

Hi there,

The two x8 information comes directly from AMD - http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/cpu/46...k-trinity-apu/

I'll verify it again.

[scaryjim]

Are you sure that the pcie slots operate at x8/x8 when two discrete cards are being used? I'm currently looking for a new a85x board and all the online retailers list the board as x16/x4.

The chipset allows x8/x8 operation. It's up to board manufacturers whether they support it or not.

On this Gigabyte board - as Tarinder's review clearly states - it's not supported, as the board isn't really intended for a high-end crossfire gaming rig. It's quite possible that most other mATX boatrds won't support x8/x8 crossfire for the same reason. full ATX A85X are more likely to support x8/x8, I'd've thought...

EDIT: This gigbyte board does x8/x8

[shortie87]

This board looks great, however, does it really need the 8-pin EPS for power? I can understand if it's overclocked, but it should work with a standard 4-pin ATX as long as everything is left alone, right?