Six A75-Based Motherboards For AMD’s A8 And A6 APUs

[beenthere]

It's no surprise that the Gigabyte mobo is excellent and the Asus is problematic. History does repeat itself over and over with Asus issues.

 

[ozonepilot]

@torque79 If it was a codec problem, the file would have not even opened and played for 6 minutes.....rather XBMC in itself contains all the codecs necessary to play these files. I don't use vlc on an HTPC, but only on my desktop pc.

 

[TeraMedia]

(off-topic) @nezzymighty: You can create a RAID-5 array at the O/S level inside WHS 2011 (Vail). I'm doing that now. This will also give your array full portability from one system to the next, as long as they are both running some incarnation of Windows that supports RAID 5.

I too find it odd that they would strip away something that is basically implemented in software anyway. AFAIK, the 890GX platform doesn't have XOR circuitry, but it supports RAID-5 just fine. Perhaps it's because these are supposed to be for smallish / desktop systems anyway.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]ecrenshaw[/nom]I agree with Teramedia above. In addition to gaming on an 1080p tele, what about how the videos look? I think these new boards can send the HDCP over the HDMI, but does it work on most AV equipment? ATI had issues with it in the past.Also, can it handle 3D blu-ray? I think the reviewers at Tom's need to remember that there are enthusiasts out there that do other things than game with hardware. Yeah, games are a big driver, but what about more HTPC stuff...especially since that is mentioned in the article.[/citation]
Tom's tries to cover the most important aspects of a new CPU and chipset in its CPU and chipset reviews. Don and Chris both have articles on Llano, is there anything there?

 

[gsxrme]

no raid 5 FAIL!

 

[alextheblue]

[citation][nom]ozonepilot[/nom]@torque79 If it was a codec problem, the file would have not even opened and played for 6 minutes.....rather XBMC in itself contains all the codecs necessary to play these files. I don't use vlc on an HTPC, but only on my desktop pc.[/citation]
You didn't even try VLC to see if that helped? Did you test any of the components before you shipped it all back and blamed it on AMD? Sounds like you should leave building boxes to the pros.

 

[goinginstyle]

Thomas,
I routinely run the Asus F1A75-M Pro board at 26x138 with a cheap Hyper 212+ cooler on a A3850. It appears something might be amiss with your results as I could also max a Mushkin 2133 8GB kit at 2200+, granted with loose 9-10-9 settings but so far this board has been rock stable when overclocking around 3600 and probably could do better if my cooling improved.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]goinginstyle[/nom]Thomas,I routinely run the Asus F1A75-M Pro board at 26x138 with a cheap Hyper 212+ cooler on a A3850. It appears something might be amiss with your results as I could also max a Mushkin 2133 8GB kit at 2200+, granted with loose 9-10-9 settings but so far this board has been rock stable when overclocking around 3600 and probably could do better if my cooling improved.[/citation]Different BIOS? A setting that needs to be changed? The problem with this sample (as tested) was that a high reference clock couldn't be reached.

 

[Guest]

There is one more thing this review should address. It's the V core setting for the Llano processors.
I recently purchased a Asrock A75M and a A6-3650 and I'm not happy with the default settings.
As in the picture from this review the stock voltage is about 1.36V that means more than 60°C under heavy load (Linpack) with stock cooler.
With a bit of working I found my rig could work well undervolted at 1.05V at the same frequency (Linpack + an hour of ME2 ). APU temp never goes higher than **50°C**.
I didn't invest too much time to found the limit, but I suspect that you can achieve better results.
I don't have a power meter but I expect about 20W less on the power at full load.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]4lph4[/nom]There is one more thing this review should address. It's the V core setting for the Llano processors.I recently purchased a Asrock A75M and a A6-3650 and I'm not happy with the default settings.As in the picture from this review the stock voltage is about 1.36V that means more than 60°C under heavy load (Linpack) with stock cooler.With a bit of working I found my rig could work well undervolted at 1.05V at the same frequency (Linpack + an hour of ME2 ). APU temp never goes higher than **50°C**.I didn't invest too much time to found the limit, but I suspect that you can achieve better results.I don't have a power meter but I expect about 20W less on the power at full load.[/citation]Yes, I too was a bit disappointed to see the default voltage this high. We can see how far the Gigabyte motherboard overclocked at 1.40V, and some of the boards were hovering around there at stock.

 

[HMRkingpin]

[citation][nom]ojas[/nom]I used to run SETI@home for a while, but then thought that using up resources on earth to look for little green men, after which me may or may not find them (most likely will not), rather than address issues closer to home (disease research, weather prediction, etc) is kind of a waste, no matter how geeky the LHC and SETI projecs are.On the topic:They're selling the A8-3850 for around Rs.10,000 ($220)in India, when the Core i3-2100 sells for around Rs.5500. What's the point? I'd rather get a Core i3 + Radeon 5770 in almost the same price....[/citation]

Man that is a steep price. In the U.S., the price is $140. I hear you on going with the intel (I like AMD myself, but I know Intel is awesome ), but I would say more or less this APU is for people or business that do not want a discrete graphics card. Having a fast enough processor with very capable graphics solution for everyday tasks is economical. It uses less power than cpu/discrete combo. It can go into slim cases and such that a discrete would not fit. Less components to go bad inside the computer. I do see your point though. At the price point in India, it may b cheaper or more bang for your buck, to go with the Intel/ATI solution.

 

[HMRkingpin]

[citation][nom]beenthere[/nom]It's no surprise that the Gigabyte mobo is excellent and the Asus is problematic. History does repeat itself over and over with Asus issues.[/citation]

Never had a problem with asus products. Every time I bought a different brand MoBo, I had problems I even have some other stuff like an Asus router and netbook. I'm not in love with them or anything, just saying from my own experience. It is funny how that goes sometimes. Kinda like how some people have had some crappy Chevy's and hate them and some people had some good ones and continue to buy them.

 

[HMRkingpin]

I really liked this article. My only problem is..... Stop crying about the SATA cables!!!! They give enough to get you going. I'm sure the motherboard manufactures were not thinking you would buy a mATX board and hook up 4 HDD's and 2 blu-ray drives. I mean if you are gonna do that, buy some damn cables.

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]HMRkingpin[/nom]I really liked this article. My only problem is..... Stop crying about the SATA cables!!!! They give enough to get you going. I'm sure the motherboard manufactures were not thinking you would buy a mATX board and hook up 4 HDD's and 2 blu-ray drives. I mean if you are gonna do that, buy some damn cables.[/citation]It's cheap. SATA cables are even cheaper for them than they are for us. If they cut back on SATA cables it makes one wonder what else they might be cutting corners on.

Really, 3 drives (including DVD) is average, why wouldn't 3 cables be average?

 

[HMRkingpin]

Why is three drives average. Maybe for a toms user. I would say average is one media drive and one 500gb - 1tb HDD. Your average user is not going to raid their drives. These are basically VALUE boards. To keep the value, they will exclude some minor things. These chips and these boards are not meant for high end systems in my opinion.

 

[ozonepilot]

sounds like an issue with Asus board overheating or just a bad board VRM. I play All my content through WMC, just save the HD files to a .MKV and windows will hanlde it with just the codec.

I didn't like the .m2ts format because of all the extra software required to play them. The biggest issue is the lack of "uninstall" most software companies are going to. One example is cyberlink. Installs 9 programs in control panel to remove one at a time if you decide to get rid of it.


Well prior to buying this HTPC, I was using a dedicated media player on my network, so it would play any type of media file, no need to download anything. Since then, I decided to go with the HTPC, so I wasn't going to go through 4.5TB of media and re-encode all my files but in XBMC, there is no need to download 3rd party codecs............as they're all built into XBMC..it did play, but not for very long, or with the GPU, the HTPC just shut down on me after a short time. I'm not a big fan of WMC or any other Windows related software but I'm going to look into other media software for playback that I've seen lately if/when I get my HTPC back from the vendor. I know they tested my build before shipping it out, so I'll find out soon enough what the problem is.

 

[ozonepilot]

@goinginstyle

@torque79 If it was a codec problem, the file would have not even opened and played for 6 minutes.....rather XBMC in itself contains all the codecs necessary to play these files. I don't use vlc on an HTPC, but only on my desktop pc.


You didn't even try VLC to see if that helped? Did you test any of the components before you shipped it all back and blamed it on AMD? Sounds like you should leave building boxes to the pros.

Well you know, I actually did leave the building of the box to the pros. I picked out the compenents and left it to the vendor to assemble/test/ship the product to me. Strike 1. VLC I didn't have the chance to use on the HTPC[I know my files work fine with VLC on my desktop], but decided to upgrade the BIOS...yes and it _was_ the correct file on the Asus site, before I started playing with other software. I was determined to use XBMC in the build as my media player. Once the BIOS choked after it reboot, I was left with nothing. I believe I know somewhat about the hardware as I went through some recovery methods to re-coup the original BIOS, but it didn't work. It's not really my concern to test out the problem. Even if I did, I still had no POST screen to go to the OS. That's why we have warrantys.

 

[ozonepilot]

that should be @alextheblue

 

[hjominbonrun]

Is it possible to give a recommendation which excluded overclocking? I know a lot of people talk about it but I don't know anyone in my circle of techies who overclock anything. As such, I would like Tech recommended on its standard operating requirements, and not on a rarely implemented metric,i.e. overclocking. btw, these peeps are Devs and DBA's, so if they are not overclocking, who is??

 

[Crashman]

[citation][nom]hjominbonrun[/nom]Is it possible to give a recommendation which excluded overclocking? I know a lot of people talk about it but I don't know anyone in my circle of techies who overclock anything. As such, I would like Tech recommended on its standard operating requirements, and not on a rarely implemented metric,i.e. overclocking. btw, these peeps are Devs and DBA's, so if they are not overclocking, who is??[/citation]Are you looking for awards or just skipping over the conclusion? It's fairly easy to see that ECS is recommended for price and Asus for features when you take out the overclocking comments.

 

[aoommen]

Thinking of a HTPC build based on the Llano platform (planning on the A4-3400 CPU) - just a glorified media player (blu-ray and DVD playback, also ripped movies majorly in MKV) with no intention of running any Games or CPU intensive applications on it. I have Core-i5 OC'd for all that. So no discrete graphics card for this build!

Budget is the main concern as far as the HTPC build goes and I'm planning on using the ECS A75F-M2 for this build. I've had no previous experience with ECS, never used them for any of my previous builds, I noticed they have a 3 year warranty, which is great for the price and they are priced unbeatable low @ around $60 now.

So just wanted to ask here, whether this would be a good idea for my build - reliability and quality wise? Or is this one of those too good to be true deals?