Friday, March 19th 2010
Gigabyte Readies Feature-Packed Mini-ITX LGA1156 Motherboard
Gigabyte is readying a new motherboard in the mini-ITX form-factor which is bound to surprise some with its feature-set. The GA-H55N-USB3 is a socket LGA1156 motherboard based on the Intel H55 chipset, supporting the entire range of LGA1156 processors with a powerful 4+2 phase VRM. The socket is wired to two DDR3 DIMM slots for dual-channel memory, which is powered by its own 2-phase circuit. Gigabyte was able to accommodate five SATA channels by the chipset, making space for one eSATA, and four internal SATA 3 Gb/s ports with RAID support.
Its lone expansion slot is a full-bandwidth PCI-Express 2.0 x16, while being based on the H55 chipset, it also supports Intel Flexible Display Interface for processors with embedded graphics. On its connectivity front it doesn't make many compromises either, with 8+2 channel HD audio with optical SPDIF connector, a two-port USB 3.0 controller giving out two USB SuperSpeed ports, gigabit Ethernet, Keyboard/Mouse combo PS/2, four USB 2.0 ports on the rear-panel + four by internal headers, and display connectivity which includes DVI, D-Sub, and HDMI. The GA-H55N-USB3 is expected to be out in April.
Sources:
Expreview, Gigabyte Tech Daily
Its lone expansion slot is a full-bandwidth PCI-Express 2.0 x16, while being based on the H55 chipset, it also supports Intel Flexible Display Interface for processors with embedded graphics. On its connectivity front it doesn't make many compromises either, with 8+2 channel HD audio with optical SPDIF connector, a two-port USB 3.0 controller giving out two USB SuperSpeed ports, gigabit Ethernet, Keyboard/Mouse combo PS/2, four USB 2.0 ports on the rear-panel + four by internal headers, and display connectivity which includes DVI, D-Sub, and HDMI. The GA-H55N-USB3 is expected to be out in April.
27 Comments on Gigabyte Readies Feature-Packed Mini-ITX LGA1156 Motherboard
pity it uses H55 and not something better from AMD or intel.
Still, better power management than the Zotac ITX-55 hope the price is right
These boards need better power management, maybe digital PWMs or a very restrictive BIOS, otherwise someone will overclock them and they will die an horrible death (I bought three DFI boards, two had to be RMA'ed, they were automatically overclocked by ABS and shortly the memory controller on both the processor and the board died)
In my case nothing really died, just one Memory channel on the mainboard and the memory controller on the CPU, got both replaced under warranty and now I'm very careful with the BIOS clock and voltage settings.
These tiny systems arent made for 24/7 load either.
My DFI board runs pretty much 8 hours a day with an i5 750@150Bclk with turbo enabled, and a 5770 inside a Silverstone Sugo SG-05. it's my main PC and I do some gaming at night.
It passed 10 hours of OCCT just fine, never actually tried prime for 24hours because I can't be up 24 hours to put out a fire :D
It's pretty stable and runs way cooler than my previous desktop (e8400@4Ghz 2x8800GTX), also it's pretty fast.
The DFI board has no overvolting/undervolting options for HT quads, maximum recomended BCLK on an i5-750 is 180BLCK and on an HT enabled 860/870 is 150BCLK.
It runs pretty cool at 19c idle actually with a Corsair H50. It's amazing all you can fit on an SG05 :D
www.techpowerup.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1802750&postcount=11
I tried Zotac, no, no.
With an I7 and some corsair W/C!!!
And 8gigs 1600MHz!!!
SFF cases come well-ventilated these days, with 40 mm fan on its top and bottom.