Sapphire Readies Pure CrossfireX 890GX Motherboard

[btarunr]

Sapphire is back to its vocation of being a motherboard vendor, the popular ATI Radeon board partner designed a new socket AM3 motherboard based on the new AMD 890GX + SB850 chipset, dubbed the Sapphire Pure CrossfireX 890GX. The board is built on the ATX form-factor, though comes with only four expansion slots spaced out. The AM3 CPU is powered by a 10-phase VRM, it is wired to four DDR3 DIMM slots for dual-channel memory. The AMD 890GX northbridge is cooled by a large heatsink which shares its heat with one of the VRM heatsinks. The ATI Radeon HD 4290 IGP is assisted by 128 MB of SidePort memory apart from sharing the system memory.

Out of the four expansion slots, two are PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x8 when both are populated) with some sort of manual PCI-E lane switching, and one each of PCI-E x1 and PCI. The SB850 southbridge gives out six SATA 6 Gb/s internal ports, while an additional controller provides an IDE connector (for two IDE devices). The eSATA port is driven by manually connecting it with one of the internal ports. Connectivity includes 8 channel audio with optical and coaxial SPDIF, USB 3.0, and display connectivity, which includes DVI, D-Sub, and HDMI with 7.1 channel audio. Available soon, Sapphire is yet to disclose its price.



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[InnocentCriminal]

I was part expecting a white PCB... like the good ol' days.

 

[(FIH) The Don]

was about to say the same ^^

 

[Chomes]

I think this part is wrong in my opinion:
Out of the four expansion slots, two are PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x8 when both are populated) with some sort of manual PCI-E lane switching, and one each of PCI-E x1 and PCI.

What I see in the picture is :
2 PCI-Express 2.0 x16
1 PCI-E X1
1 PCI
AND
1 MINI PCI-E like a laptop, for wireless cards, tv tuners,...

 

[a_ump]

yea...looks wise that mobo is ugly as balls. color scheme reminds me of legos. shoulda made the expansion slots all yellow like the dimm slots.

 

[Hunt3r]

Sapphire investing in motherboard?
very good

 

[(FIH) The Don]

sapphire has been making mb for many many years

 

[Lionheart]

Sapphire makes motherboards

 

[(FIH) The Don]

Ya REALLY

 

[Yukikaze]

If it were white, I'd buy one just to have one.

Been looking for one of their white boards for an oldie build and couldn't find a single one of them.

 

[MilkyWay]

I personally had the Sapphire 790GX it was a DDR2 board as it was AM2+ socket. It was alright was the worlds best clocker pretty much a decent value board. Ended up going with this ASUS in my specs and its a much better.

LOOKS exactly like the 790GX.

 

[eva2000]

hmmm only worry would be quality of bios support

 

[theonedub]

I think this part is wrong in my opinion:
Out of the four expansion slots, two are PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x8 when both are populated) with some sort of manual PCI-E lane switching, and one each of PCI-E x1 and PCI.

What I see in the picture is :
2 PCI-Express 2.0 x16
1 PCI-E X1
1 PCI
AND
1 MINI PCI-E like a laptop, for wireless cards, tv tuners,...

Yup, between the PCIe 16 slots there is a x1 slot and what looks to be a mini PCIe slot as well. Maybe a nice place to stick a MiniPCIe SSD perhaps

 

[Yokozuna]

Rebranded Jetway HA-09

I have a Sapphire 780G AM2+ MATX mb in my HTPC. It's a rebranded Jetway mb as well.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Rebranded Jetway HA-09

I was just going to say that it was a Jetway board

 

[suraswami]

Rebranded Jetway HA-09

I have a Sapphire 780G AM2+ MATX mb in my HTPC. It's a rebranded Jetway mb as well.

I was just going to say that it was a Jetway board

I was also about to say its a Jetway

 

[Hayder_Master]

great cooling but poor slots, need one more pci-e,and pci, also more sata and e-sata

Sapphire makes motherboards

yeah this is not first time

 

[jagd]

Sapphire (and zotac ) subsidiary of pcpartner and pcpartner has long history with mobos.

Sapphire makes motherboards

 

[roast]

I was part expecting a white PCB... like the good ol' days.

+1!! I was gutted when Sapphire stopped producing them. I always wanted a white mobo. Maybe they'll start manufacturing them again in the future???

 

[entropy13]

Sapphire also has an AM3 mini-ITX board (with a green PCB).

 

[WSP]

+1!! I was gutted when Sapphire stopped producing them. I always wanted a white mobo. Maybe they'll start manufacturing them again in the future???

no way you could find a white mobo made by sapphire in these days.
sapphire do not design their own mobo, and that also happens with the bios.dunno with the old sapphire mobos

it's either rebranded Jetway or DFI

like this:

Sapphire PC-AM2RD790 - PURE CrossFireX 790FX:

is a rebranded of DFI Lanparty UT 790FX-M2R (note LANPARTY marking):

Sapphire PI-AM3RS760G:

is a rebranded of Jetway MA3-760GSM (different PCB color, same layout)

 

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

makes sense since DFI is no longer making enthusiast boards, sapphire picked up the back stock.

 

[ToTTenTranz]

The placement for that PCI-Ex 1x is odd to say the least.

What's the point of placing the only PCI-Ex 1x slot next to one of the only places you'll not be able to put anything there (underneath the top 16x slot).

 

[roast]

no way you could find a white mobo made by sapphire in these days.
sapphire do not design their own mobo, and that also happens with the bios.dunno with the old sapphire mobos

What are you talking about?
I'm talking about in the past, sapphire used to make white-pcb motherboards. I wasnt talking about the new ones.

 

[(FIH) The Don]

that is not a sapphire board, its a old AMD/ATI reference board for reviewers