Foxconn Quantum Force X79 Final Version Pictured

[btarunr]

Foxconn's latest premium gamer-overclocker segment motherboard, the Quantum Force X79, has finally taken shape. Foxconn's Quantum Force motherboards are designed to offer good overclocking features at a great value. The Quantum Force X79 uses a 14-phase VRM to power the LGA2011 "Sandy Bridge-E" processor, plus a 2-phase VRM for the memory. There are four DDR3 DIMM slots, one per memory channel. Expansion slots include three PCI-Express 3.0 x16 (PCI-E1_x16, PCI-E3_x16, and PCI-E4_x16. The second black slot (PCI-E2_x16) is electrical PCI-Express 2.0 x8.

The board is packed with features that help overclockers, starting with triple redundant BIOS, voltage measurement points for manual voltage measurements (with a wide range of voltage domains), manual overclocking buttons on board, power, reset, clear-CMOS buttons, POST speaker, and plenty of fan headers.



In terms of connectivity, there are four each of SATA 6 Gb/s (red) and SATA 3 Gb/s (black) internally, two of the 6 Gb/s ports are driven by an ASMedia-made controller. There are two eSATA 3 Gb/s ports on the rear panel, driven by a JMicron controller. There four USB 3.0 ports (two on the rear-panel, two via header), both sets driven by Renesas-made controllers. Also available are two gigabit Ethernet connections, one of these two are controlled by an Intel-made GbE chipset, the other by a Realtek-made one. To top it off, there's 8+2 channel HD audio with optical and coaxial SPDIF outputs.



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[micropage7]

nice foxconn is return. its been a while we aint hear new stuff from foxconn.
all we had is just sad news bout foxconn workers.
i hope foxconn really back with new and improved features

 

[shb-]

Nice, no active cooling.

p.s.
Those who buy this will hear foxconn worker groans while benchmarking. Muhahahah.

 

[mstenholm]

Nice, no active cooling.

I think I wait to jump to this new platform untill EK and the likes have a water cooling kit ready. There must be a reason to the other manufactures have a fan there. OK looking board.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I'd wait for the chipset revision which fixes the SCU so you get four extra SATA 6Gbps ports...

 

[Steven B]

looks like a nice board!

 

[blibba]

I'd wait for the chipset revision which fixes the SCU so you get four extra SATA 6Gbps ports...

Depends whether you need them.

 

[pr0n Inspector]

Nice, no active cooling.

p.s.
Those who buy this will hear foxconn worker groans while benchmarking. Muhahahah.

So will most members here. Foxconn is huge.

 

[dj-electric]

Others have active coolers on their southbridge for a reason... i can already see the amounts of aftermarket coolers for the X79 chipset

 

[Darkleoco]

I like the look of it but it is concerning that this is the first X79 I have seen without fans on it >.>

 

[Freedom4556]

Others have active coolers on their southbridge for a reason... i can already see the amounts of aftermarket coolers for the X79 chipset

I like the look of it but it is concerning that this is the first X79 I have seen without fans on it >.>

Either of two things seems to have happened with X79
1. The chip barely crossed a TDP threshold and most manufacturers are being seriously conservative about it
or 2. Problems with Patsburg are worse than Intel is claiming and high TDP (and thus active sinks) is just one small symptom of the larger issues that resulted in the delay of Patsburg-D and disappearance of SAS ports from X79 boards

Either way the Buldozer farce would've been worse had SandyBridge-E been released on time, so I guess Intel is just waiting to capitalize on holiday shopping at this point.

 

[mediasorcerer]

4 sata 3, and 3 pcie3 x16 = handy , the layout seems pretty well thought out far as i can see in the picture.

 

[buggalugs]

I like the look of it but it is concerning that this is the first X79 I have seen without fans on it >.>

There are plenty of X79 boards without fans like the Asus X79 Deluxe and nearly all of the gigabyte boards dont have fans.

 

[xBruce88x]

eh... the last foxconn board i had caught fire... specifically the one in my cpu-z sig.

 

[Neuromancer]

Miss my bloodrage, had someone mod it for me, and they killed it *sigh.

 

[Neuromancer]

There are plenty of X79 boards without fans like the Asus X79 Deluxe and nearly all of the gigabyte boards dont have fans.

Um ASUS ran the R3F without fans too, I had to use fans laying on the heatsinks to clock it at all. And I tend to bench in low ambients and not in cases.

 

[Steven B]

You don't need a 6 CFm fan pushing around air for a chipset, not this chipset at least.

 

[Neuromancer]

You don't need a 6 CFm fan pushing around air for a chipset, not this chipset at least.

Oh cool, did not realize you had one already

this is an X platform not a P platform. until it is in my hands, I will not dismiss the idea it needs at least some airflow. But if you have one, then thank you for your input

EDIT: TBH.. finding the whole VRM heatsink issue laughable on some of the X79 boards I am seeing. Less cooling than a Sandybridge based mobo, but support an octo core based on the same architecture? I know my 2600K sucks down some watts at 5.5 GHz. Cant imagine waht a octocore unit will need.

then again I did see someone post a pic of bulldozer overclocking wehre they melted the EPS cable.

 

[Steven B]

To be honest i will have a system for this platform setup this weekend, and if i find otherwise I will change my statement, but from what i saw with X58 is that raising the voltage to the IOH really helped a lot for certain BLCK OCes and SLI/CF. For Z68 and X79 i don't see any need to raise the PCh voltage. For this i expect the PCh for X79 to run no hotter than Z68, if not cooler. If intel was to raise the TDP/TDc on their PCh they would be moving in the opposite direction if they didn't add any major features, as the X79 PCh doesn't seem to offer too much more than the Z68, there would be no reason to have it have a higher TDP/TDC.

But if having the fan there really does help, then i would think other manufacturers would do it (or at least have more beefier heatsinks), especially foxconn, did you see some of their chipset cooling for X58? They even included a series of attachments for the chipset, one for a waterblock, one for a fan, passive, and get this a DICE container for the X58 IOH. Id expect foxconn to include something if it would help/was needed.

I do have a friend who currently has the R4E and says there is some odd shroud on the PCh portion of the chipset, maybe the fact that ASUS decided to do more low profile this time instead of fancy shapes with previous ROG boards, they decreased the surface area, and thus need a fan. of course it could just be an enhancement to have the board run cooler as a whole too to extend product lifetime.

 

[[H]@RD5TUFF]

No one should buy this out of principle.

 

[ICEEXOL]

Hi,

Detailed reviews: http://www.pckoloji.com/foxconn-quantumian-1-x79-anakart/