Biostar Intros the A6N-5100 "Kabini" Motherboard

[btarunr]

Biostar introduced the A6N-5100 mini-ITX motherboard. A slight upgrade over the company's A6N-5000 from two years ago, the new board integrates AMD A4-5100 APU based on the "Kabini" silicon, which has the chops to outperform Intel's Celeron "Braswell" processors. The A4-5100 integrates a quad-core CPU ticking at 1.60 GHz, and AMD Radeon GCN graphics. The board features two DDR3 SO-DIMM slots, supporting up to 16 GB of memory, one PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slot, two USB 3.0 ports, HDMI display output, and storage connectivity that includes two SATA 6 Gb/s ports. The company didn't reveal pricing.



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[Toothless]

Seems like it's weaker than the 5350, and at a near 0.5ghz downclock. HTPC maybe or storage server with a sata pci card.

 

[Assimilator]

Seems like it's weaker than the 5350, and at a near 0.5ghz downclock. HTPC maybe or storage server with a sata pci card.

This one has a massive advantage over Intel's FCBGA boards in that it has a full-length PCIe x16 slot, not a measly x1. Like you said, perfect for a home storage server with a dedicated RAID card.

 

[Toothless]

This one has a massive advantage over Intel's FCBGA boards in that it has a full-length PCIe x16 slot, not a measly x1. Like you said, perfect for a home storage server with a dedicated RAID card.

So does my 5350 build.

 

[londiste]

This one has a massive advantage over Intel's FCBGA boards in that it has a full-length PCIe x16 slot, not a measly x1. Like you said, perfect for a home storage server with a dedicated RAID card.

physical x16, it only has 4 lanes of pci-e 2.0
more of an fyi, point still definitely stands and i think intel's competitors have 4 lanes much total while 5350/5100 have 8 lanes total.

 

[marinexu]

"The board features two DDR3 SO-DIMM slots" but they look like DDR3 DIMM not SO-DIMM

 

[Arnulf]

Hello Biostar, this is year 2013 calling. I want my APUs back!

 

[john_]

Pity that Biostar tries to do business with what ever hardware it can get for peanuts. I bet AMD didn't knew what to do with those Kabinis and the A68 chipsets, so it sold them at a small discount, like 80% discount.

 

[hojnikb]

Dear Biostar,

How about making a mitx board with stoney ridge ? Now _that_ would be killer for htpcs

 

[hojnikb]

Pity that Biostar tries to do business with what ever hardware it can get for peanuts. I bet AMD didn't knew what to do with those Kabinis and the A68 chipsets, so it sold them at a small discount, like 80% discount.

Kabini doesn't have a chipset, it's a SoC design.

 

[john_]

Kabini doesn't have a chipset, it's a SoC design.

The funny part here is that I have an AM1 in the living room.
Yeah, forgot that and came to wrong conclusions when looking at that A68N in the model number.

 

[Cataclysm_ZA]

Was someone at Biostar sleeping on the "Release this product!" button? Kabini is really old at this point.

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

"The company didn't reveal pricing."

Probably about -$20. They will pay you to take these things, just so biostar can write of such a horrible investment.

I mean, kabini in 2017? Really?

 

[FreedomEclipse]

I see the A6N and it takes me back to 2005

 

[Aquinus]

The board features two DDR3 SO-DIMM slots

Tell me, do those slots look like SO-DIMM slots?

 

[kruk]

So, AMD: How about releasing some faster CPUs for all us AM1 owners? Preferably die shrinked ...

 

[Random Murderer]

Seems like it's weaker than the 5350, and at a near 0.5ghz downclock. HTPC maybe or storage server with a sata pci card.

Exactly my thoughts, this would be perfect for a NAS using a SATA card/HBA or as a PFSense router using a multi-port NIC.

 

[hojnikb]

That things needs a bigger heatsink, this is too small for 15W without some serious throttling.

 

[hojnikb]

So, AMD: How about releasing some faster CPUs for all us AM1 owners? Preferably die shrinked ...

AM1 is dead sadly.

 

[dj-electric]

Holy Hell BIOSTAR has horrible timing.
This company is completely out of touch. "ATi Radeon".

 

[silentbogo]

Sadly, this ain't any better than what we had before....
I actually downgraded my mini-server to Zotac M880G-ITX.
Same performance as much newer N3150 at only twice the power (I think for Turion K625 it's somewhere near ~25-30W).
The only downfall is very slow RAM, but it has 6[!!!] SATA-III ports.

 

[Assimilator]

I see the A6N and it takes me back to 2005

I actually still have one of those boards... not in use though.

 

[eidairaman1]

Console replacement?

 

[silentbogo]

Console replacement?

not really, unless you like to play NES, Sega or Wii via emulators, or Steam indie crapware. CPU is way too weak.
Perfect for HTPC/Streaming. Or, as mentioned before, fully functional NAS with hardware RAID (most boards of this class only have PCIe x1 slot, which limits it to x2 SATA from chipset and 2-4 more with some limited software RAID functionality).
Even older Q5000 could handle 4K playback flawlessly.

I actually have an AsRock QC5000-ITX somewhere in the donor pile... wondering if I should order a replacement CPU from china, cause N3150 is not enough for me anymore...

 

[eidairaman1]

not really, unless you like to play NES, Sega or Wii via emulators, or Steam indie crapware. CPU is way too weak.
any Xbox 360 or PS3 emulators
Perfect for HTPC/Streaming. Or, as mentioned before, fully functional NAS with hardware RAID (most boards of this class only have PCIe x1 slot, which limits it to x2 SATA from chipset and 2-4 more with some limited software RAID functionality).
Even older Q5000 could handle 4K playback flawlessly.

I actually have an AsRock QC5000-ITX somewhere in the donor pile... wondering if I should order a replacement CPU from china, cause N3150 is not enough for me anymore...