Equipment Used

For testing AMD sent us an ASUS M3A78-T Motherboard, ATI Radeon HD4870 Graphics card and a Phenom II X4 CPU (Black) which was running at 3GHZ and is unlocked for overclocking.

We then added ourselves a 160GB SATA 5400rpm Hard Disk (Running Vista), a SCYTHE CPU cooler and 4GB of DDR 2 667Mhz memory (Samsung).

The above was then tested against our MESH Test PC which featured the same memory and graphics card but was running with an Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 CPU (2.4Ghz), Asus P5N-E-SLI Mobo and a 500GB 7200RPM SATA Hard disk instead.

Motherboard

The Processor itself utilises an AM2+ socket, so in theory your existing AMD motherboard may be able to handle the CPU with a BIOS upgrade. But for testing the ASUS board that we were sent is geared up to support the CPU from the off and we have to admit for around the £100 mark it certainly boasts a wealth of modern features.

Specs

• Chipset: AMD 790GX
• Form Factor: ATX
• Dimensions (WxDxH): 30.5 cm x 24.5 cm
• Chipset Type: AMD 790GX / AMD SB750
• Multi-Core Support: Dual-Core / Triple-core / Quad-core
• Max Bus Speed: 2600 MHz
• Processor: Socket AM2+
• Compatible Processors: Athlon 64, Sempron, Athlon 64 FX, Athlon 64 X2, Athlon X2, Phenom X4, Phenom FX, Phenom X3
• 64-bit Processors Compatibility: Built-in
• 3 PCI Express Slots
• RAM: 0 MB (installed) / 16 GB (max)
• Supported RAM Technology: DDR2 SDRAM (Has native DDR2 1066 Support)
• Supported RAM Integrity Check: Non-ECC, ECC
• Storage Controller: ATA-133, Serial ATA-300 (RAID), eSATA port
• USB Ports Configuration: 12 x USB
• Storage Ports Configuration: 1 x ATA, 5 x SATA, 1 x eSATA
• FireWire Ports Configuration: 2 x FireWire
• Graphics Controller: ATI Radeon HD 3300 - Shared Video Memory (UMA), HDMI, DVI and D-Sub connectors.
• Audio Output: Sound card - 7.1 channel surround
• Networking: Network adapter - Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, Gigabit Ethernet
• Manufacturer Warranty: 3 years warranty
• Support for ATI Hybrid CrossFireX - Allows the system to combine the onboard card with the dedicated PCI Express card.

Software Included with Mobo - Small example

• Norton Internet Security 2008
• AMD Overdrive utility for overclocking
• Marvell Yukon Virtual Cable Tester that diagnoses and reports LAN cable faults.
• ASUS Cool'n' Quiet - Adjusts CPU Fan automatically to limit noise
• Cyberlink PowerBackup
• Ulead PhotoImpacy Image editing software
• ASUS MyLogo 2 for designing your own boot logo
• ASUS PC Probe II - monitors PC
• ASUS Suite for quickly launching AI Gear2 (4 Preset performance boost settings), Booster (Overclock CPU in Windows instead of BIOS), NAP (Minimise Power consumption)  and Q-Fan2 utilities (Set performance of the CPU or chassis fan) -
• ASUS Express Gate - Instant on-environment that allows access to the Internet from initial PC Boot.

CPU Specs

• True Quad-core Desktop Processor
• 3.00GHz clock speed
• 2MB L2 cache
• 6MB L3 cache
• DDR2-1066 support
• 45nm process technology
• Integrated Memory Controller
• Fast Hypertransport 3.0 technology
• Cool & Quiet v3.0
• True Multi-core Processing
• Direct Connect Architecture
• Integrated Dual-Channel Memory Controller with up to
• AMD Balanced Smart Cache
• AMD Wide Floating Point Accelerator
• AMD Memory Optimizer Technology
• AMD Digital Media Xpress 2.0
• AMD Virtualization with Rapid Virtualization Indexing