Sapphire Pure Black 990FX Motherboard Review - PAGE 1

Carl Poirier - Monday, September 24th, 2012 Like Share

The AMD FX processors have drastically dropped in price since launch, with the flagship product now selling for $170. This is due to the fact that the FX series has a hard time competing with CPU offerings from Intel, namely the Ivy Bridge and even Sandy Bridge generations. The FX processor isn't such a bad choice at the new price point, though. The lower-tier models in the same family are also quite affordable and can make for a fully-featured gaming rig or workstation.

Meanwhile Sapphire has something in store for the enthusiast AMD platform; it's the Pure Black 990FX, a high-end motherboard that can run all AM3 and AM3+ processors. Before everyone gets excited though, it's important to mention that for a good while, the board has only been available in Europe; it's unclear why North American retailers do not stock them.

Specifications
CPU	Support AMD Socket AM3+ FX / AM3 Phenom II / Athlon II / Sempron 100 series processors
Chipset	AMD™ 990FX + AMD™ SB950 Chipset
BIOS	AMI BIOS, 16Mb Flash ROM, Dual-BIOS
Memory	16 GB Max. Dual Channel 240 pins DDR3 up to 1866/1600MHz, non-ECC, Unbuffered memory
Expansion Slots	2 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots 2 x PCI Express 2.0 x8 slots 2 x PCI Express 2.0 x4 slots
Storage	9 x Serial ATA III 6Gb/s connectors Supports HDDs with RAID 0, 1,5,10 functions Supports HDDs with RAID 0, 1 functions
Audio	Realtek ALC892 HD Audio CODEC with 8-Channel
Ethernet LAN	Dual Marvell 88E8057 PCI-Express Gigabit LAN
Rear Panel I/O	8 x USB 2.0 port 2 x USB 3.0 port 1 x SPDIF Coaxial OUT 1 x Audio I / O ports 1 x SPDIF Optical Out 1 x Supporting Bluetooth® 2.1+ EDR by Atheros AR3011 1 x e-SATA port PS/2 KB/MS combo port Dual RJ- 45 Gigabit LAN with ESD
Internal I/O	4 x USB 2.0 headers 4 pins CPU PWM Fan connectors 3 Pin Chassis Fan connectors 24-pin ATX Power connector 8-pin ATX 12V Power connector Control (Front) panel headers 4-pin ATX 12V Power connector 2 x USB 3.0 headers Audio I/O (Front) header SPDIF out header Power Button Reset Button CMOS clear Button Dual BIOS select switch with indicator LED
Form Factor	ATX, Size 304x244mm
OS Support	Windows 7 (32/64bit)

Specifications are courtesy of Sapphire @ http://www.sapphiretech.com/presentation/product/?cid=2&gid=1089&sgid=1099&pid=1128&psn=&lid=1&leg=0

next: Closer Look »

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Article Index

1.	Introduction & Specifications
2.	Closer Look
3.	Test Setup, Benchmarks & Overclocking
4.	SiSoft Sandra
5.	Handbrake & POV-Ray
6.	7-Zip & Cinebench
7.	PCMark 7 & HDTune
8.	Far Cry 2 & Colin McRae DiRT 2
9.	3DMark 2011 & Power Consumption
10.	Conclusion

Comments

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hbn Sep 25, 12

Would've thought it'd be time that PCIE 3.0 slots start featuring on AMD boards. I know that is based on the chipset used but all new graphics cards now will be PCIE 3.0, and not using that means they're immediately out of date.

Seems like high end boards are more of a statement to make rather than have that much of an impact upon performance.

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