MSI unveils X58 Eclipse motherboard

Posted at: 11:47am 26th August 2008 by Ben Hardwidge

Eclipse nods to the past with CPU jumper switches and Turbo button, and it also features MSI’s DrMOS VRM and power management system

Now that Intel has revealed some more tantalising info about its forthcoming Core i7 (Nehalem) CPUs, the race is now on for motherboard manufacturers to show off their wares. First Asus showed us the P6T Deluxe, and now MSI has unveiled its new Eclipse X58 motherboard.

Like the Asus board, the Eclipse has six DIMM slots to take advantage of Nehalem’s triple-channel DDR3 memory controller, and it also has some other gizmos to take advantage of Nehalem’s feature set. For a start, there’s a Turbo button next to the Power and Reset switches, which we assume is there to take advantage of Nehalem’s Turbo mode.

The Turbo button isn’t the only nod to the past either; there’s also a set of switches marked CPU_CLK, which looks very similar to the old CPU clock switches of yore, before the days of BIOS overclocking. MSI’s marketing manager, Richard Stewart, explained to Custom PC that this is ‘a pre-set tuning switch for your CPU,’ adding that ‘Nehalem  will have a set of new tuning features for the CPU, and these are to address these news features offered by the chip.’ That’s all the information we have at the moment, but it all looks quite interesting.

The main way in which MSI hopes to differentiate the Eclipse from the competition is with its DrMOS power system, first seen in the company’s P45 motherboards, which features High-C capcacitors. The board has six DrMOS VRMs for the CPU, two for the Northbridge and another two for the QuickPath memory controller inside the CPU. The board also features a six-gear active phase switching (APS) power system, which can either be set up in the BIOS, or using MSI’s GreenPower Windows app.

You’ll have probably noticed a disturbing lack of heatsinks on the photos of the board, but MSI says that this is because it has plans for a brand new Circu-pipe cooling system for the board that’s currently ‘still under wraps.’ Interestingly, the Eclipse also features a very conservative black and blue colour scheme, without a hint of the bright red motherboards and pink and green slots that MSI’s had before. This, according to Richard Stewart, was a very conscious decision that was a ‘response to some feedback from media and customers.’