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Biostar claims Core i5 runs DDR3-1333

Published on 9th March 2009 by Richard Swinburne

Biostar's next generation Core i5 motherboard.

CeBIT 2009: Biostar hit a few design wins for its P45 products, providing an excellent price-performance ratio with its superb Overclocking, and we can only hope the same is true with its next generation P55 products for Intel's upcoming Core i5 CPUs.

Biostar mentions in its descriptive blurb that the standard memory speed for Core i5 CPUs is 1,333MHz, but it supports 1,600 to 2,000MHz via OC functions (we assume are either Intel XMP or part of the BIOS).

With twelve phase power (8+4) around CPU socket, dual channel DDR3, plenty of space around the CPU socket and a set of features to match the Gigabyte P55 product, Biostar has everything setup to directly compete.

There are slight difference though: the PCI-Express slot layout is a simple two GPU CrossFire setup, and Biostar doesn’t mention Nvidia SLI support so we presume it's not included. With two slots between the cards for extra cooling room this could be a favourable design, and between sits a PCI-Express x1 and x4 slot, while below are a couple of PCI slots: all good here then.

What perked our interest is that Biostar has not included any display outputs on the rear I/O. Whether this is intentional “feature” or just an early sample we’re not sure, why design and build a PCB to not include them? No enthusiast will want to use Intel integrated graphics, so perhaps Biostar is tuning this board's feature set for overclockers and gamers that cannot afford Core i7? We can only hope so.

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6 Comments

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g3n3tiX 9th March 2009, 12:41

Well as core i7 920 are memory unlocked (and QPI, for the moment) as well, I don't see where the "faster memory" is.

Icy EyeG 9th March 2009, 12:46

What's that chip just below the CPU? Is that a PCIe bridge?

Slyr7.62 9th March 2009, 19:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Icy EyeG
What's that chip just below the CPU? Is that a PCIe bridge?

or perhaps it's the NV chip that gives more pci-express lanes, but SLI wasn't mentioned so I'm not sure.

Bindibadgi 9th March 2009, 21:14

No it's a very pre-production board so I think it was just the clock gen.

wuyanxu 9th March 2009, 23:03

it's never bad to have an output if there is an integrated controller. you never know when you are going to run hackintosh off it :) (Intel ones are best supported i've been told)

Splynncryth 10th March 2009, 01:49

Will all the new boards have integrated integrated graphics, or will it be like other chipsets where some versions have the controller and others don't?