[Kal-EL]

msi revs up p55 lineup with sata 6 gbps / usb 3.0 motherboard
msi decided to rev up its high-end socket lga-1156 motherboard lineup with the new p55-gd85. A part of this board's design seems to have been inspired from the asus p7p55d premium, in which a plx pex8608 pci-express bridge chip has been used over the pci-express 1.1 x4 link from the p55 pch to give out pci-express 2.0 x1 connections, which then drive the nec d720200f1 usb 3.0 and marvell 88se9123 sata 6 gbps controllers on their optimal interface speeds of pci-e 2.0 x1.

The cpu is powered by a 10-phase vrm, which is wired to four ddr3 dimm slots. Expansion slots include two pci-express x16 (electrical x16/nc or x8/x8 depending on how they're populated), two pci, and two pci-e x1. One of these two is color-coded blue, and could be wired to the pex8608, occupying its third port. Apart from the six sata 3 gbps ports the pch provides, and the sata 6 gbps controller with its two ports, an additional controller provides two more sata 3 gbps ports and an ide connector. Other features are standard issues for an msi motherboard in this class: Notably the oc genie feature, centralized manual voltage measurement points, and support for both nvidia sli and ati crossfirex.

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msi

[DrNip]

I drooled over this mobo a couple times today. I wish I would have gotten a AM3 while I had the chance.