ASUS Crosshair IV Formula review - Introduction

As if the launch of two six-core processors was not enough, AMD today also has updates on their motherboard chipset line-up of products, and quite interesting ones as well.

This review will entail the AMD 890FX chipset, initially to be paired solely with Thuban based processors but obviously intended for the entire AMD Phenom II and Athlon II processors.

Now we were already fond of the 890GX chipset when it got released, the FX chipset however ups the ante even a little more as next to the integration of SATA6G we see something really interesting, a massive increase in PCIe lanes allowing 890FX motherboards to become very flexible in their bandwidth needs versus component usage.

You see, when you pop on more USB controllers, SATA6G controllers and multiple x16 graphics cards, your average motherboards run out of bandwidth real fast as often there are only 16 PCIe links available. Not a huge deal, but if you pop in a nice Radeon HD 5870 you certainly would like it to run over a x16 link, and not a x8 link. As such the FX chipset is aimed at the more enthusiast segment of the AMD motherboard market.

PCI-Express is key in the AMD 890FX release as we get PCIe 42 lanes at our disposal! Next to that, the chipset will be paired with the SB850 which we already covered in the 890GX review, it offers 14 USB 2.0 ports, up-to six SATA 6G ports and an integrated Gigabit Ethernet controller. That is the basis of the 890 FX chipset. It's that kind of flexibility that allows ODMs like ASUS to make little gems motherboards out of that chipset. So today we'll cover that 890FX chipset, but do so by reviewing the all new ASUS Crosshair IV Formula motherboard.

The Crosshair IV Formula is the Mc Daddy of AMD 890FX motherboards, the alpha dog motherboards loaded with features like the aforementioned, but also USB 3.0, automated overclock switches ..and get this four PCIe x16 slots and even core unlock functionality by pressing a button.

The Crosshair IV Formula oozes with features and performance, the six-core Phenom II X6 processor review which you probably just read was overclocked towards 4.1 GHz on a cheapo CPU air-cooler .. based on this motherboard.

All in all we got a thing or two to tell ya .. show ya .. and explain to ya. Head on over to the next page, where we'll head deeply into the AMD 890 FX chipset and the ASUS Crosshair IV Formula motherboard that has the 890FX chipset embedded.

But first have a look at one of the most attractive looking motherboards of all time ...