Is the Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3 the perfect 690G board?

[chucky2]

Just wondering if anyone knew when the Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3 will be coming out, if ever?

To me, as long as you don't need mATX, this looks like a perfect 690G motherboard...

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

I just checked with Gigabyte, and it sounds like the best estimate for this board is May 21st, 2007.... :brokenheart:

AMD/ATI, why were you so late on 690G?!?!?!?!?

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

OCWorkbench has a nice preview of this board...it still looks to be the uber-690G motherboard so far:

Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3H (AMD 690G) mainboard review - Introduction

When this comes out, I'll definitely be getting one. Combined with a cheap X2 CPU, this ought to last well down the road assuming Agena and/or Kuma support (which they better have DAAMIT!!!)

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

Quick follow-up:

It's wierd, but the Realtek ALC889A that this board uses sounds great, but Googling it yields basically no information except in the press release for this board (and it's mATX equivalent).

Even going to Realtek's site and searching on either ALC889A of ALC889 yields nothing.

Guess when the press release said new, they meany really new.

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

Update:

Gigabyte says this board should be available via eTailors the first week of June!

Gigabyte's site was update this weekend/today with this board, so specs direct from Gigabyte are now officially available. For those wondering, it seems to definitely have the 889A, Gigabyte themselves call it out as a feature:

Gigabyte GA-MA69G-S3H on Gigabyte's site

I cannot wait for the first week of June!!!

Chuck

 

[chucky2]

Man, I just read through the manual and this board just does everything...the only thing I'm confused/concerned about is on page 94, section C, which is titled, "Playback of HD DVD and Blu-ray Discs":

In order to get better playback quality, when playing the HD DVD or Blu-ray discs, refer to the recommended system requirements (or better) below.
CPU: AMD AthlonTM 64 X2 Dual-Core processor (4200+)
Memory: Two 1 GB DDR2 800 memory modules with dual channel mode enabled
BIOS Setup: At least 256 MB of Frame Buffer Size (refer to Chapter 2, "BIOS Setup,"
"Advanced BIOS Features," for more information)
Playback software: CyberLink PowerDVD 7.3 (Note: Hardware Acceleration is not supported)

Suitable Resolutions:
Non-protected contents: Windows XP 1920 x 1080p Windows Vista 1920 x 1080p
HD-DVD (MPEG 2, VC1): Windows XP 1920 x 1080i Windows Vista 1280 x 720p
Blu-ray (MPEG 2): Windows XP 1280 x 720p Windows Vista 1280 x 720p

I'm not understanding a.) why 1080p is not supported for all these formats and b.) why 1080p would not be supported for Windows Vista as it would for XP???

Hopefully there'll be a review that covers this board and either answers these questions or sheds light on them...as otherwise this boards looks to do just about anything a non-dualPCIx16Crossfire owner could want (and No, I have no need for Crossfire).

Chuck

EDITS: OK, I give up on making the columns and rows look right...I think anyone viewing and capable of building their own PC will figure it out.

 

[Marinski]

Do you know how much $$ it will be when its out?? I just ordered one of Foxconns, but i may return it for one of these

 

[chucky2]

I think I saw someone post that the pricing structure for the 690-series Gigabyte boards would be $79, $89, and $99...for the 690V mATX, 690G mATX, and 690G ATX.

This would the be the full ATX board of course, so, if they can bring it to us for $99, then that's just an amazing deal IMHO for what you get.

Keep in mind though where I saw that wasn't an official source I don't think, so we'll just have to wait until they're available to see what they're going to be priced at.

Chuck

 

[Marinski]

Its available at ewiz for 88.58. And now i have to return the Foxconn because the fan headers dont work. I wonder if i can just return it and get my money refunded then get this board.

 

[chucky2]

Thanks Marinski for that!

I've been waiting so long for this thing to be available I was going stir crazy!

Just have to wait what will hopefully be a little bit for it to be available on NewEgg or ZipZoomFly and then I can order everything at one place.

If eWiz has it though then that should mean ZZF and/or NewEgg will have it really soon to!

Chuck

 

[yehuda]

Have you guys noticed what type of network controller is used on this board?

block diagram :camera:

Unfortunately it's a PCI device rather than PCI Express.

 

[chucky2]

Hmmm, that's interesting yehuda, I wonder if that's really right, and if so, WTF they did it that way for?

Maybe because they provided the PCIe x4 slot, they didn't have anymore lanes available to have the LAN and Firewire be PCIe?

If so, I think I'd rather ditch the PCIe x4 slot. Having the LAN and the Firewire on the PCIe bus would be much more preferable than the PCI bus.

I wonder though, if someone is running 1Gbps LAN, and taking a Firewire download, and has 2 PCI devices (say a soundcard and a TV tuner), how can the PCI bus support all those devices?

I mean, there's only like 124MB/s real possible bandwidth out of the PCI bus I thought (after taking into account overhead), so how exactly can they really have the LAN and Firewire both on the PCI bus?

Think I'll write Gigabyte and ask, it's worth seeing what they have to say.

Chuck