AMD Preps am3 motherboard lineup.

[chew*]

Now if any tier 1 companies want to make a winner here's what they need to do.

4 usb back I/O, ditch the onboard graphics, 1 1394 fire wire will suffice I/O not necessary.

Additonal USB with todays USB devices a total of 10 total is not absurd

Ditch 1 IDE and Floppy connections *EDIT* 1 IDE Would be necessary to keep customers with existing quality peripherals.

Make the cpu socket clear of obstructions. *edit* optional mounting holes for optional orientation of aftermarket cooling.

Beef up the power scheme.*Edit* quality passive cooling all around

*edit* clean power, if you need an example - reference ati manta or grouper which i'm sure can even be improved upon.

6 or more sata mounted sideways off the edge of the board.

Make sure that installing ram is not impeded by having a card installed in PCI X 1.
*EDIT* Make sure ram is spaced taking oversized coolers in mind so that taller ram modules can be used without interference

*EDIT* Gigabyte lan

Plenty of PCI E slots, 1 additional x16 PCI X slot with as much space as possible between the 2 x16PCI X slots, and if they feel the need to use a regular PCI slot stick it at the bottom. *Edit* Ensuring that at least one PCI and PCIe slot will not be blocked when using 2 Dual slot vid cards.

Well placed auxillary power connectors

Stay away from the bold colors, a black board with white slots would work wonders or even all black or white with black slots.

I would personally ditch ps/2 connections. who uses a ps2 mouse or keyboard anymore.......*edit* 1 Ps/2 for keyboard may be necessary as USB still has some issues especially for new installs, acess to bios and wake from KB.

Power and reset buttons built onto the motherboard!!!!!!!!!!! very little space and cost.......

If asus is reading this an OC palm!!!!!!!!!!!

Azalia audio is ok, most will have they're own soundcard.

!!!*EDIT*!!! Tweaking/OC options, These are a must for a enthusiast board, manta reference and DFI NF4 Ultra D ( although I hated it ) would be a good guide of what offered great tweaking/OC options............IMHO a good board will survive the utmost abuse and is more than capable of killing a cpu if used wrong.............IF you can't kill a cpu then you aren't pushing the max limits of a CPU....
Have i missed anything.

[chew*]

Last time i checked this is november 2007, And i'm still searching for possible sneak peaks of an AM3 reference design. If the web doesn't yield anything I will try resort to a few of "my people" It does give us an overview of what the motherboard makers can choose to do with the platform, If enough noise is made we may get what we want. It's worked before.

[Morgoth Bauglir]

Last time i checked this is november 2007,

A year has passed since you last checked, apparently.

[chew*]

A year has passed since you last checked, apparently.

OOps got my year wrong, anyway I found it under new news at a few sites.

[Morgoth Bauglir]

OOps got my year wrong, anyway I found it under new news at a few sites.

Well, being younger by a year wasn't necessarily bad, you know

[dinos22]

one thing i like about AMD is their upgradeability feature

i remember my good old Asus (A7V133) that ran a 800MHz Athlon and then later upgraded to 1.7GHz Palomino with some beta bioses

that setup is STILL working. My father in law got the upgrade from my downgrade .

[cbjaust]

>><<
Have i missed anything.

I'd like to see an option to mount bolt through coolers like the Thermalright Ultra 120 extreme in both orientations so that you could clear tall memory modules and not be restricted in which dimm slots you can use or which memory you can use.

With a TRUE on the 790FXB-M2RSH I can't run dual channel with tall RAM like my G.Skill PI kit and on my Fatal1ty AN9 32X with its DIMM channels paired up I an just able to run the tall G.Skill PI ram in dual channel - but the TRUE causes the first module to lean into the second. It's a tight fit but it works - just.

Cheers

[chew*]

Thats actually a very good and valid point. I had originally planned on using dominators in my build but my OCZ cooler interferes with tall ram.......

[Sparky]

Well I guess I'm weird, I want 1 IDE channel I have a good solid dual format dual layer IDE DVD burner and no reason to replace it

If they were to ditch IDE though, then give at least 6 SATA. 4 won't cut it with no IDE!

I want at least 1 PCI slot that won't get blocked by double height graphics cards for my Audigy 2 ZS. Again, it works great (with Daniel_K's drivers) so no desire to find a replacement.

6 USB ports on the rear IO panel is nice, but 4 will do.

Must have gigabit ethernet!

Black boards are

[chew*]

Edited also valid points.

I kind of like the placement of the NB on that reference 790, sort of out of the way.

Does anyone agree disagree that 4 PCI X is overkill?

[Jaivan]

Does anyone agree disagree that 4 PCI X is overkill?

Yeah 4 is overkill and since you cant use 4 dual slot cards its useless.
I prefer the DFI 790FX layout much better with the 3 pcie.

[Daveburt714]

Does anyone agree disagree that 4 PCI X is overkill?

Personally I think Xfire & SLI are both overkill (but I'm not a hardcore gamer). At the rate VC's advance, there will probably be a better single slot solution within the next 6 months, that costs less than 2 cards...

I agree with ya though chew*... I would be more tempted to buy a board with 2/16x slots, 2/4x slots and 2/PCI slots.

Maybe I'm the exception...

[possessed]

Well I guess I'm weird, I want 1 IDE channel I have a good solid dual format dual layer IDE DVD burner and no reason to replace it

If they were to ditch IDE though, then give at least 6 SATA. 4 won't cut it with no IDE!

I want at least 1 PCI slot that won't get blocked by double height graphics cards for my Audigy 2 ZS. Again, it works great (with Daniel_K's drivers) so no desire to find a replacement.

6 USB ports on the rear IO panel is nice, but 4 will do.

Must have gigabit ethernet!

Black boards are

Yes, 1 IDE channel is a must have, I have a Plextor 716A DVD burner and another Plextor Premium Cd Burner. Those are the best you can have not going to change because they don't put 1 ide.

Also I prefer to use ps2 keyboard and mouse connectivity, feels more stable to me. And I then I can have plenty of spare usb ports so I can connect my 5 usb pens all at one time .

has for the floppy that one could go, but I'm certain some people would need it also (I have an usb floppy drive to use in case I need it)