ASUS is the first company to present an update program for its Socket AM3 motherboard before AMD’s launch of the new processor architecture Bulldozer. The company has revealed that it is has ten or os new motherboards in the ASUS M5A series will support Bulldozer from day one.
AMD will launch the Zambezi family in Q2, based on Bulldozer, taking aim for the performance market. Together with the Northern Islands family of GPUs (Radeon HD 6000) and the new 900 series of chipset AMD will launch the Scorpion platform.
AMD has long claimed that its new AMD FX processor family requires a new AMD 900 chipset to make full use of the new Bulldozer architecture. Though the new processors are pin-compatible with Socket AM3, something which ASUS has taken advantage of. The company has released BIOS updates (still in beta) for its AMD 890FX and AMD 890GX motherboards that increase the processor support to Socket AM3+ models.
ASUS, the worldwide leader in motherboard design and sales, today announced the release of the industry’s first AM3+ CPU enabled motherboard solution based on the existing AMD 8-Series Chipsets. Current owners of an AM3-based board* can make their AMD 8-Series motherboards compatible with the latest AM3+ CPUs with a simple BIOS** update from the official ASUS website.
AMD 890FX/SB850:
- *Crosshair IV Extreme
- *Crosshair IV Formula
- *M4A89TD PRO/USB3
- *M4A89TD PRO
AMD 890GX/SB850:
- *M4A89GTD PRO/USB3
- *M4A89GTD PRO
*Motherboards than support AM3+ processors through BIOS update
Ahead ASUS will also launch a new family of AMD 800 motherboards all supporting Socket AM3+ from factory. ASUS M5A series will have the following 10 members.
AMD 880G
- M5A88-V EVO
- M5A88-M EVO
- M5A88-M
AMD 870
- M5A87
AMD 760G
- M5A78L
- M5A78L LE
- M5A78L-M/USB3
- M5A78L-M PLUS
- M5A78L-M LE
- M5A78L-M LX
Exactly what and which functionality AMD will add to the 9 series of chipset is uncertain, but according to the manufacturer’s own tests ASUS’ updated 8 series motherboards will work flawlessly with AMD’s new Bulldozer processors.
AMD will launch the FX series in Q2 2011. The processors will have 4 to 8 CPU cores and go up against Intel Sandy Bridge in the mid-range and performance markets.
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