14 DAY TRIAL // Even though the Kaveri accelerated processing units (APUs) from Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) won't be available until next year, motherboards capable of handling them are already coming out.
And it seems that they aren't even coming out one by one. Instead, companies, or at least some of them, are releasing whole product series compatible with them.
ASRock is one such company, having revealed five motherboards equipped with the FM2+ socket.
On the high end, there is the mighty FM2A88X Extreme6+, while the other edge of the spectrum is determined by the FM2A88X-ITX+ mini-ITX.
We'll get to that one later though. For now, we'll focus a bit on the FM2A88X Extreme6+, since this is the so-called flagship.
First off, PCI Express 3.0 technology is supported. Up to FM2, only 2.0 slots were possible to include. It was the one area where AMD was one clear generation behind Intel.
In addition to PCI Express Gen. 3.0 support, the FM2A88X Extreme6+ also gets two DDR3 DIMM memory slots with up to 2600+ MHz support.
Also, Japan premium gold capacitors are used, along with a Digi Power and 8+2 power phase design, plus Purity Sound 115 dB audio technology (a Reatek ALC1150 audio chip brings it to the fold, along with two TI NE5532 amplifiers, one for headset amplifier and the other for differential amplifier).
Furthermore, the mainboard boasts PCB Isolate Shielding plus DTS Connect, an EMI Shielding Cover, and four video outputs: DVI, D-Sub, HDMI, DisplayPort.
Finally, the X-Boost overclocking technology will be included, which allows the whole system to overclock with a single click (15.77% performance boost).
The other motherboards in the ASRock FM2+ Lineup are FM2A88X Extreme4+, FM2A88M Extreme4+, FM2A88 Pro+, FM2A88M-HD+ and FM2A88X-ITX+. The last one is the mini-ITX model, featuring Home Cloud, HDMI-in technology, a mini-PCI Express slot for Wi-Fi cards, and 7.1 channel audio, plus onboard D-Sub, DVI-D and HDMI connectors.
Prices weren't included in ASRock's press release, sadly.