14 DAY TRIAL // Micro-ATX motherboards based on the Intel H61 chipset are a great buy for users not wanting to spend an arm and a leg for a Sandy Bridge system, and Gigabyte has just introduced a new LGA 1155 solution that should deliver on that promise, the H61M-USB3-B3.
Since this is an entry level offering, the motherboard doesn't packs so many features as its more expensive siblings, but users will still get USB 3.0 support as well as Gigabyte's own Ultra Durable design.
This means that the motherboard uses only solid state capacitors, that are supposed to have a longer operating life.
In addition, the board features six phase CPU power, two DIMM sockets, that can support up to 16GB of DDR3 memory, and four SATA 3Gbps ports paired together with another two 6Gbps ports driven by a Marvell 88SE9172 controller.
Graphics wise, users can opt for the Sandy Bridge built-in graphics or can add a dedicated GPU thanks to the PCI Express x16 slot.
This is also accompanied by two PCI-E x1 slots as well as by a regular PCI slot, quite an impressive list for a micro-ATX board.
Moving to the board's I/O panel, we get all the basic ports and connectors that one would expect from such a motherboard, including DVI and VGA video outputs, four USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports, a Gigabit Ethernet port, a pair of PS/2 ports and 5.1-channel audio thanks to the high-grade Realtek ALC889 HD audio codec.
An HDMI output is also provided, so users interested in building an HTPC system can go for the H61M-USB3-B3 without any worries.
The H61 chipset is destined to be used in budget Sandy Bridge systems and should be a great choice for users who will buy cheaper Pentium CPUs.
No information regarding pricing was provided by Gigabyte, but the H61M-USB3-B3 is expected to hit the streets in the coming weeks. (via TechPowerUp)