Asus Showcases Thunderbolt Riser Card

Asus launched their Z77 boards a few months back, and if you have been notice the motherboard properly you will find a TB_HEADER. This header is used to connect to a riser card which is sold separately. To date there is only two asus motherboards which has native thunderbolt ports. 

Asus announced the thunderbolt riser card a Computex. This riser card is holding the Cactus Ridge 2C chip and requires a PCI-E X4 and a motherboard which has the header (refer the chart above). To be able to use the riser card you must connect the ThunderboltEX to the internal header of the motherboard this is so that the it can send/receive signalling information (for hot plug and pray events) from the motherboard BIOS, the header is powered so it also serves as power for the riser card. There is two ports on the ThunderboltEX riser card, one of it is the thunderbolt/mini display port and the other is a full size display port. The reason there is a display port is to receive display port signals from the motherboard so video out can be supported via the thunderbolt/mini display port.

If you think that 1 thunderbolt port is not enough asus has gotten ready another riser card which has two thunderbolt ports. This riser card is using the top of the line Intel DSL3510 Cactus Ridge 4C host controller. Like its similar single port sibling this riser card will need to be plugged in to the motherboard TB_HEADER for sending/receiving signalling information (for hot plug and pray events) from the motherboard BIOS and also additional power. This riser card has 2 thunderbolt/ mini display ports and 2 displays ports so that it receive display port signals from the motherboard.

Vr-Zone was at the Asus computex booth and they noticed that all of the AM3+ motherboards for Bulldozer FX/Phenom II processors have been refreshed. So they asked the product manager about details about the new refresh and they were answered " meet windows 8 WHQL requirements " without any major changes. Then they looked at the ROG Crosshair V Formula-Z (revised C5F), which was located at the bottom of a glass case. From what they know, the memory overclock capabilities of the board have been fine-tuned and storage options buffed up to two internal SATA ports and another eSATA and the onboard sound solution was also bumped to the Supreme FX III. And located below the lowest PCI-E slot is a thunderbolt header labeled TB_HEADER, which is to be paired up with their Thunderbolt EX riser cards.This can only mean that thunderbolt will be available in future Asus AMD motherboards.

The Crosshair V Formula-Z

Sabertooth 990FX R2.0

Source: Vr-Zone, Vr-Zone, Engadget 

Like our Facebook Page and Follow our Google Plus Page Please Subscribe for more updates (Button Located at the right side of the page)

Asus P8Z77-VPremium and P8Z77-VPro/Thunderbolt Motherboard Launched

PRESS RELEASE

Further demonstrating its market leading innovation, ASUS has announced the launch of its P8Z77-V PREMIUM motherboard - the flagship of the P8Z77 Series and the first Intel certified motherboard in the market to offer the latest Thunderbolt connection interface. The PREMIUM designation has been reserved for only the best motherboards with the latest technologies, and the P8Z77-V PREMIUM maintains this standard. In addition to the onboard Thunderbolt connection on the P8Z77-V PREMIUM, ASUS also offers the same technology on the P8Z77-V PRO/THUNDERBOLT to give consumers a wider range of choices.


"Intel and Asus have worked closely on the implementation of Thunderbolt technology onto Asus motherboards," said Jason Ziller, Intel's Director of Thunderbolt Marketing. "The P8Z77-V PREMIUM is the first Thunderbolt certified motherboard in the industry, a testament to its solid design and compatibility."

Thunderbolt and the latest technologies on board
The ASUS P8Z77-V PREMIUM is the first Thunderbolt motherboard to be certified by Intel, showing its strength in the industry. Thunderbolt is a new, high-speed I/O technology designed for performance, simplicity and flexibility, with lightning fast transfer speeds that are twice that of USB 3.0 and up to 20 times faster than USB 2.0. It offers simultaneous bi-directional, 10 Gbps transfer speeds over a single cable, with the flexibility to daisy-chain up to six Thunderbolt devices with a single connection for a clutter-free computing experience. Users can connect multiple Thunderbolt-enabled external storage drives to a Thunderbolt-enabled display and transfer files while watching HD movies, all without experiencing any lag.

Strength through cooperation
With its long history of working with high tech vendors, ASUS is able to show its strength and commitment to innovation with a close relationship to three of the leading brands currently producing products with Thunderbolt technology, Elgato, LaCie, and PROMISE.


"Elgato is delighted to work with ASUS to bring the world's first portable Thunderbolt drive to Windows," says Markus Fest, Elgato's CEO. "The powerful combination of ASUS' new PREMIUM board technology and the Elgato Thunderbolt SSD dramatically outperforms state-of-the-art portable USB 3.0 or eSATA drives."


"LaCie is pleased to work with ASUS to showcase the power of Thunderbolt technology in a Windows environment," said Erwan Girard, Business Unit Manager for Professional Solutions, LaCie. "Our solutions will deliver the unprecedented speeds and advantages of this technology to PC demanding users, especially those working in digital media applications who continually strive for more performance."


PROMISE is a leading supplier of sophisticated RAID storage solutions catering to customers from the enterprise to SMB, as well as SOHO and digital home applications. They currently offer the world's first Thunderbolt enabled RAID storage solutions and have previously worked 
with ASUS to develop a diversified portfolio to meet customer's requirements.


Premium features for a premium motherboard
The title of PREMIUM carries certain expectations, and as such, the P8Z77-V PREMIUM motherboard boasts several new features, such as true 4-way NVIDIA SLI and 4-way AMD CrossFireX on the latest PCIe Gen 3.0 slots for maximum graphics performance. Also introduced is advanced SSD Caching II, allowing users to cache additional frequently used programs and files using multiple SSDs to instantly upgrade system performance. A 32 GB mSATA based SSD is also onboard, enabling Intel Smart Response and Rapid Start Technology for super-fast boot up and resume times. Network traffic is expertly handled by a pair of Gigabit Intel LAN ports, ensuring lag free transfers and streaming entertainment.


Dedicated to providing the latest innovations, the P8Z77-V PREMIUM and P8Z77-V PRO/THUNDERBOLT provides users with the best and most complete solutions available, such as DIP3 with SMART DIGI+ Power Control, Wi-Fi GO! and Fan Xpert 2.


Source: Techpowerup 
Like our Facebook Page and Follow our Google Plus Page Please Subscribe for more updates (Button Located at the right side of the page)

Intel DZ77RE-75K with Thunderbolt Support

Intel is set to release their top of the line Z77 motherboard, the DZ77RE-75K. This motherboard from intel will support thunderbolt I/O which can handle up to 10Gb/s transfer speeds. This motherboard resembles its little brother the DZ77GA-70K, which the only difference between the both of them are the presence of thunderbolt on the 75K.  The thunderbolt I/O is powered by the DSL3310 Thunderbolt controller in tandem with Intel FDI. The DSL3310 unfortunately, is a slim variant in Intel's Thunderbolt controller lineup, which only takes advantage of PCI-Express gen 2.0 x2, so Thunderbolt might not perform to its fullest. This board is ready for launch early next week.

Source: Techpowerup via Vr-Zone and Techpowerup Forums
Like our Facebook Page and Follow our Google Plus Page Please Subscribe for more updates (Button Located at the right side of the page)

Thunderbolt on a Gigabyte Motherboard

 Gigabyte talked about plans to release 3 motherboards capable of Thunderbolt in the PlugFest event held in Malaysia. The rear I/O panel of one of the three was shown on a slide, which reveals it to have a Thunderbolt/mini-DisplayPort connector, alongside standard DisplayPort, HDMI, DVI, and D-Sub, among other common I/O connectors. The Thunderbolt connector will also be wired to the Flexible Display Interface (FDI), letting you use processor-integrated Intel HD 4000/2500 graphics, and probably discrete graphics over LucidLogix Virtu MVP. The Thunderbolt I/O will allow users to daisy-chain as many as six high-bandwidth devices like a storage device, apart from a display. To date there is only one motherboard which has onboard thunderbolt which is the MSI Z77A-GD80. Whereas there is a Intel board (DZ77-75K) which is slated to be released in the coming weeks. Asus has also provided users with a flexibility to add thunderbolt via a breakout box sold separately on any P8Z77 motherboard except the P8Z77-WS. Its is noted that hot swap of devices is not yet supported on windows, so you must reboot to plug a device.

Source: Techpowerup

Like our Facebook Page and Follow our Google Plus Page Please Subscribe for more updates (Button Located at the right side of the page)

MSI Z77A-GD80

PRESS RELEASE

MSI, the leading innovator in mainboard and graphics card technology is happy to announce the availability of the new MSI Z77A-GD80 mainboard with Intel Thunderbolt technology. With MSI's true integrated Thunderbolt design you don't have to worry about losing bandwidth or placing additional add-in cards as it is the most simple Thunderbolt solution available. Of course, the renowned Military Class III components are again available to deliver the highest quality and most stable components. OC Genie II boosts your overall CPU, Memory, Disk and Graphics performance and thank to its power saving hardware features such as Active Phase Switching (APS) and DrMOS II, the MSI Z77A-GD80 can combine its CPU performance with best power saving.


Thunderbolt Technology: The Fastest Connection available
MSI equipped the Z77A-GD80 with the groundbreaking Thunderbolt technology. Thunderbolt is the fastest data connection available for your PC, running at 10 Gbps. Thunderbolt technology delivers two communications methods, or protocols, on a single cable: PCI Express for data transfer and DisplayPort for displays. MSI has integrated the Thunderbolt controller on the mainboard, ensuring that Thunderbolt is a hassle-free solution that not requires additional cards, cables and configuration issues because external Thunderbolt controllers steal bandwidth from other devices. Thunderbolt is an easy technology and should not add to your PC complexity!

Fastest Data transfers
Data transfers for backup, sharing, and editing are faster with Thunderbolt technology, significantly reducing times to complete these tasks. Running at 10 Gbps, Thunderbolt technology on the MSI Z77A-GD80 can transfer a full-length HD video in less than 30 seconds and backup 1 year of continuous audio playback in just over 10 minutes.

Cable management without clutter
Thunderbolt technology delivers great responsiveness with data and display transfers - in each direction, at the same time - using a single cable to connect devices. It's no longer needed to connect multiple devices directly to your PC. Using multiple connection in a daisy chain, the amount of cables directly attached to your PC will be reduced while maintaining maximum throughput.

Military Class III components
The MSI Z77A-GD80 is equiped with Military Class III components. consisten of the new DrMOS II next-generation MOSFET with double thermal protection ensure safety while providing the highest efficiency and power output. Hi-c CAPs have very high efficiency and small form factor, ideal over overclocking or oversized CPU cooling. Super Ferrite Chokes (SFC) are more powerful and more efficient than Chokes employed on other mainboards and the all-solid capacitors are the backbone of any long-lifetime product.

Smoothest system experience with OC Genie II
MSI OC Genie II is world's easiest overclocking technique and allows a complete performance overhaul with a simple push of a button. My OC Genie is a new feature that allows end-users to customize their OC Genie II experience through MSI's unique ClickBIOS II interface.

Source: Techpowerup

Like our Facebook Page and Follow our Google Plus Page Please Subscribe for more updates (Button Located at the right side of the page)

Intel DZ77GA-70K

The DZ77RE-75K and the DZ77GA-70K shares the same PCB and has the same feature set with the major difference being that the DZ77RE-75K will support Thunderbolt support. However, as Intel's Cactus Ridge Thunderbolt chipset isn't quite ready as yet, it looks like this model will launch later in the year. Looking at the PCB of the DZ77GA-70K on can clearly see a missing chip just left of the topmost x16 PCI Express slot  and a missing connector right next to the audio jacks. beyond the specifications mentioned, the pictures reveal some additional features, although thanks to Intel blanking out the text on all the peripheral chipsets on the board, it's a little bit hard figuring out what they all are. It appears that the additional SATA 6Gbps ports are via Marvell's second generation SATA 6Gbps controllers if we're not entirely mistaken and there also appears to be a PLX PCI Express bridge chip on the board. Amusingly it seems like Intel's motherboard division has run into the fact that the company's chipset division doesn't like adding a sufficient amount of PCI Express lanes to it chipsets and as such had to add the PLX bridge. There is also 2 internal USB 3.0 internal headers. there is also a vertical facing HDMI port.

Source: Vr-Zone

Tech update for 11/1/2012

Last week was cebit 2012. first in line is EVGA finally announced their Classified SR-X motherboard, this is a dual Xeon LGA 2011 motherboard. it has 7 pcie slots capable of 4 way SLI and CrossfireX. it also has a dual 6 phase PWM and has 12 DDR3 dimm slots.

Source: Techpowerup


MSI shown their full lineup of ivy bridge based motherboards. for now the MSI Z77-AGD80 is the most high end board they can offer. these motherboards feature military class iii components certified with MIL-STD-810G, OC Genie II, Clck Bios II and PCI Express 3.0

one of the killer features of the MSI Z77A-GD80 is the fact that there is a thunderbolt port which has transfer speeds of up to 10 Gb/s and can also be a display out

The thunderbolt port is below the D-Sub connector

Source: Techpowerup, Techpowerup via Hardwareinfo

Meet the Asrock Extreme 11, this motherboard is the best board Asrock can give on the X79 chipset. this board has a 16+2 power phase design and a pair of 8 pin 12v power connector. has dual ehternet ports as well as molex power for PCI express lanes. this board has two PLX chips. 14 sata ports; 4 of them are sata 3, 6Gb/s. this board has 2 internal usb 3.0 headers with  a total of 8 usb 3.0 ports including the ones at the rear I/O.

Source: Vr-Zone

Finally is the MSI R7970 Lightning edition. this may just be the best card out there. this card not only performs fast but also has a very sleek look to it. this card has military class III components, 2048 Shader Units, a 384-bit memory interface, 3 GB of GDDR5 VRAM, Eyefinity 6 support, plus two DVI and four mini DisplayPort outputs.

The cutout behind the backplate is for the Reactor core

 Source: Techpowerup

 Stay tuned for another update about Asus Lineup of intel 7 series chipset