The Box and Packaging
The actual box does look pretty attractive with its bright colours. There’s not much else with the packaging … just the manual, drivers disc, 4 x SATA data cables and the I/O shield. That’s it.
The Motherboard Itself
The yellowish design of the motherboard is pretty striking … it’s rather like Marmite. You’ll love it or hate it. All the connectors seem to be in the right places. The SATA3 ports are vertically mounted … something I’m not to fond of.
You’ll notice the M.2 cooling heat spreader which is covering on the M.2 connectors, while the other M.2 connector is bare … just above the first PCIE x16 slot.
A Closer Look
You’ll notice the diagnostic LEDs, and the GT Touch panel for onboard power-on, reset and ECO mode. There’s a total of 2 x M.2 connectors for SSDs and 6 x SATA3 ports.
Two of the PCIE x 16 slots come with what appears to be steel protectors, while the other PCIE slot is just your usual standard connector.
BIOSTAR’s famous HiFi audio is included as well as the super surge protection. Oddly, the manual tells us that motherboard supports 3-way AMD Crossfire Technology, but no mention of Nvidia SLI.
The I/O back panel features a PS/2 mouse and keyboard combo, 2 x USB 3.1 Gen2 Port, 1 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-C Port, 2 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Port, 2 x USB 2.0 Port, 1 x HDMI Connector, 1 x DVI-D Connector, 1 x Gigabit LAN Port and 6 x Audio Connectors
