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ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO AMD 785G Chipset Motherboard Review
ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO AMD 785G Chipset Motherboard Review - PCSTATS
The ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO motherboard is an AMD 785G platform built with Home Theatre PC and High Definition media applications in mind. Key to its allure are a trifecta of video outputs.
Filed under: Motherboards Published:  Author: 
External Mfg. Website: ASUS Nov 28 2009   J. Apong  
Home > Reviews > Motherboards > ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO

The ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO motherboard is an AMD 785G platform built with Home Theatre PC and High Definition media applications in mind. Key to its allure are a trifecta of video outputs - HDMI, VGA and DVI - powered by the integrated graphics AMD Radeon HD 4200 graphics card and 128MB of onboard SidePort memory.

As a socket AM3 motherboard go, the ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO accommodates AMD's Phenom II and Athlon II processors alike, and can be installed with up to 4GB of DDR3-1066/1333 memory. When overclocked, memory can run as fast as DDR3-1600/1800. Storage on the ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO is handled by the AMD SB710 southbridge, which has a solid history. The AMD SB710 has support for five serial ATA 3Gb/s connectors that support RAID 0, 1, 0+1 and JBOD connections, an eSATA 3Gb/s port, and a legacy IDE connector. The board has a pair of PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots (with x16/x4 bandwidth, respectively), a single PCI Express x1 slot, and three standard PCI slots.

On the I/O panel of the ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO you'll find six USB 2.0 connectors (with six more USB 2.0 ports available through internal headers), the aforementioned eSATA 3Gb/s port and HDMI, DVI and VGA ports, as well as a 1394a firewire part, an optical S/PDIF port, 8-channel stereo output, and of course a RJ45 LAN port and a PS/2 keyboard and mouse combo port.

The heart of the ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO is however the AMD 785G graphics controller, the Radeon HD 4200 GPU. This is what makes almost every AMD 785G mothberboard such a darling of users with High Definition 1080i twinkling in their eyes. With all of these graphics capabilities, the ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO is positioned as a good candidate for an inexpensive HTPC box or everyday work PC for that matter. ASUS' M4A785TD EVO is priced around $95 CDN, ($90 USD, £55 GBP) .

ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO Motherboard


INCLUDES: Manual, Driver CD, (4) SATA cables, IDE cable, Q-Connector, I/O shield.

Chipsets: AMD 785G / AMD SB710
CPU Support: AMD socket AM3
Memory Type: Dual Channel DDR3-1066/1333,1600/1800(OC)
Videocard Support: (2) PCI Express x16 2.0 (x16, x4)
Integrated Graphics: Yes (HDMI, Analog, DVI)

Key to the success of virtually al AMD 785G motherboards on the market is of course the integrated graphics processor, a slight upgrade from the Radeon HD 3200 equipped 780G. The abilities of the Radeon HD 4200 have been enhanced with support for DirectX 10.1 and Shader Model 4.1, as well as expanded compatibility of ATI Stream. ATI Stream uses graphics hardware to accelerate certain desktop applications. The ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO supports HDMI 1.3, which increases overall bandwidth and colour depth support.

The guts of the Radeon HD 4200 IGP include 40 stream processors that run at a core clock of 500MHz. The M4A785TD-V EVO complements this with Sideport memory, 128MB of DDR3-1333 tacked onto the board just off side. The memory acts exclusively for the graphics subsystem.

ASUS has enabled IGP overclocking on the M4A785TD-V EVO, which means it might be possible to push this humble integrated motherboard quite a bit further than a regular IGP. PCSTATS will test ASUS' GPU NOS overclocking a little later on in this review, as well see how far a Phenom II processor can overclocking on this ASUS platform.

Let's take an in-depth look at ASUS' M4A785TD-V EVO motherboard, and in particular AMDs 785 chipset.

AMD 785G / SB710 Chipsets

The AMD 785G chipset brings support for DirectX 10.1, Windows 7 compatibility, and hardware-acceleration for certain kinds of video transcoding and graphics-intensive applications to the world of IGPs. It's an all-around incremental improvement to the AMD 780G chipset that's been the darling of the IGP world. The AMD 785G chipset also continues AMD's strategy of having cross-compatiblity support for a huge range of processors depending on the board implementation. In this review, Socket AM3 processors and DDR3 memory are the only, and best future-proof options.

The centerpiece of the AMD 785 chipset is the Radeon HD 4200 IGP. This graphics core is very similar to the Radeon HD 3200 that powered the AMD 780G. Both IGPs are built on a 55nm process, have 40 stream processors, and consist of approx. 205 million transistors.

Performance of the Radeon HD 4200 IGP is largely similar to AMD's previous IGPs, with the key changes being support for DirectX 10.1 and Shader Model 4.1.

Should you want to use a stand alone videocard the AMD 785G chipset supports a PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot, and can be used in Hybrid Crossfire mode with selected ATI Radeon graphics cards such as the Radeon HD 3450. Realistcally speaking, the IGP's 3D performance isn't comparable to the power of a dedicated graphics card in Hybrid Crossfire, so don't waste your money attempting it.

Sideport memory is optional, so availability depends on the motherboard manufacturer.

The ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO that PCSTATS is reviewing today has 128MB of DDR 1333 sideport memory, which should give it a slight edge in 3D graphics benchmarks. You'll see what we mean right after the jump...

High Definition Video Output & ATI Stream

Further improvements include new hardware-accelerated transcoding support for selected video applications. ATI Stream lets the Radeon HD 4200 GPU accelerate media encoding, which can result in dramatic performance improvements when compared to CPU transcoding speeds.

Unified Video Decoding is also here, and also uses the GPU to decode video, reducing load on the CPU....

© 2023 PCSTATS.com Next Page >

 

Contents of Article: ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO
 Pg 1.  — ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO AMD 785G Chipset Motherboard Review
 Pg 2.  AMD 785G and Stream GPU Acceleration
 Pg 3.  ASUS M4A785TD-V EVO Motherboard Highlights
 Pg 4.  High-Definition Content playback and ATI Stream testing
 Pg 5.  Overclocking the Motherboard and IGP, BIOS Screenshots
 Pg 6.  Power Draw Tests, Test System Specs
 Pg 7.  Motherboard Benchmarks: SYSmark 2007, Sandra 2009
 Pg 8.  Motherboard Benchmarks: PCMark Vantage
 Pg 9.  Motherboard IGP Benchmarks: 3DMark06
 Pg 10.  Motherboard IGP Benchmarks: 3DMark Vantage, FEAR
 Pg 11.  DX10 Motherboard IGP Benchmarks: Call of Juarez, Crysis
 Pg 12.  Worthy Motherboard for the AMD 785G

 
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