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Hardware
ASRock reveals three Clarkdale-ready motherboards
ASRock has joined other motherboard makers in flaunting their upcoming Clarkdale-ready products. The company has released images of three motherboards designed for Intel's soon-to-be-released 32nm processors. ASRock's new units will be branded H55M, H55M Pro, and H55DE3 -- with the first two being microATX motherboards.
Judging by the model nomenclature, all three boards appear to feature Intel's H55 chipset. The H55M Pro houses VGA, DVI, and HDMI display outputs, while the H55M and H55DE3 are said to carry at least VGA connections. Naturally, those ports should be directly wired to the CPU socket to make use of Clarkdale's built-in graphics core.
All of the designs also include two PCI Express x16 slots, and the microATX models feature two sets of heatsink mounting holes -- not unlike the company's P55 motherboards, which have holes for both LGA 775 and LGA 1156 heatsinks. ASRock's H55M seems the most barren of the trio, with only four SATA ports and two DIMM slots.
Apart from features seen in the images, few details are known, but it's probably a fair assumption that ASRock's H55 motherboards will ship alongside Clarkdale in early 2010 at around $100 price point.
Judging by the model nomenclature, all three boards appear to feature Intel's H55 chipset. The H55M Pro houses VGA, DVI, and HDMI display outputs, while the H55M and H55DE3 are said to carry at least VGA connections. Naturally, those ports should be directly wired to the CPU socket to make use of Clarkdale's built-in graphics core.
All of the designs also include two PCI Express x16 slots, and the microATX models feature two sets of heatsink mounting holes -- not unlike the company's P55 motherboards, which have holes for both LGA 775 and LGA 1156 heatsinks. ASRock's H55M seems the most barren of the trio, with only four SATA ports and two DIMM slots.
Apart from features seen in the images, few details are known, but it's probably a fair assumption that ASRock's H55 motherboards will ship alongside Clarkdale in early 2010 at around $100 price point.
User Comments (24)
Post a comment| regenweald on November 30, 2009 3:15 PM | Integrated intel graphics........definitely for the 'wait and see' approach. I look forward to seeing what the full platform will possibly cost. |
| coldpreacher on November 30, 2009 3:16 PM | Sub one hundred sounds good to me! |
| manintech on November 30, 2009 4:12 PM | we'll wait and see |
| IvanAwfulitch on November 30, 2009 4:16 PM | I'd only consider this if I were running a MicroATX system, which I'm not. If you're really going to try for a Micro setup, feel free to try this out. I'll stick with my higher performance/quality full atx size boards, thank you very much. |
| BlackIrish on November 30, 2009 5:49 PM | Wow, great price, and those i5 dual core cpu's deliver some
massive Ghz bumps. Anyway, does anyone know how will these H55 boards interact with discrete graphic cards? Like, would they use the cpu graphics while in windows and for movies, and switch to the other card when playing games? |
| klepto12 on November 30, 2009 6:39 PM | this seems nice as asrock had the cheapest 1333 mb for i7 cpus and it was a great board at a $100 price point who could go wrong with these mbs |
| Heretic on November 30, 2009 7:02 PM | This looks like a pretty rock solid board if you'll excuse the pun. My only beef is that it's not a full size board. |
| Matthew on November 30, 2009 9:26 PM | @IvanAwfulitch, Heretic: I think you guys may be confused.
Three motherboards were revealed -- one of which (at least
by the naming convention) seems to be a regular old ATX
board. Either way, there will be plenty of ATX products
available when the time comes  .
|
| saintbodhisatva on November 30, 2009 11:18 PM | It seems a bit unfair to those buying more premium P55
boards but can't run Clarkdales. And also, Is Sata 6Gb and USB 3 included in this? |
| techdisciple on November 30, 2009 11:19 PM | Definitely the starting $100 price point sounds good but
would be great if little lower. 
|
| tengeta on November 30, 2009 11:55 PM | It looks nice but I've become less and less of a fan of smaller things when it comes to computing the last few years. Results in a lot less failed hardware too. |
| lfg18 on December 1, 2009 12:28 AM | It looks promising, we have to wait and see what it is capable of, anyway I'm reluctant to these cheap plataforms, but hey if it works fine I will definitely buy one |
| PNagy on December 1, 2009 8:14 AM | I think ASRock should get more attention. They're the 4th who has H55 boards. |
| fref on December 1, 2009 8:59 AM | Can someone explain who ASRock is exactly? I seem to recall reading that it was part of Asus, or had been bought by Asus, or something like that? Are they considered a good brand like Asus is, or are they more budget oriented? |
| absolutgaloot on December 1, 2009 10:14 AM | This integrated graphics thing has such amazing potential, but unfortunately I don't see the performance actually surpassing add-in cards anytime soon. |
| TorturedChaos on December 1, 2009 11:31 AM | I don't think I have ever heard of ASRock. Always used
Gigabyte and Asus Mobo..... If they do a lot of Micro-ATX boards might be why. Always bought full sized boards :p. |
| SNGX1275 on December 1, 2009 12:06 PM | Can someone explain who ASRock is
exactly? I seem to recall reading that it was part of Asus,
or had been bought by Asus, or something like that? Are
they considered a good brand like Asus is, or are they more
budget oriented? ASRock used to be part of Asus back
in the day, but now they are separate. They aren't on the
same quality level as Asus, they are geared to compete in
the budget segment of the motherboard market. Having said
that though, if you don't need to overclock with very
precise control over things then an ASRock board can still
be a worthwhile purchase. I've owned MSI, Asus, Gigabyte, ECS, and ASRock boards and to be honest I've had the most problems with Asus. |
| claycc on December 1, 2009 1:14 PM | I am interested to see how these do. For someone that doesn't game and is looking for a solid setup on a budget this might fit the bill really well. |
| ken777 on December 1, 2009 1:25 PM | I wish they would include a Displayport output too. |
| ryan29121 on December 1, 2009 3:10 PM | Sounds pretty good for under $100. As mentioned before, displayport output would be nice. But what do you expect from a mobo that costs $100? |
| jgvmx on December 1, 2009 5:00 PM | In my country the general idea is that Asrock is one of the
cheapo lame brands, but in reality they release very
interesting boards at nifty prices. If i remember well they
were among the first ones to offer an affordable X58
board. . It would be quite hilarious if Intel announced they would release yet another socket for the clarkdales. |
| SNGX1275 on December 1, 2009 5:13 PM | They also had a board that would take a C2D and an AGP video card (you could also use PCIe). So that was a great board for me to use when I wanted a better processor than my super old Athlon64 (one of the very first ones made, 754) but had a good AGP vid card (7800GS). So for about a year I ran that as my main machine and it worked great. Then it got little use, and now Tarkus on the boards is using it because his C2D box died and he needed a quick replacement that wouldn't choke on youtube (his secondary machine was a low power via box). I believe he's running a PCIe card in it now. So the versatility of that board is great, and its still working after several years. |
| ununpentium on December 2, 2009 11:49 PM | Cheap with eSATA and DDR3... a good compromise for a modern
and affordable motherboard! |
| buttus on December 3, 2009 7:54 AM | It looks like Intel is making this platform their price competitive answer to AMD. They are trying to close the price gap to AMD in order to woo more people to the Intel side (for just a few dollars more you can have an i5 instead of the AMD chip). Traditionally the price differential between Intel and AMD has been huge (and I for one believe AMD is the better overall value and Intel obviously gets the performance crown). |
