This might be a bit late for this particular thread but this is the problem I encountered under Windows XP SP3.

I have a USB connected 4 port KVM switch. Keyboard and mouse are PS2. On a MSI - K9A2GM-FIH motherboard sporting SB700 chipset, invariably either the keyboard or the mouse are not recognised. Quite often neither is recognised. I have to resort to resetting the KVM to gain access to the PC.

Another problem I face is using a 16GB Kingston Traveler pen drive. It ALWAYS gives an error, even in reading.

MSI is clueless in finding a solution to either of the problems.

Both work flawlessly with via and nVidia chipset motherboards. I had to plug in a via chipset USB 2.0 addon pci card to get over these problems. Would appreciate suggestions from anyone who has found solution to these problems.

Due to the massive WAF of htpc stuff, I've got one on-order.

Nice review, and good to see that AMD is staying strong on the platform. This is a compelling product - cheap, low power, but decent. I think you'd be mad to buy anything else for a dedicated HTPC setup unless games were a strong requirement, simply because you don't need the discrete graphics card at all, and you will still have excellent performance.

I would have liked to have seen overclocking results, seeing that I have read so many comments about 780G overclocks to around twice the standard speed, albeit with a more active cooler.

Looking forward to seeing boards with on-board graphics memory, and how Phenom + Crossfire performs too.

That's great work, Geoff. I have really been looking forward to this chipset and an excellent TR review. AMD/ATI has really nailed the northbridge features and performance. This has got to be the new recommended chipset for all budget non-gaming builds. Considering that Gigabyte's implementation is already $30 cheaper than the competing G35 motherboard, it's a heck of a value.

With flawless 1080p performance from the integrated chipset, you can safely put your HTPC into a low-profile case and not worry about needing an add-in graphics card.

The performance boost from the fast HT speed of the Phenom may make this a good platform for the cheaper tri-core versions of that CPU.

One minor nit-picky comment about the review presentation: the two-point bar charts on page 11 could be clearer if the AMD and Intel chipset kept the same position (top or bottom for all of the two-point charts) and used different colored bars.

The Official Gigabyte GA-MA78GM-S2H RS780 mATX Thread
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=987960

For people interested in the A/V aspects of this board...

These poor motherboards are starting to be loaded down with more graphics ports than accessory ports.

Pretty soon they will have to add Displayport. will they ditch VGA?

I'm really impressed by the northbridge and I'm really impressed by Gigabyte's implementation. The Asus board is simply outclassed as far as connectivity goes.

I am extremely disappointed in the SB700. I would honestly honestly rather them not have even bothered. At least if they hadn't bothered it would not smack of being an abysmal failure. This is the third revision of AMD's southbridge as far as I know (SB400, SB600, SB700) and such dismal performance should not be. I'm quite simply astounded - how could AMD have failed to address what is/was clearly the weakest link of the platform? It would not be hard to argue that improving on the SB600 was far more important than improving on the already terrific 690G. It's not the end of the world but it is pathetic. (Disclaimer: I own a 690G / SB600 and it does just fine for me.)

On another note, the x2-4800e looks pretty darn acceptable. It's a ridiculous shame that it's not a K10 based processor being released, but in no way is the 4800e a bad CPU.

Oh, and a final note: this is the most interesting mobo review I've read in a long time - probably since the 690G review. I'm glad you put a G35 in there. Thanks Geoff.

Is this the video chipset for my new HTPC? Low power: check! Low CPU utilization by hardware (UVD) HD decode: check! Smooth playback of H.264 encoded 1080p video: check!

But what about HD (post processing) video quality?

Previous reviews showed that even discrete UVD graphics cards like the Radeon HD2400 and HD3450 do not obtain a full HD HQV quality score, contrary to the HD2600 and HD3470 cards. So I cannot imagine that the 780G will. (as it is based on the HD2400 core).

So may we still compromise here on HD video quality?

Unfortunately, this review only discusses the SD HQV score and not the HD HQV score, which can be completely differend!!!!

Sources:
http://techreport.com/articles.x/12843/11
http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTQ1MSwsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0 (slide 15)

In the HQV tests why did the AMD solution score 130 and the Intel 70 and in this website is the exact opposite, any theory why they get distinct results ?

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/03/04/amd_780g_integrated_gra...

Very impressive chipset. Over at Tom's hardware, they were even able to get a Sempron 3200 to play BDs with 60% average CPU utilization. Under Vista. That impressed me. :)

What was once an expensive accessory confined to enterprising geeks and do-it-yourself enthusiasts has moved into mainstream living rooms.

Bwah? Sorry Geoff, but your nerd-centric view is interfering with reality there. HTPCs in living rooms are *far* from being mainstream.

I'm very surprised that you guys didn't test if PCM 7.1 is passed through the HDMI interface to an HDMI receiver.

How come hardware reviewers NEVER test this. They will test a multi-thousand dollar nitrogen-cooled setup, but completely ignore a simple PCM HDMI test using a cheap $300 HDMI receiver...

For HTPC, decent 5.1 audio would of cource have been a big plus! Well, maybe we can get that from a different motherboard manufacturer.

Sigh, yet another in a long line of 'perfect for me' boards with no coax-out. It's pain enough having both my 360 and XBMC competing for the single (!) optical port on my receiver but the coax keeps going unused.

I would be about to crack, and just get a Mac Mini instead, but it's only got an optical port.

It's disappointing to hear that AMD has still not sorted out the AHCI issue. I'd feel much more comfortable getting a 780G board if I knew AHCI would be handled by Microsoft's generic msahci.sys driver as it should be. That's one less third-party driver to keep track of.

"Mainstream desktops and home theater PCs may see little benefit from the Native Command Queuing support that AHCI mode provides, but it's a feature that should work properly. And it just doesn't."

I think you'll also need it for the onboard eSATA port, or it will not support hot plugging. This makes AHCI a conern for a far broader audience.

Anyone know if you can use the HDMI and DVI outputs at the same time? Previous integrated graphics boards have been limited to a single digital video output.

http://www.hothardware.com/articles/AMD_780G_Chipset_and_Athlon_X2_...

This chart is a bit clearer in showing the real difference between HT2 and HT3.

I thought these chipsets would be able to boost higher end cards' capabilities to a small extent, like crossfire on training wheels. But I guess this makes sense too, frequency being the delimiting factor.

I’m not sure why the G35 system consumed so much power at idle! 66W at idle is very poor as I managed the same using a G33/Q6600/2GB DDR2-667/500GB at stock settings.
I recently bought my parents a Dell Vostro 400 G33/E4500/2GB DDR2-667/250GB and it consumes 46W at idle. I know the TR system used a Raptor and DDR2-800 but 20W difference still seems a lot unless it’s purely down to the Dell having a very efficient power supply.

47W for the AM2 system is very impressive especially since it uses a Raptor. With a WD GP hard drive and lower rated power supply which should be more efficient at lower loads you should manage below 40W at idle.

for the multiplayer component of COD4, there have been many people having it crash before it would even load. plugging in a microphone and selecting mic in the auto port detect thingy seems to fix the problem. its a very strange fix but seems to have worked for many people, based on posts on random forums

it seems to be attributed to COD4 itself and realtek drivers

overall, interesting review but was hoping AMD would get it together with SB700 especially with the SATA performance and AHCI issues, although it does look like the USB performance and cpu utilisation is much more comparable to intel's solution now

Nice review. As flip mentioned, comparing to G35 was a nice touch.

I've got that ASUS P5E-VM HDMI board myself, and I'm suffering from problems where the Atheros LAN would just die on me, needing a reboot to fix. This can happen once a week, or 4 times a day, or not at all. Reading on forums, it seems I'm not the only one having problems with ASUS boards and Atheros LAN controllers. Hope this can be fixed in software, although the fact that ASUS has not acknowledged this issue is not encouraging.

I really enjoyed this review. Sure it could have been a little more in depth for some. But it was a pleasure for me to read. I was particularly grateful for the south bridge, sata controller, and network chip testing. Well written.
I've built my last two main rigs thinking they would someday end up as htpc's. A 6150 and a 690g.
Believe I'll wait on nvidia's new chipset after reading about the sb700 failure. Which is just as well as I'm deadset on a quadcore, and the phenom is still too pricey, considering it's issues, for my taste. Hopefully the quads will be more reasonable by the time the nvidia boards are reviewed.
I really like gigabyte boards, but that south bridge is a dog.
Considering I already own that dog, via the 690 g. I'll wait.

I have a 690 coupled with a 8600GT for my HTPC and love it ---- I will mark this guy (780G) as my next upgrade --- AMD sure has pulled it out for the HTPC the last year or so!!

And with-out the need for add-in cards (8600GT) I can make a micro sized case for that micro-atx board!!

Mojo

Finally AMD released the SB700 for me to lust after.

I like the fact that it's Gigabyte that brought out the board. I'll probably get one and replace the 690G in my HTPC - which is only used to watch movies, listen to music online, and access the net to settle a dispute amongst 10 rowdy drunken friends.

I'll replace the nforce 6100 board in the Linux machine with the 690G board, also by Gigabyte. The I'll replace both processors with Phenoms and get ready to update my main rig.

Lovely times ahead.

If it wasn't for that accursed Supreme Commander, I could do everything I wanted to on a PC that uses less than 100W. That's awesome.

Does the gigabyte board support undervolting the cpu?

Maybe not a perfect implementation yet, but this is really a very good leap forward for AMD and maybe more clearly than ever underscores the advantage of AMD and ATI together. Remember, it's been less than 2 years.

BTW, THG has an extremely positive review and talks about how well you can oc the gpu.

Finally, with all the discussion re. how many people have HTPC, does anyone know how to define objectively HTPC? Is HTPC just connecting a computer to a large HDTV? Hell, if that's the case, then I've got one, but it's just a pretty good gaming machine (8800gt with zalman cooler, e6750 at 450 X 8, raptor, LG combo blu-ray/HD-DVD player and DVD burner) connected to our 47" LG HDTV. But man, do games look awesome and I can play blu-ray and HD-DVD through it using XP Home.

Does the Hybrid work any better with a phenom in there as opposed to the 4850?

Great article. A few weeks ago I almost updated my HTPC with a 690G setup, then I heard 780G was so close to release I figured it'd be worth a little extra wait. I'm glad I held off.