Last January, 2019, BIOSTAR showed off its latest line-up of motherbaords, solid state drives, and SoC (system on a chip) boards at a press event that unfortunately, we weren't able to attend. We got in touch with them, though, and they were kind enough to send us the pics and the details from the reveal.
During the event, they revealed their new local distributor, IonTech, the new M500 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD, and a bunch of their Intel and AMD gear for both gaming and productivity.
Let's talk about the new items.
As an M.2 user myself, I have to say I'm excited for more players in the market. Competition is always good. M.2 slots are good for a number of reasons - they're faster, they save space, and you get to brag that you're rocking an M.2 drive.
The BIOSTAR M500 M.2 SSD is NVMe 1.2 compliant, which means it can throw down up to 1,700 MB/s sequential read and 1,100 MB/s sequential write and random read/write IOPS of up to 200k/180k. The M500 SSD has visible smart LED indicators that gives you temp status - green at 50°C, yellow between 50°C to 65°C, and red for antyhing over 65°C. To be safe, though, use HWmonitor or something. M.2 slots aren't always visible. Hell, mine are placed beneath the mobo so you'll never see that.
But the BIOSTAR M500 is meant to be seen - it has a "gamer-y" look with its heatsink.
SoC Solutions
SoC means "System on a chip," That means your CPU (usually with integrated graphics and sound card) is already integrated into a chip on the motherboard. It saves on cost and space for the most part, ideal for workstations that don't require a ton of processing power.
The A68N-5600 SoC motherboard from BIOSTAR features an AMD A68H chipset with an on-board AMD A10-A655 quad-core processor with integrated RAdeon HD7620G graphics in a compact mini-ITX form factor, supporting two DIMM slots for DDR3-1333MHz RAM, up to 32GB max capacity. It also sports USB 3.0 and VGA and HDMI outputs. Should be perfect for some workstations and home offices.
Racing Series
BIOSTAR calls their gaming line the Racing Series, and they're bringing their A game with their new motherboards.
The Racing X470GT8 supports 1st and 2nd gen AMD Ryzer CPUs and APUs with Radeon Vega graphics with the AMD X470 chipset. It comes with 4 DIMM slots, supporting DDR4-3200/ 2933/ 2667/ 2400/ 2133/ 1866 Mhz memory up to 64GB max capacity. For storage, it has an M.2 slot, supporting up to 32Gbps storage with M.2 Cooling Protection (because yeah, those things can get hot). it also USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C connectivity. As far as display output goes, it does have HDMI supporting 4K resolution with Ryzen APUs.
It doesn't say so in the press release, but it looks like it has PCI Express slots for your beefy GPUs.
The Racing B250GT5 is their Intel offering - supporting 7th Intel Core processors featuring the Intel B250 chipset. Similar to the X470GT8, the B250GT5 also has 4 DIMM slots supporting DDR4 RAM but up to 2400 / 2133/ 1866Mhz only, it seems, up to 64GB. It also features the BIOSTAR exclusive Hi-Fi technology, essentially a proprietary sound card. For storage, it also has an M.2 slot with 32Gbps transfer rates. It, too, has an HDMI port for 4K. Don't use that, though. Use your GPU's displayport.
Home/ Business Solutions
BIOSTAR also has some new home and business boards for you guys.
The A320MH board supports 1st gen AMD Ryzen CPU/APU with the AMD A320 chipset. It has 2 DIMM slots that supports DDR4-2667/ 2440 Mhz up to 32GB. It also has HDMI output and USB 3.1 Gen 1 connectivity. It does have a PCI Express x16 for your GPU, if you wanna get into that.
The Hi-Fi A68U3P supports FM2+/FM2, AMD A-series, AMD E-series CPUs up to AMD quad-core processors up to 100W TDP. It's got two DDR3 DIMM slots for 2600/ 2400/ 2133/ 1855/ 1600/ 1333/ 1066/ 800 Mhz RAM up to 32GB. It features BIOSTAR's Hi-Fi technology for audio and AMD Dual Graphics Technology for AMD GPU/APU combo.
There you have it - some of the items are supporting a lot of dated tech like DDR3, which is good for legacy builds.
If you wanna know more about IonTech, check out their Facebook page here. And for more Biostar news, check out their Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, and Facebook.
To me, the most exciting piece of tech they showed is the M500 M.2 slot. Hope I could get my hands on one to test it out.