- Jul 27, 2014
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A78 chipset:
A78 is the mid range Fm2+ chipset. A78 supports only PCI-e Gen2 (regardless of APU) with 16 lanes available for PCI-e device allocation; this is fine for a single-GPU setup and is probably where you'd be using an A78 board anyway, but you'd want something with more lanes for additional PCI-e devices. Dual GPU configurations are not supported by the chipset (natively).
Native I/O support hosts 6xSATA III 6Gbps ports, 4xUSB3.0, 10xUSB2.0, and 2xUSB1.1 ports with RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 support. This chipset is really targeted at users who don't need the extended PCI-e capabilities of A88X; keep in mind that dropping a chipset class to A78 will often correlate with an overall drop of component quality, so the VRM, its heatsinks, and other board components may be down-classed a bit between A88X and A78.
This stated, it's for a reason: You won't need as much power and tolerance for thermals on an A78 board since it's meant for more mainstream-targeted chips and users who aren't serious about OCing or multi-GPU configurations.
A78 is meant more for users who will be sticking in the APU and leaving it alone (minimal OCing or tweaking) and will not make use of more than a single GPU, if that. Read tier descriptions for more info.
_______________________________________
Tier One: High quality. Crossfire capable boards with good enough thermals and power phases to drive any current CPU with some tweaks as well. Quality is decent and perfect for single GPU+CPU user. CFX is supported but not really ideal to do on this chipset, since it is not supported natively.
GA-F2A78M-D3H
A78M-E45(V2 as well)
_______________________________________
Tier Two: Fine quality. Decent boards to run current CPU/APU at stock speeds w/o much tweaking and single GPU support. Quality is ok, but not advisable for OCing.
mATX Form Factor:
A78M-E
FM2A78M-HD+
A78M-A
A78M-E35 (V2 as well)
GA-F2A78M-HD2
FM2A78M PRO3+
Mini-ITX Form Factor:
FM2A78M-ITX+
_______________________________________
NOTE: This thread is a part of the article series 'Motherboard tier list'.
A78 is the mid range Fm2+ chipset. A78 supports only PCI-e Gen2 (regardless of APU) with 16 lanes available for PCI-e device allocation; this is fine for a single-GPU setup and is probably where you'd be using an A78 board anyway, but you'd want something with more lanes for additional PCI-e devices. Dual GPU configurations are not supported by the chipset (natively).
Native I/O support hosts 6xSATA III 6Gbps ports, 4xUSB3.0, 10xUSB2.0, and 2xUSB1.1 ports with RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 support. This chipset is really targeted at users who don't need the extended PCI-e capabilities of A88X; keep in mind that dropping a chipset class to A78 will often correlate with an overall drop of component quality, so the VRM, its heatsinks, and other board components may be down-classed a bit between A88X and A78.
This stated, it's for a reason: You won't need as much power and tolerance for thermals on an A78 board since it's meant for more mainstream-targeted chips and users who aren't serious about OCing or multi-GPU configurations.
A78 is meant more for users who will be sticking in the APU and leaving it alone (minimal OCing or tweaking) and will not make use of more than a single GPU, if that. Read tier descriptions for more info.
_______________________________________
Tier One: High quality. Crossfire capable boards with good enough thermals and power phases to drive any current CPU with some tweaks as well. Quality is decent and perfect for single GPU+CPU user. CFX is supported but not really ideal to do on this chipset, since it is not supported natively.
GA-F2A78M-D3H
A78M-E45(V2 as well)
_______________________________________
Tier Two: Fine quality. Decent boards to run current CPU/APU at stock speeds w/o much tweaking and single GPU support. Quality is ok, but not advisable for OCing.
mATX Form Factor:
A78M-E
FM2A78M-HD+
A78M-A
A78M-E35 (V2 as well)
GA-F2A78M-HD2
FM2A78M PRO3+
Mini-ITX Form Factor:
FM2A78M-ITX+
_______________________________________
NOTE: This thread is a part of the article series 'Motherboard tier list'.
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