The most significant change with the 800 series chipset is in the southbridge, SB850. Unlike Intel's current southbridge solution, it features native SATA3 support, which is more for future proofing than anything, as solid state drives are just starting to saturate SATA2. Unfortunately, SB850 drops ACC, advanced clock calibration, widely known as the core unlocking feature. Many motherboard manufacturers are coming up with their own core unlocking features, though. Out more recently are the 880G chipset motherboards. They're quite similar to the 880G, but feature some difference.

For review, we've got the ASUS M4A88TD-V EVO/USB3. Featuring integrated HD4250 graphics with DirectX 10.1 support, SATA3 and USB3 .0 support, it's pretty loaded, and for less than $120, it's looking good so far. However, as we all know, paper specs don't always match up to real-life performance, so let's take a closer look.

ASUS, a technology-oriented company blessed with one of the world's top R&D teams, is well known for high-quality and innovative technology. As a leading company in the new digital era, ASUS offers a complete product portfolio to compete in the new millennium. The philosophy of ASUS product development is to do the fundamentals well first before moving forward. Started with computer components such as motherboards, graphic cards, and optical storage devices, ASUS now has now over 16 product lines, including desktop barebone systems, servers, notebooks, handhelds, network devices, broadband communications, LCD monitors, TVs, wireless applications, and CPT (chassis, power supply and thermal) products.