Pros: I bought the motherboard with an AMD 5350. I liked the setup with Windows 8 so well that I ordered another to rebuild my wife's Windows 7.

Cons: None. I would have liked for there to be 4 SATA connections instead of only two, but that's no problem, I can simply swap cords for the rare occasions of needing to use a third SATA device.

Other Thoughts: I have had no problems whatsoever with the MB, so that's a good thing.

Pros: Easy set up, low power use, no glitches.
With 16g decent memory and SSD, all the performance you need for everything but heavy gaming.

Cons: Nada

Other Thoughts: A S Rock board in this platform NEVER worked. Glitch after glitch. This board has been flawless.

Pros: How can a motherboard be that cheap? It has 3 different video outputs (VGA/DVI/HDMI) and USB 3.0!

Cheap, and works with my Athlon 5350 APU.

Cons: Not sure if the problem comes from the motherboard, APU or ram sticks, but the system won't boot if Intel XMP is not enabled in the BIOS. Weird graphical artifacts appear and the computer crashes otherwise.
I take an egg off because It took me a while to debug, and the MSI website was not much help. BIOS flashing didn't seem to work. The [AUTO] settings in the BIOS should at least make the system functional...

Pros: well advertise

Cons: USB3 on board for front panel does not work.

Other Thoughts: MSI web site no help with driver

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,
Based on the symptom you reported, we suggest you checking following steps below since many reasons can cause the situation like this ,
1. Check and make sure that power are connected correctly and firmly.
2. Check the cable from your case to the board USB header, ensure that it is conenct correctly to the correct pins layout.
3. Check your other major hardware’s (memory, video card, CPU and power supply) to ensure that they are not the cause of the issue.
4. If you need further assistant, please feel free to contact our technical support department directly at 626.271.1004 from M to F, 6am to 6pm Pacific standard Time.

Best Regards,
MSI Review Team | usreview@msi.com

Pros: Bought this to be a low power, low costs, small office server for apache web server, dovecot mail server, running linux. Got this with the 4 core AM1, and 16 gigs of 1600 ram.

I was not expecting much given the specs, but this thing will more than handle most small office server loads. Have not really fully tested it out yet, but with no real load it sits at around 1% of the resources in TOP leaving lots of room to grow.

Cons: In linux the the onboard nic may not be detected out of the box in older linux distros. You may need to install the driver. Kind of a hassle when the nic is not working.

The nic not work with centos 6.6, but works fine in Centos 7.0, Ubunto 14+, fedora 21, and so on. So, like many things that are completely new, it can take a bit of time for the drivers to get in to the linux distros.

The USB booting of linux seems flaky, but I blame that on the UEFI boot system. Makes me want to beat a microsoft executive for forcing that garbage on the world. Used a SATA dvd rom to boot, and no further problems installing.

The bios needs to be updated. It was about 4 version behind. Very easy to do with a thumb drive however.

Only two SATA ports, which kind of sucks, but I guess you could fix that by adding a RAID card.

Other Thoughts: There are a lot of overclocking features in the bios. I have not really played with them, as I am all about low power and stability for a server. This would make an excellent home file server if someone was looking to do that. I would also not hesitate to build office desktops with this for grunt work.

Pros: Excellent upgrade motherboard, does not require newer power connecters just the usual ATX 24 pin and ATX 4 pin. Very nice set of output connectors for video. Has a plug for two more USB 3 connectors for the front panel. Has a single old style keyboard/mouse connector so I can even use the old keyboard.

Cons: This is not specific to this motherboard, all the AM1 motherboards only have two SATA connectors.

Other Thoughts: My wife's 2006 computer gave up the ghost, the motherboard was bad so I went shopping and found the 5350 processor and this motherboard. The micro ATX mb fit perfectly and the power connectors plugged right in. All the Windows experience numbers came in above 6 except the desktop graphics so I plugged in a GT520 I had available and that brought that up, but also brought them memory number up to 7. I only plugged in one 4GB stick, so I guess the video card freed up some memory because the whole 4GB was now available. It is not a hardcore gaming machine, but it does all the stuff my wife needs and is power frugal too. I plan to build another based on this pair to replace and old dual atom machine my daughter has. We use a media drive so infrequently I think I'll go with a SSD and a terabyte drive for this one and use and external USB media drive that we already have.

Pros: Price, price, price. Seriously, it has everything you need for this type of set up.

Cons: Haven't found any - and I've built several computers using this board for my clients - they are all satisfied.

Other Thoughts: First, let's keep this in context - if you are building the world's fastest gaming computer, what are you doing here in the first place? That's not the target for this technology.

The fact is that today's CPUs and GPUs are way beyond the needs of everyday office and consumer computing. Your clients - and mom/grandmother - spend most of their time with the CPU parked, doing nothing.

That's why this is the right choice for that market - word processing, basic spreadsheets, Quicken (r) and Quickbooks (r), getting info from the web, reading emails, running genealogy programs, online videos, recipe lists, basic photo editing (not video editing), etc. Add a video card for simple gaming or HTPC.

Consumer or commercial, this board fits perfectly.

The low-wattage CPU will do whatever you need done quickly. There is no need for more than 8 GB of RAM - thus 2 slots. You have 1 PCI 2.0, and 2 X PCIe x 1 slots, for expansion. A 300- to 400-watt PSU does the job. 2 SATAs - 1 for the HDD, 1 for the DVD.

The truth is that you could use the expansion slots for a RAID card, or additional SATA connections - even an IDE hook-up. I'm building one now with a PCIe card for a HAM operator who needs a 4-port serial add-on.

There's room for maneuver - again, keeping in mind the target for this class of technology.

This technology allows you to compete with the lower-end Big Box offerings - or, if your really make service what you are selling, it returns you to solid mark-ups that we've all seen drained away with too big to really need components.

You should be able to build a satisfactory computer for the target market for under $300 in parts - a quality case with PSU included,1 TB HDD, the 5350 top-end processor, DVD burner, and 8 GB of RAM.

I highly recommend this board - and ask you to ignore the Egg Count as the date of this posting because with just one dissatisfied buyer, it is skewed way down below where it deserves to be.

This board works.
-30-

Pros: None

Cons: Arrived dead. No POST, nothing.

Other Thoughts: Replaced with an Asus board using the same cpu, psu, memory and hard drive, booted immediately. This is the first bad MSI board I have ever received.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,
Based on the symptom you reported, we suggest you checking following steps below since many reasons can cause the situation like this ,
1. Check and make sure that power are connected correctly and firmly (JPWR1 and JPRW2).
2. Check your other major hardware’s (memory, video card, CPU and power supply) to ensure that they are not the cause of the issue.
3. If you need further assistant, please feel free to contact our technical support department directly at 626.271.1004 from M to F, 6am to 6pm Pacific standard Time.

Best Regards,
MSI Review Team | usreview@msi.com

Pros: Simple, low cost, fast. Room for three PCI-e cards.

Cons: Two SATA ports (not 4)

Other Thoughts: Paired with a 8GB Hyper memory stick, A-5350 processor and a 120GB SSD. Installed Windows 10 (beta). It is fast and so far I have had no problems and I had not need to use the MSI disk to install drivers (all came ok from Microsoft). I will try to install a SATA Raid card to have an on-line backup solution using some extra drives I already have.