ASRock FM2A75M-ITX FM2 AMD A75 (Hudson D3) HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Mini ITX AMD Motherboard

Pros: The only board at the time to support AMD A10 in a Mini-ITX form factor.

Cons: I came home to a burning plastic smell. After 2 weeks of constant use, Tiny, my mini-ITX box, set next to my TV, was dead. I've had it overheat before, even with my Zalman ZNPS 7500 CU, and it'd just turn off, so I tried turning it on, and saw fire, and immediately pulled the plug, took the cover off, checked all the wires, and didn't see anything. Plugged it back in to see where the fire originated, and it sparked next to the 4-pin CPU power connector, and actually melted part of the board next to it. The board is done for.

Other Thoughts: At the time of its release, there were two mini-ITX motherboards which supported Socket FM2, this one and MSI's. I could not find any place that sold MSI's board, but did find it was a bit more expensive, and decided that this one had all the features I really needed, and anything extra could be added later.

My roommate pointed out the terrifying thought that what if the failsafes didn't kill the power to the board and the fire was left uncontrolled while we were out having dinner? We'd be homeless and everything we had of value would probably be destroyed.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Please contact our Tech Support at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: none

Cons: Overheating and locking up more and more frequently. I have the case open with all fans at 100%. Resetting the cpu with new grease does nothing. It worked ok in the beginning albeit a little hot. Over time the board just completely degraded.
Sitting in BIOS the temp starts out at 50 C and creeps up to 80C until it locks up.

Other Thoughts: ASRock needs to be replacing these boards with the newer version, or offering a refund. I'm shocked to go back and read reviews on this thing after 6 months.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Please contact our tech support with detail problem description at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: not really sure - the board died twice in my posession after only being on each time for a few days.

Cons: Very HOT
Unreliable

Other Thoughts: This is my second board. After paying out of pocket for shipping, I received a replacement board 10 days later and then swapped it out. It worked for 1 day and then died just like the last time. I am blown away. After 20 years of working in the computer field, I have never experienced the surreal feeling of buying a board, having it die, watching the product line be discontinued, receive a new replacement, and going through the same exact set of sequences. WOW. This makes me very concerned about buying Asrock again.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Sorry to hear the second mainboard has malfunctioned after 1 day. Please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.


Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: nice feature set

Cons: always had overheating problems that eventually caused system freezes, and eventually complete failure.

Other Thoughts: get another board or wait for more to come out, this one is too risky to be worth it

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize that you having difficulty with mainboard. Please download and update the latest BIOS at " http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/FM2A75M-ITX/?cat=Download&os=BIOS ", set the UEFI BIOS default. If you have any technical questions or warranty issues please contact our Tech Support at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com

Pros: High overclock ceiling. Mini-itx Fm2 support. worked first time, all drivers worked. OC works etc etc.

Cons: Gets hot, part of that is due to mini-itx cases being constrained. I can see how people would burn their boards. If you're careless and don't heat sink the VRMs, etc then yeah you can burn it up. Keep it in spec and keep it cool, and it'll work. I've had for about three months now, and no problems. (Fingers crossed i guess)

Other Thoughts: Overall seems like a great board, just gotta get some cooling going if you're going to OC high. Since its a delicate piece of equiptment, you gotta do your homework and realize that there are differences beyond the just the form factor. Also the new drivers I've seen people have problems with (Sata 3 ide etc). The drivers work if you know anything about how ridiculous windows can be. Also, the dual graphics is pretty decent, just make sure to get the fast ram, since the memory clock is the bottleneck for fps and etc.

Pros: My motherboard has not caught on fire.

Cons: Cannot load AHCI driver to install Windows.

Other Thoughts: The AsRock support forum is at OC Workbench. In order to establish an account, I have to answer the question, "What is the name of the famous horse dance style known as ?" Yeah. Right. Could a question be more obtuse? To open a support ticket and contact AsRock, you have to fill out an intrusive and exhaustive form that includes your phone number. Their response? "For technical issue and emergency case, we suggest you to contact your dealer first." Thanks for nothing, AsRock.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize that you having difficulty with mainboard. AHCI driver is not required for Windows 7. If Windows XP, please set the SATA mode to IDE since Windows XP requires floppy drive to install the third party drivers for AHCI. If you have any technical questions please contact us at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com

Pros: Not many options for FM2 in mITX format. The WEFI firmware update function worked like a champ. Relatively easy to use.

Cons: The Motherboard was rather slow. It seemed to underclock the processor to 14x more often than desired. Then it died after 45 days.

Other Thoughts: It had been working fine (although slow) for a month and a half, on firmware 1.1, then I wanted to update the firmware to see if the performance improved. I did so, but performance did not improve. I turned the dehumdifier function on and rebooted, and everything was normal for a few hours. I put the machine to sleep, and woke up the next day and the system would not post. Took everything unessential out of the rig, still would not post. Switched PSU's (original was a seasonic, substitue was a coolermaster) and still nothing. Took it out of case, rinse and repeat, still nothing =(. I guess we will see what ASrock suppor has to say.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Please trouble shooting the mainboard for below steps with known good components;
Remove the mainboard from inside computer to outside. Place the mainboard on top of the empty mainboard’s box
Clear the CMOS
Reseat the CPU and heatsink fan as well
Test with 1 memory module
Using onboard Video (plug the monitor)
Power supply with connecting 24 pins + 4 pins ATX power to the mainboard
Plug the computer case’s power switch to mainboard's front panel power header and try again
If you have any technical questions please contact us at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.


Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com

Pros: Nice board for a small profile system

Cons: MOSFET caught on fire not long after having this board.

Other Thoughts: If you get this board you absolutely have to get heat sinks for the MOSFET. There are adhesive heat sinks out there that are sized for memory that will work on this, you may have to size them down though.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Please contact us at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com

Pros: This is the only mini ITX board always available.
MSI FM2-A75IA-E53 gets constantly sold out for the obvious reason.

Cons: Catches on fire. Faulty VRM design. 3+1 phases is not enough. GPU inside the Trinity APUs is too powerful to be given just one power line.
No radiators on VRMs

Other Thoughts: Asrock has released a new mini ITX motherboard.
FM2A85X-ITX

I checked the specs. It's gonna rock!
4+2 VRMs (MSI has 3+2) covered up with a radiator.
7.1 audio.
A85 chipset is overkill, though. The difference between the A75 and A85 is that the second one has got +2 SATAs and one more PCIe. The latter cannot be squeezed into the mini ITX form factor anyhow.

Disappointed how Asrock treats its customers! Faulty mobos are still being sold around the world. (Google FM2A75M-ITX FM2 fire - a lot of "funny" photos)

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Please contact us at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com

Pros: Nice color and layout, good feature set, one of the few available FM2 its boards.

Cons: I got 2 minutes into installing Windows 7 before the system locked up. rebooted into bios, then attempted installation again. after that the system refused to boot at all. I reseated the CPU and, removed a stick of RAM, disconnected all peripherals and cleared the CMOS. this time, a puff of black smoke puffed from the first 2 VRMs and then the board was fried completely.

Other Thoughts: I've RMA'd my board through New egg... I'm not expecting it to work, either, honestly. Will probably end up getting a refund... AsRock has an A85 board on the way. Maybe they should start replacing faulty models with that board.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear AsRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. For the future reference, please download and update the latest BIOS at link " http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/FM2A75M-ITX/?cat=Download&os=BIOS ". If you have any technical questions please contact us at http://www.asrock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

AsRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@asrockamerica.com