Joined on 02/15/08
Works fine
Pros: Plugged in. It works.
Cons: First I used the VGA connection to the monitor and the right one-third of the display moved to the far left and the left two-thirds moved to the right. Changed the connection to the HDMI port (HDMI to DVI-D cable) and everything straightened. I use Linux and it could have been a problem in Xorg. No problems since.
Great PS
Pros: Plugged it in. It works. Voltages seem to be within 1% of what they should be. Very quiet.
Cons: None
Overall Review: I have had Rosewill power supplies before and they have never failed me.
Works Great
Pros: Received. Installed. They work great. Base at 1333MHz with XMP to 1866MHz certified and also on the QVL for the ASUS M5A99FX Pro. R2.0 motherboard at 1866MHz. I am not yet ready to overclock them to 1866MHz
Cons: None
Great CPU
Pros: Not too many cores, not excessive power consumption, fast. On first installation I managed to bend three of the pins on the CPU. Carefully straightening them out, I reinstalled the CPU and it worked.
Cons: None.
Overall Review: The OEM heatsink is small but I have not had a temperature above 119F according to the UEFI graphics on the motherboard. I have not overclocked it and do not intend to. Plus, I am not a gamer, so the OEM heatsink will probably be adequate for my purposes.
Great case
Pros: Nice layout, interior black and well marked for installation of three sizes of motherboards. Front panel is pre-cabled so all you have to do is connect to the motherboard. Two included fans front and rear. Accessory screws and standoffs nicely packaged. Very sturdy steel case, not flimsy or easily twisted. Box it comes in is heavier than expected and protected the case well - arrived with no damage. Roomy with an ATX motherboard. The places for standoffs (included) for the motherboard were stamped next to the threaded holes and another stamped chart showed which holes to use for ATX, miniATX, and one other size motherboard. Included a special adapter to adapt a Philips head screwdriver to use in screwing in the standoff. Included a small package of plastic ties to organize cables for the final assembly. I had left over screws to be used if I wanted to use more or vice the included plastic single-twist DVD-RW or other option. An adapter to use a 2-1/2 inch drive in a 3-1/2 inch slot was included.
Cons: Instructions not great but at least the parts list is accurate. No other cons.
Overall Review: A pleasure to work with this case. I chose it for the layout and options of the front panel and the subdued look while having great capabilities. Subdued look which is exactly what I wanted.
Great board
Pros: Well built, heavy insulators over non-cpu chips, well laid out in general, lots of good features, easy to get to UEFI graphical settings. Runs Linux (two distributions) with no problems AFTER setting the UEFI to non-protected boot.
Cons: Six of seven SATA ports are oriented parallel to the motherboard. This can cause a problem if the case (mine does) has a slight ridge where the SATA connectors would have a problem making contact. This is so that clearance for very large graphics cards can be accommodated. More than four SATA connections could be a problem. The graphical UEFI bios wording does not match the owners manual in several places. This is not critical but could be very confusing for a newbie. The UEFI boot sequence selection is different from the MBR type settings. If the UEFI boot into a distribution chooses a certain sequence, be very careful when arguing with it. Trial and error with these settings does work.
Overall Review: I like the board. The owners manual says it was designed specifically for Win8 and it took me a while to get it running Linux because I was not familiar with the UEFI booting. Read all you can find on UEFI before purchasing the board. It handles GPT partitioning with no problems. Once set up, it works great.