ASUS Announces B85M-Gamer
As you might infer from the name, the ASUS B85M-Gamer is a gaming-featured motherboard aimed at the small form factor, budget buyer. The B85 chipset sits between the H97 and H81 series Intel chipsets, and while technically B denotes 'business', to date the B85 has impressed reviewers in its price:performance credentials for home users(/gamers) as well. Typically the B85M-Gamer buyer will be adding an equally price:performance aligned Intel Pentium, Core i3 and entry-i5 chip, paired with a Nvidia GTX 750/750 Ti or AMD R7 alternatives, so the need for an overclocking chipset is negated.
The B85M-Gamer has a black PCB with a flash of red along the heatsink and on the SupremeFX 'redline' to accentuate the look. LANGuard and Intel Gigabit Ethernet also features from the ROG stock. The high-quality audio has the same SupremeFX shielding technology, ELNA premium audio capacitors and headphone amp of its ROG and Pro Gamer brothers to yield 115dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) stereo output.
In addition to the usual four SATA III/two SATA II ports placed above the PCI-Express graphics slot for easy access, the rear IO and onboard pins support four USB 3.0/six USB 2.0, HDMI/d-sub (if you're using the Intel processor graphics), PS2 keyboard and mouse, GigE RJ45 socket and 3.5mm audio jacks. Hit the PR button below the pics for the full details.
