Conclusion

Despite everything Biostar TPower I55 mainboard makes a very good overall impression. I didn’t like its enormous “golden” box, but you can always put it away and it is definitely not the reason to lower the total score for this product. Biostar has a lot of issues with their brand name software, and even though “T-Overclocker” tool does have some potential, it hasn’t been yet implemented properly. However, no one can make you use these utilities, there are a lot of suitable alternatives available these days. Nevertheless, the board has very good design if we disregard a few insignificant drawbacks and an overcomplicated cooling system. As for the BIOS functionality, they seem to be quite common and familiar, but the fact their remarkable combination is something truly unique. Yes, there is a serious issue with the “CPU Load Line” parameter, but in reality it is none other but a silly mistake. The actual function works perfectly fine and fixing it shouldn’t take much time.

Things are a little more complicated when it comes to performance and overclocking. The mainboard did formally good during overclocking having achieved the same maximum frequency as ASRock solution and just a little lower than Gigabyte and Asus solutions. Its performance is at about the same level as that of the competitors, but it is a little confusing that we have to enable “CPU Load Line” to achieve it, otherwise, the specific implementation of Intel Turbo Boost will cause the board to run slower. This lower performance is compensated by higher energy-efficiency, so you will have to choose between speed and low power consumption, even though you will definitely want to have both. Maybe they will eventually optimize these complex and not quite obvious connections, but at this point it makes more sense to use Biostar TPower I55 as a basis for an energy-efficient system for use in nominal mode. Although in some cases its performance may be a little lower than that of similar solutions, but it will consume way less power. Moreover, it will be a perfect fit for CPU overclocking too, as in this case it is both: pretty fast and economical. Overall, Biostar TPower I55 is a good mainboard!