PCB Design and Functionality

Not so long ago we talked about Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6 mainboard, which is also based on Intel P55 Express chipset. Unlike many other mainboards that use the advantages of single-chip core logic sets with low heat dissipation, Gigabyte engineers made serious modifications to the initial reference design when they were developing their mainboard. The cooling system on Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6 looks exactly the same as before, when the chipsets consisted of two chips called North and South Bridge according to their placement on the PCB. The North Bridge used to heat up quite significantly. Therefore, the cooling system included a chipset North Bridge heatsink, a chipset South Bridge heatsink, two heatsinks on the processor voltage regulator components that are all connected together with heatpipes. Of course, the board doesn’t have a South Bridge anymore. They simply moved the chipset to where the North Bridge used to be and covered some additional controllers with the former South Bridge heatsink. At first glance Biostar TPower I55 looks exactly the same: we see a traditional four-heatsink combination here:

However, the first impression is quite deceiving, as you can see if you look at the components layout of the Biostar TPower I55 mainboard: there is nothing where the chipset North Bridge used to be.

Although the developers of Biostar TPower I55 mainboard stuck to the reference design and kept the Intel P55 Express chip in the South Bridge’s spot, they have still significantly complicated the mainboard cooling system. They placed an additional heatsink where the chipset North Bridge used to be. As you can see from the layout scheme, it doesn’t cool anything, it simply works as an intermediate heatsink between the chipset heatsink and two heatsinks over the processor voltage regulator components, since all of them are connected via heatpipes. This excessively complex cooling system is obviously not a necessity but rather has marketing reasons behind it. In fact, a small heatsink like the ones that sued to be installed over Intel South Bridges would be more than enough to efficiently cool Intel P55 Express chipset. There is no need for heatpipes or additional heatsinks at all.

An extra heatsink is not the only drawback in the Biostar TPower I55 mainboard cooling system, but to better understand this we have to point out its obvious advantages first. The mainboard is equipped with a 12-phase processor voltage regulator circuitry: four phases power the CPU and another four – part of the North Bridge integrated into the processor including the memory controller. By the way, they use two-phase regulator for the memory modules. According to “Biostar Dura-MAX” technology, the board is made with contemporary high-quality electronic components, such as solid-state capacitors, for instance. They offer a number of advantages: longer life, more stable characteristics, more efficient use of energy. To ensure even higher energy-efficiency many today’s mainboards with multi-phase processor voltage regulators know to disable inactive phases depending on the processor utilization at the moment. Biostar have their own technology like that called “Biostar G.P.U.” (Green Power Utility). You can see the way this technology works with the help of twelve LEDs located around the processor socket. They light up when the corresponding phase is active and turn off when it is disabled.

Everything seems to be fine, but large heatsinks over the processor voltage regulator components cover these LEDs almost completely. Even inside an open system case like Antec Skeleton we had to be really creative to get a peek under the heatsinks in order to see how many processor voltage regulator phases were active. I have to say that this not very thought-through design of Biostar TPower I55 mainboard makes it nearly impossible to use this interesting feature. In fact, it is not really a drawback, but an example of a technology that is formally there, but in fact doesn’t work.

But let’s get back to the advantages of the Biostar TPower I55 mainboard. It has two graphics card slots that allow building ATI crossfire and Nvidia SLI configurations. The connectors and contacts on the board are color coded, there are Power On and Reset buttons, POST code indicator and even BIO-V (Biostar Voltage Point) control spots next to the 24-pin power connector. They allow you to manually monitor major voltages: processor core voltage, chipset voltage and voltages on different busses.

The back panel of Biostar TPower I55 has the following ports and connectors:

• PS/2 keyboard connector;
• Eight USB ports, six more ports can be connected to onboard pin-connectors;
• IEEE1394 (FireWire) port implemented via LSI FW322 controller, second port is available as an onboard pin-connector;
• Two eSATA ports implemented via JMicron JMB363 controller that also provides PATA drives support;
• Optical and coaxial S/PDIF and six analogue audio-jacks implemented via Realtek ALC888S codec (7.1 + two additional stereo channels (multiple streaming) on the case front panel);
• Two local network ports (network adapters are based on Gigabit Intel 82578DC and Realtek RTL8111DL controllers).

The complete list of Biostar TPower I55 mainboard specifications looks as follows:

As you may see, the beginning of our discussion of Biostar TPower I55 mainboard features and functionality got a slight negative feel. I would like to smooth out any sort of negative impression you may have got at this point. If you take an unbiased look at Biostar TPower I55, you will see a lot of advantages and very few pretty insignificant drawbacks. For instance, not the best location for the floppy drive connector shouldn’t even be regarded as one, because it has already become standard for all contemporary mainboards. Only three fan connectors is a drawback, but not a critical one. Difficulty with checking the status of Biostar G.P.U. technology is also a drawback, but it doesn’t interfere with the work of the technology and its ability to save power. Powerful cooling system may attract an unsophisticated user, but from a practical standpoint an excessively complex cooling system is in fact a drawback. Heatsinks may prevent you from using large processor coolers or interfere with their installation. There is no need for so many heatsinks of such large size and for the heatpipes between them, but we will have to pay extra for this extensive cooling solution when we purchase this mainboard. However, I have to admit that excessive cooling is still better than insufficient cooling. As for other drawbacks, we could also mention the absence of any LEDs indicating that the mainboard receives power at all.

To oppose these several drawbacks found by Biostar TPower I55 mainboard we can mention quite many great advantages. The design of this solution is pretty convenient for system assembly, the functionality of Intel P55 Express chipset has been extended with a number of additional useful controllers. Buttons, POST-code indicator, voltage control spots – all these little things are not a must but are always nice to have. They definitely make your experience with this mainboard much more convenient and make you feel more loyal to the manufacturer. In terms of technical characteristics and features Biostar TPower I55 is as good as the flagship solutions from other manufacturers and I personally liked it a lot.