MSI A75MA-G55 AMD Socket FM1 Motherboard Review

MSI A75MA-G55 Motherboard Review

MSI has been making mainstream and enthusiast level motherboards for 25 years now, and have never failed to bring a quality product to the table! With a little bit of luck today will be no different. If you haven’t guessed it yet, we will be taking a look at the MSI A75MA-G55 motherboard. The MSI A75MA-G55 motherboard is built for the new AMD A Series APU’s and uses the new FM1 socket design.

The MSI A75MA-G55 APU motherboard is built using the same Military Class II high quality components that we have been finding on the recent MSI Motherboards that we have looked at. The Military Class II technology features Hi-c capacitors, Super Ferrite Chokes, and Solid Capacitors. The Hi-c Caps (highly conductive capacitors) have a life expectancy eight times that of a Solid Capacitor and have a higher thermal stability. The core of the Hi-c Capacitors features a Tantalum Core which is a rare and highly stable material. Also making up the Military Class II components are Super Ferrite Chokes (SFC). The SFC’s use a Ferrite core that is Super-Permeable. This allows the Super Ferrite Chokes to run at a 35 degree Celsius lower temperature, have a 30% higher current capacity, which is a 10% improvement in power efficiency and better overclocking power stability. The last component of the Military Class II is Solid Caps (Solid Capacitors). The solid capacitors have an ultra long lifetime in excess of 10 years. Advantages of the solid capacitors include no explosions, low ESR and a lower temperature!

The MSI A75MA-G55 has a lot of features packed into a micro ATX platform. One of the features from MSI that I have always enjoyed is the OC Genie II. The OC Genie II is an extremely easy way to make an already fast system that much faster. Auto overclocking with the OC Genie II isn’t going to break any world record overclocks, but it’s not meant to. It’s designed to give a rock solid boost to your system with minimal effort on your part. Every time that I have used it across the various MSI motherboards we have looked at, it has done exactly that.

Aside from the Military Class II components and the OC Genie II, the MSI A75MA-G55 still has a number of features worth mentioning. Among these is Winki 3. Winki 3 is a free Linux based operating system that boots up in as little as 25 seconds. Once inside Winki 3 you will have internet access for e-mail, instant messaging and just about anything else online. We also have features like Click BIOS, i-Charger for intelligent charging of your smart phone/tablet, M-Flash, AMD Dual Graphics and, of course, AMD CrossfireX.

MSI A75MA-G55 APU Motherboard Specifications

CPU	AMD Llano APU
Chipset	AMD Hudson D3
DDR3 Memory	Supports four unbuffered DIMM of 1.5 Volt DDR3 1066/1333/1600 DRAM, 32GB Max
Expansion Slots	2 PCI Express gen2 x16 slots – PCI_E1 supports up to PCIE x16 speed – PCI_E2 supports up to PCIE x4 speed 1 PCIE x1 slot 1 PCI x1 slot
On-Board SATA	6 SATA 6Gb/s ports by AMD Hudson D3 – Supports storage and data transfers at up to 6Gb/s
LAN	Realtek PCI-E GbLAN controller RTL8111E – Supports 10Mb/s, 100Mb/s and 1000Mb/s – Compliance with PCI-Express Bus specification v1.0a
TPM	2 USB 3.0 rear ports by AMD Hudson D3 1 USB 3.0 onboard pinheader by AMD Hudson D3
USB 3.0 ports (Rear)	2 USB 3.0 rear ports by AMD Hudson D3 1 USB 3.0 onboard pinheader by AMD Hudson D3
Internal I/O Connectors	– 1 x ATX 24-pin power connector – 1 x ATX 4-pin 12V CPU power connector – CPU x 1 / System x 1 FAN connectors – 1 x Front panel audio connector – 1 x Front panel connector – 2 x USB 2.0 connectors – 1 x USB 3.0 connector – 6 x Serial ATA 6Gb/s connectors – 1 x Serial port connector – 1 x Parallel port connector – 1 x Clear CMOS jumper – 1 x TPM module connector – 1 x Chassis Intrusion connector
Back Panel I/O Ports	– 1 x PS/2 keyboard or mouse – 1 x Graphic Card port – 1 x HDMI port – 1 x DVI-D port – 4 x USB 2.0 ports – 2 x USB 3.0 ports – 1 x RJ45 LAN jack – 1 x 6 in 1 audio jack
DirectX	Microsoft DirectX 11
Form Factor	M-ATX
Multi-GPU Support	AMD CrossfireX, AMD Hybrid Crossfire

The MSI A75MA-G55 surely has a lot to offer for a board that retails for as little as $101.76! Join us on the next page where we will take a look at the retail packaging and bundle for the MSI A75MA-G55, followed by the layout and the MSI Click BIOS.