MSI FM2+, AMD A88X, SATA 6Gb/s, USB 3.0, 2 PCI-E 3.0 (1x16; 2x8) and Micro-ATX Motherboard A88XM-E45

Ordered this as part of a build for someone that also had 32GB of RAM. Great feature is when 16GB RAM sticks come out, this can be upgraded at that time to 64GB of RAM. That, along with the fastest of the Socket FM2 processors (A10 6800K at 4.1 GHz) and a Solid State Drive have that machine running super fast.The problem was it took a while to actually build. The first motherboard I got was defective (bent WAY too much, though that could have been no fault of the manufacturer) and may have damaged the original processor I got (had to get a second processor) while a second motherboard was unable to put in the processor (since I could not know if it was the APU or Motherboard I had to replace both). The third one (replacing both parts) worked great and is currently working as intended.Still would probably buy this board again because sometimes, motherboards can go bad in transit for any number of reasons (it's a known issue with motherboards).

The board mostly is great. The only complaint I have is that the USB controllers are intermittent at best. The USB 2 ports disconnect several times a second. The USB 3 ports are actually usable, however they also have intermittent disconnects. I should RMA the board, but instead I'm just adding a USB 2 card for the mouse and Bluetooth. After some online research this seems to be a common problem on MSI AMD boards. I've never had any issues with MSI in the past, however I think I'll try Biostar next time.

I have always had good results with MSI motherboards. This one appears to be no exception. Bought it for a new PC build for a friend. Has a small footprint inside the case leaving plenty of room to work and have good air flow. The blue colors look great in person too. Love that it has several USB 3.0 ports and VGA, DVI and HDMI graphics ports. Plugged everything in and it booted up without a hitch.Love the BIOS display. Never seen anything like it. But then I haven't done a new build in a while so I was pleasantly surprised at the layout.Note: When you first enter the BIOS the CPU temperature reading is prominently displayed and it may cause some panic. Initial reading was 45 degrees C but it gradually increased to over 60 C. This is a FALSE reading. After updating the BIOS the correct reading showed a steady temp of 43 to 45 C. This, after I had already pulled and re-seated the heatsink/cooling fan on the CPU to no affect. But all is well that ends well.Other than that one temporary glitch I am completely satisfied with this colorful board. Combined with an A8 series quad core processor, 8 GB of RAM and a Solid State drive, it easily jumped through all the hoops an average user could hope for. Nice.

Building your own desktop is a no brainier!When I was looking for a MOBO I needed the following 1) LOTS of RAM 2) CPU compatibilityI'm a photographer I ran with an iMac for the past 7 years and working with Photoshop and Lightroom the resources on your PC need to be semi high end.The install was easy as always the documentation is great easy to read and very clear. The BIO's is very advance I'm not into "Over Clocking" but if someone is your looking at the right board!I also wanted to make sure I bought a board that had an on-board graphics card, I don't do no 3D modeling or play games so I paired this MOBO with the following CPU "AMD A10-Series APU A10-7850K". Since I didn't have a dedicated graphics card the 16GB of RAM I installed dropped to around 14.9 because of the use of the on-board graphics card calling for the RAM.But overall so far so good!5/5 STARS

really not much better than older board wasn't impressed solid board just bios little tricky

This little board packs a good punch and allows for the creation of a beastly gaming rig with the right components.Pros: Has all the features you'd want out of the gate except one minor hiccup for meCons: No easy way to configure Raid

Simple, reliable motherboard. However, you'll want to buy an Intel NIC since the onboard NIC requires a lot of CPU!

great product, only wish some of the ports on the board were easier to plug into.. There a little tight!!