Via gets back into chipset game

WE SAW quite a few Asus, MSI and others motherboards using Via chipsets. It turns out that the Via P4M890 north bridge and the Via 8237A south bridge might actually mean that there should be some affordable Conroe boards after all. The chipset can handle FSB 533, 800 and 1066 but it supports only DDR 2 400 and DDR 2 533.

Asus P5V-VM board will use this combination and it comes with integrated graphic but supports SATA Raid, has PCIe 16X slot and HD audio.

That's not all as Asus also makes P5VDA -MX, Intel Core Extreme/DUO ready boards again micro ATX but this time uses discrete P4M890 Northbridge and the same Via 8237A south bridge. The chipset is again limited to DDR 533 MHz memory only but we can bet that it will be cheap.

We remember seeing many Asrock boards using this chipset as well, so Via is slowly but surely getting back into the chipset game. It will take it some time but it can regain some market share.

Asus also has AM2 based K8T890 board that uses the same Via 8237A south bridge comes in a full ATX factor, supports single PCIe 16X slot, four PCI slots, DDR 2 800 support, Gbit LAN and SATA 2 and HD audio. It is called M2V and should be out soon. µ