ECS Black Series A785GM-M

The A785GM-M is part of ECS' Black Series line, which targets cash-strapped performance seekers.

Looking over the Black Series we found it the least legacy-friendly motherboard in this grouptest. This is simply because it lacks PS/2 ports, which means you'll have to invest in a new keyboard and mouse if you use devices that rely on those ports.

The A785GM-M's BIOS is a step up from other ECS boards in terms of overclocking. Whereas past Black Series boards only allowed you to modify the CPU and memory frequency, the A785GM-M's BIOS offers those options in addition to various voltage settings. That said the BIOS still lacks the overclocking punch packed by other boards because it still lacks multiplier adjustments and in terms of voltage options, the ranges are quite limited.

The maximum CPU voltage increment you can supply is 0.165volts over default and regarding memory, the top limit is 2.23volts. The increments are also listed in millivolts, rather than volts, so you'll need to manually convert from millivolts to volts, so you know how much voltage you'll actually be applying. (To convert from millivolts to volts divide the number of millivolts by 1000.)

Coming to performance the A785GM-M returned basic results. With the exception of its Street Fighter IV benchmark result, it returned the lowest figures in this grouptest.