Biostar H55A+ review

Biostar’s budget H55A+ ATX motherboard is designed for Intel’s socket LGA1156 Core i3, i5 and i7 processors. At around £70, it’s cheaper than most, but it has a rather sparse set of features, with just one PCI-E x1 slot, two PCI slots and a pair of PCI-E x16 slots. We appreciate the layout of these, though; there are no expansion slots directly beneath the main PCI-E x16 slot, so fitting a large graphics card won’t block access to anything else. The second slot can be used for CrossFireX dual graphics card configurations, but only runs at x4, so it best used for other PCI-E cards.

Four memory slots allow you to install up to 16GB of 1,866MHz DDR3 RAM and there are six SATA2 connectors for hard disks and optical drives. There are also three USB headers to connect up to six ports on your case’s front panel or additional back plates. The motherboard’s own back plate is rather minimal. It has the bare essentials of four USB ports, a PS/2 port and three 3.5mm analogue audio outputs from the on-board Realtek ALC662 audio processor. This can only output six-channel (5.1) surround sound, so three audio outputs is enough if you’re prepared to go without a mic. There’s also a full set of integrated graphics outputs – VGA, DVI and HDMI; however, the integrated graphics on compatible processors can’t output Full HD Blu-ray audio, although they can decode Full HD video.

The H55A+ is gratifyingly inexpensive, but it’s not terribly good value for money. Its performance in our tests was adequate, with an Overall score of 126, but its limited range of features, one-year warranty and paucity of USB ports makes it a poor choice overall. If you’re after a budget LGA1156 board, we prefer the Asus P7H55, which costs less and has more USB ports.