In conclusion the nVIDIA GeForce 7050PV offers a modest upgrade over the GeForce 6150 and brings nVIDIA up to spec with AMD and its 690G integrated chipset.

The nVIDIA GeForce 7050PV addresses two main areas where the GeForce 6150 was seriously lacking today's multimedia heavy homes. With the inclusion of native HDMI and more importantly HDCP support, the GeForce 7050PV allows you to play encrypted Blu-Ray/HD-DVD content on a large HDTV.

Time will tell whether the nVIDIA GeForce 7050PV will be as successful as the GeForce 6150 was, but at this point PCSTATS would be just as happy building a system on either nVIDIA's GeForce 7050PV or AMD's 690G. Although, given the track record of nVIDIA with chipsets, I'm starting to lean towards the GeForce 7050PV for my future Home Theatre PC...

The Biostar TF7050-M2 motherboard retails for about $98 CDN ($90 USD, £43GBP), or for a little less than that at ZipZoomFly.com. Elsewhere, NCIX and ClubIT also have the board in stock. Either way you cut it, the nVidia 7050PV is as affordable as AMD's 690G platform.

As PCSTATS has seen in this review, the board has a decent set of integrated goodies; 4 Serial ATA II ports, a Gigabit network card, 7.1 channel High Definition Azalia audio controller and of course the integrated GeForce 7050 videocard. Biostar is clearly aiming the TF7050-M2 at the home theatre market, and we are very pleased that it integrates both S-Video and HDMI video outputs into the rear I/O of the motherboard. HDMI in particular is the connection standard of choice for High Definition content, as it transfers video signals and audio over one compact cable.

From a performance standpoint in Windows Vista Ultimate, the Biostar TF7050-M2 motherboard handled all the benchmarks PCSTATS threw at it very well. In the office oriented benchmarks and the handful of DirectX 9.0C compliant games we were able to test with in Vista this board held its own. While the onboard GeForce 7050 videocard is the fastest integrated thing available, none of the onboard graphics options are truly 3D videogame ready. Repeat, none. In 2D applications the GeForce 7050 and indeed the AMD 690G are more than sufficient for the task.

The GeForce 7050PV chipset will not allow you to run an expanded desktop if a stand alone PCI Express videocard is installed (ie three monitors, two connected to the videocard, one to the motherboard). However with a videocard like the popular GeForce 8800GTS 320MB plugged in, performance is sweet.

The Biostar TF7050-M2 motherboard was even pretty good at overclocking, it hit a maximum motherboard clock speed of 285 MHz! There were some pretty decent memory tweaking options in the BIOS as well, it's nice to see that even though this board is aimed at the entry level market it still has a bit of flair.

Expect a flurry of nVIDIA GeForce 7050PV motherboards to hit the streets - nVIDIA has itself a great chipset here. Biostar has done an excellent with the TF7050-M2 motherboard and you'll be well served if it fits into the mold of your new PC.

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