Best Processor for GA - M61PME S2P ?

Review of this motherboard clear shows that its a Am2+ board, due to bios update we can manually turn it into Am3 giving it a new platform.

 If you plan to insert a new processor in that board, you really have to take care of these following problems :

1. If you install AMD AM3/ AM2+ CPU on AM2 motherboard, the system bus speed will    downgrade from HT3.0 (5200MT/s) to HT1.0 (2000 MT/s) spec; however, the frequency of AM3/ AM2+ CPU will not be impacted. 

2. Max TDP is only 95 watts 

Note : The processor must have to consume only 95 watts of power supply, so the following processors are supported :

Phenom™ X4 processor/ AMD Phenom™ X3 processor/ AMD Athlon™ X2 processor/ AMD Athlon™ processor/ AMD Sempron™ X2 processor/ AMD Sempron™ processor 

Note : Phenom II processors are not supported for this board.


Updating Bios 
In order to support AM3 processors bios has be updated, if not you will see that the system doesn't  recognize the model of processor it displays  as  AMD PROCESSOR MODEL UNKOWN. 

You can update the bios to a more recent by downloading the files from this official gigabyte site
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3262#bios 

Download the latest bios F7B and install them through QFLASH by entering  bios setup.