Best overclocker of the P55 bunch.
One of the first manufacturers out of the gates with a P55-based motherboard was the big blue giant GIGABYTE, slotting first in line to get tested with the i7 870 chip. We've held GIGABYTE in good stead many times before, so we've got high expectations for this board - and we weren't disappointed.
As mentioned, this motherboard is running Intel's latest P55 Express chipset, a chip which is manufactured on a 65nm process and contains all the storage options available on the motherboard. It also links with the components onboard to give audio and networking capabilities, and is the sole chipset. Slotting inbetween the CPU and PCIe slots are four thin chips just below the first PCIe x16 slot, called Packet Switch chips, and these allow the PCIe lanes to be rerouted to the remaining slots in the presence of multiple graphics cards. Unfortunately for those planning on running multiple cards, two cards will run in 8x8 PCIe 2.0 mode - and the bottom slot will only run at 4x speed. Still, they're equally as compatible with other PCIe devices, and a single graphics card isn't too restrictive.
The area around the LGA1156 socket is the most packed we've ever personally seen, with a whopping 24 phases of power available for the CPU. Each of the PWMs around this are treated to their own heatsink, incredibly styled in a race-car theme that looks very sexy (though perhaps a darker PCB colour would make it even more attractive). There's plenty of room around this socket for heatsinks, but the first DDR3 slot will be blocked due to close proximity. Six slots are used, though due to the dual-channel limitation this only allows more memory to be used - not a performance increase. A power button sits at the top-right - incredibly handy for overclocking - and is out of the way of graphics cards.
Ten right-angled SATA ports line up along the right-hand side of the mobo, and while they're not the SATA 3.0 ports we'd heard musings about they are RAID capable. An IDE port is included for those who stick to their old-school tech, and even a floppy port makes an appearance at the bottom of the board. An LED POST screen is in the corner next to the front panel headers, but doesn't show anything once booted into the OS. One small CMOS button is also in this corner. USB and Firewire headers lie along the bottom edge, but the audio is tucked near the I/O ports in typical GIGABYTE fashion.
I/O options are great, with one PS/2, eight USB, Optical/Coaxial, 6-pin Firewire, 4-pin Firewire, two Ethernet and 7.1 channel audio (off a Realtek ALC889A). The cooling array is a little silly however; while the P55 chip in the middle could be cooled by that heatsink alone, there is no Southbridge at all - rather just an aluminium cap that sits there and looks pretty. This was evidenced by the very cool running temp, needing very little airflow.
Overclocking performance was the best we've seen yet, rocketing all the way to 193x22 for a final speed of 4246MHz. The BIOS was incredibly clear, and the board felt more solid than three-foot lead plating. While performance wasn't as good as ASUS' board, this one is the board of choice for overclocking champions.
Smart SixGIGABYTE has tooled with the 16MB BIOS chips on this mobo, and include six programs to speed up boot time, auto-overclock the CPU, recover the system to a previous state, store passwords, monitor file changes and even a Bluetooth-powered harddrive encryption system - nice one!
Issue: 107 | December, 2009