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- Date:
- Thursday , January 20, 2011
- Author:
- Daniel Dobrowolski
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
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Gigabyte P67A-UD7 Motherboard Review
Gigabyte is one of many manufacturers on the Sandy Bridge and P67 chipset bandwagon. We examine its latest offering, the P67A-UD7. A high end solution designed for the gamer and the hardware enthusiast. With so many P67 boards already out there to choose from, just how does the P67A-UD7 stack up?
Introduction
Gigabyte is one of the largest motherboard manufacturers operating today. Gigabyte itself was founded over 20 years ago. While best known as a motherboard manufacturer its product portfolio is actually larger than you might imagine. Its list of products encompasses everything from motherboards, notebooks, server and data center oriented solutions and even video cards. This list doesn’t even stop there continuing on into consumer electronics such as cellular phones.
The company advertises many first including the first USB 3.0 equipped motherboard, first motherboard equipped with all Japanese manufactured all solid electrolytic capacitors and more. This solidifies their position as innovators and even as one of the industry's leading companies.
The Gigabyte P67A-UD7 is based on Intel’s P67 Express chipset and LGA1155 socket. It is therefore compatible with Intel’s Core i5 / i7 2xxx series parts. Like the P55 Express chipset before it functions such as the memory controller and PCIe controller have been moved into the CPU’s die. Thus simplifying the chipset design. Like Westmere based Core processors, these new Sandy Bridge based Core i5’s and i7’s have integrated video. Though you need a motherboard with the actual monitor port to use it. Additionally there have been some improvements to the chipset, most notably is support for SATA 6G devices. Two of the six ports are SATA 6G capable and the rest are only 3G ports. Memory support has been increased to 32GB using 8GB DIMMs.
Gigabyte seems to have pretty much abandoned its blue and pastel color scheme opting for basic black. This board is also equipped with NVIDIA’s nForce 200MCP. Love it or hate it, it's here. Actually having it isn’t all bad as it allows for more devices to be connected to the PCIe controller integrated into Sandy Bridge based processors than normal. This board also therefore supports SLI, 3-Way SLI and even Quad-SLI using dual GPU cards. Support is much the same on the AMD side as it supports Crossfire and CrossFireX as well. The board’s design touts 24-phase power and full VRD 12 compliance. Unlike what we saw with ASUS’ latest boards going to fully digital power circuitry the P67A-UD7 appears to be a "hybrid analog / digital" design. The board has the same Driver MOSFETs used in earlier designs. Like earlier designs the P67A-UD7 also features a 2oz copper PCB, ferrite chokes and all Japanese solid electrolytic capacitors.
The most standout feature here though is that this board is well prepared for USB 3.0 as it has at least 8 USB 3.0 ports. It does this through the use of multiple USB 3.0 controllers. The manual is somewhat confusing in regard to which USB ports are which in terms of USB 3.0 or 2.0 capabilities. There are a total of 18 USB ports on the board however. That’s by far the most I’ve ever seen. This is also the first board I’ve ever seen with proper USB 3.0 headers on the PCB. A USB 3.0 bracket is included so that you may make use of them.
Main Specifications Overview:
Detailed Specifications Overview:
Packaging
The packaging is fairly standard for Gigabyte boards. It uses a ton of packaging but the outer box is thin and prone to tearing. It’s clad in a black and gold color scheme reminiscent of the black and gold Smokey and the Bandit Trans Am made famous in those films. The box is huge and heavy but doesn’t contain as many accessories as you might think. Included in the box are the following accessories: quick start guide, user’s manual, CPU socket warning in multiple languages, driver disc, SLI bridge, 3-Way SLI bridge, I/O shield, SATA cables, external I/O bracket with eSATA ports and a 4 pin Molex connector for power.
Board Layout
The color scheme found on the packaging carries onto the motherboard itself as the board PCB is all black as are all the slots and most of the connectors. The heat sinks themselves are a dark grey with some gold accents. The board is actually very sleek looking and it’s easily the best looking motherboard I’ve ever seen Gigabyte make. Normally its color schemes aren’t in good taste, at least not in my opinion but I like this one. The PCB is marked as "Rev: 1.0." As for the layout itself, it’s pretty solid with very few potential issues. There are a couple of issues which I’ll get to in a moment.
The CPU socket area is relatively clear of obstructions. Only the largest cooling solutions could have clearance issues. MOSFETs are cooled by a large heat pipe solution which connects to the nForce 200 MCP and the P67 Express chipset. This is one of the nicest looking cooling solutions I’ve ever seen. Elegant in its simplicity. Unlike the ASUS P8P67 WS Professional, the CPU socket is clear of resistors or other components on the back side allowing me to mount the bolt-through kit for the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme and any other back plate which might have a similar design.
The P67A-UD7 has all black memory slots. This poses a problem to people who do not know how to install memory in dual channel mode. If you are populating all the slots it’s not a big deal, or if you know how it works on other boards, again no problem. For noobies though, it may convolute things at best and at worst they may run memory in single channel mode without knowing any better robbing them of performance. Of course if you read the manual this is not an issue. Aside from that the memory slots are placed well with enough room to allow enough clearance to install memory modules with large video cards installed. The slots are also far enough away from the CPU area to leave room for larger cooling solutions.
The south bridge is cooled by the same cooling solution which handles the MOSFETs and even the nForce 200MCP which is located where the north bridge would be on say an X58 chipset based motherboard. The heat sink on the south bridge is actually rather tall. Despite the incredible heat pumped out of the nForce 200MCP, the MOSFETS and P67 chipset coolers remain relatively cool to the touch. One thing I don’t like there is that the height of the south bridge cooler causes video cards such as my 9800GTX+ to actually rest on it. I don’t like the fact that they end up making contact. Gigabyte could have reduced the height of the chipset cooler slightly to prevent this. Why they didn’t is beyond me. I don’t think it will cause any significant problems but it’s a mistake that didn’t have to be made.
The expansion slot area is OK. It’s not the best setup I’ve ever seen. The top most PCI-Express x1 slot is nearly useless due to the large chipset cooler impeding on this area. Even the manual makes mention of that. Gigabyte's solution being to use one of the other slots instead. If you have a 3-Way SLI setup or a similar CrossFireX setup, this of course isn’t possible. Gigabyte chose to retain two legacy PCI slots. I think that’s a bit much but I’m sure the feature will be attractive to some people.
The I/O panel area is about as full as I’ve ever seen. It has your standard PS/2 keyboard / mouse port, IEEE1394 A and B style ports, optical and S/PDIF out, dual RJ-45 jacks and of course 6 mini-headphone jacks for audio output. Among the highlights here are the dual eSATA / USB 3.0 port connectors and the total of 10 USB ports. The manual is somewhat confusing as to which ports are USB 2.0 and which are USB 3.0.