Gigabyte GA-Z97X Gaming GT Review

Rakesh Sharma Apr 06, 2015 4102

Gigabyte GA-Z97X Gaming GT Review

At COMPUTEX 2014, a new Intel Z97 chipset based gaming series of motherboards was announced by GIGABYTE and today we have the opportunity to review the latest Gaming motherboard, the GIGABYTE GA-Z97X Gaming GT following the previous Gaming series board with extra features like high end integrated audio, preset UEFI BIOS and software overclocking.

Now let's see what this new Intel Z97 chipset gaming board have for us.

Package

Looking at the front of the box, we see Gigabyte logo with motherboard model no. At the rear of the box, we find that Gigabyte goes into great detail on the specifications of the motherboard. Opening the box gives a glimpse of the actual product.

Inside the box

Looks

Board is a solid build in a black and red colour theme.

Features

Supports 4th and 5th Generation IntelÂ® Coreâ„¢ processors
Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi MB3 gaming audio suite
AMP-UP Audio technology with exclusive Upgradable OP-AMP
Audio Noise Guard with LED path lighting
Dual DAC-UP USB ports
Gold plated display and audio ports
High end Nichicon audio capacitors
Realtek ALC1150 115dB SNR HD Audio with Built-in rear audio amplifier
Killerâ„¢ E2200 gaming networking platform
Extreme gaming 4-way graphics support
SATA Express support for 10 Gb/s data transfer
Long lifespan Durable Black Solid caps
APP Center including EasyTuneâ„¢ and Cloud Stationâ„¢ utilities
GIGABYTE UEFI DualBIOSâ„¢

Specifications

Layout

Detailed layout of board.

1. Intel LGA 1150 socket, supporting current 4th generation and 5th generation CPU.

5x (15Î¼) Gold Plated CPU Socket Design. GIGABYTE 9 Series motherboards come equipped with a gold plated CPU socket, which means that enthusiasts can enjoy absolute reliability and longevity for the CPU socket overtime, without having any concerns about corroded pins and bad contacts.

2. 4 x DIMM slots supporting maximum 32GB of 1600/1333MHz DDR3 or up to 3200(O.C.) DDR3 memory.

3. ATX Power connector (24-pin EATXPWR)

4. ATX CPU Power Connector (8-pin ATX12V).

5. Back Panel Connectors 1 x PS/2 keyboard/mouse port, 1 x D-Sub port, 1 x DVI-D port, 1 x optical S/PDIF, Out connector, 1 x HDMI port, 1 x DisplayPort, 6 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports, 2 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports, 1 x RJ-45 port, 6 x audio jacks (Center/Subwoofer Speaker Out, Rear Speaker Out, Side Speaker Out, Line In, Line Out, Mic In)