Gigabyte P45 DDR2 & DDR3 Motherboard Roundup

“Gigabyte proves that a mid-range board can hang with its high end brethren. Intel gets some of the credit for its P45 Express chipset, but Gigabyte's implementation in the GA-EP45-DS3R earns much more praise that boos and hisses. A well organized layout is just the beginning, and once fired up, the performance takes over. The EP45 put up impressive benchmarks across the board. Yet it's the overclocking prowess that's the main selling point here. Armed with an Intel Core 2 Duo E8400, we left almost all the settings on Auto and the EP45 ably took our processor from its stock 3.0GHz to over 4GHz. In fact, our testbed's RAM waved the white flag before the motherboard had a chance to, and you may very well find that your complimentary components will end up being the bottleneck, not the motherboard. And for those wanting to tweak, Gigabyte's BIOS offers a bevy of options that are more easily accessible as has been in the past.”

“The Gigabyte GA-EP45T-Extreme is worthy of the Extreme moniker offering stellar performance at both stock and overclocked speeds. It is no wonder that this board has become my primary benchmarking board for Wolfdale processors. It has the ability to hit nearly 100% FSB overclocks under liquid nitrogen and hefty ~80% FSB overclocks on air. Stock performance was exceptional and users with a hankering for more speed can overclock to their hearts' content with only their cooling and processor being their limiting factor.

Enthusiasts looking for a DDR3 board with the P45 chipset should look no further for a top tier performance motherboard. Given how DDR3 prices have plummeted lately, adopting this new platform isn't restricted to solely those who competitively benchmark or have deep pockets. The GA-EP45T-Extreme lives up to its Extreme name and gives the consumer another option in the high-end motherboard arena.”

“I found no issues or problems with the board. It worked well with the original BIOS, and the latest BIOS worked just as well. It was very stable throughout the testing, once I found satisfactory overclock settings.

The EP45T-DS3R sells for $175 at my favorite online retailer. Gigabyte's mainstream P45 boards sell for $250-$265, so if you are willing to do without a few niceties, you can get a good performer and still have a good chunk of change to put on a better processor, memory, or video card. ThinkComputers.org awards the Gigabyte EP45T-DS3R a 9 out of 10 score.”