Initial Thoughts On Gigabyte GA X38 DQ6

[jbloggs]

Was initially going to get the Asus P5E WS Pro, but investigated the Gigabyte GA X38 DQ6 a bit further, and found it offered (in the way of features) everything I needed.

I already had the Gigabyte GA P35 DS3P, and was quite impressed with it, as it offered some really nice features for the price.

At the moment I am using BIOS F6b, which is the latest beta, it quite happily OCs my Q6600 @ 3.6GHz (using 1.4000v), with 4GBs of Crucial Ballistix (4 x 1GB) 4-4-4-12 @2T, Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, it would not run @1T with these timings.

At the moment I have it at 3.4GHz, 4-4-4-12.

A few screen shots:

Will endeavour to add more info at a later date.

 

[jbloggs]

Can you update the BIOS via USB stick?

Yes, via Q-Flash, or from floppy or HDD (using FAT32 etc file system), quite simple to do.

 

[jbloggs]

3.6ghz with 1.4v is very good. Is that prime stable?

As to date, I have not run Prime95 etc on it...however, I intend to do so in the coming days...any of the benches I have run (and there have been quite a few) have completed without any issues....

why downclock to 3.4ghz?

If I require any more processing power I can just up the clocks....don't see any reason to run it at the limit all the time when I don't require it....just a personal preference...

can you tell me if the X38 shuts down when you make changes to ram timmings

If I remember correctly, it does, also if I change the (CPU) FSB, but I believe this is to do with the processor rather than the mobo, as my Asus P5WDG2 WS Pro did the same.

supershanks:

I had actually seen your blog before I bought this board, from a link on XtremeSystems, there is quite a long thread on it there which I read through.

 

[jbloggs]

=rafster;10469694]What way do you mount it? the fans facing up or towards the RAM slots? if I put my Noctua facing up (ie mounting fans will be horizontal) the heatsink fouls the RAM slots. Can I do this with the Thermalright fine? Do you know of any good pictures of it in action?

I am using the X38 DQ6 with the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, as already stated, simply remove the "crazy cool" backplate, to enable you to fit the backplate for the extreme, mine is orientated the conventionl way, ie. if looking into the PC Case the top of the heatsink is at 90 degree with the bottom on the case (or parallel with the side of the pc case), the cpu fan attached to the side next to the Ram, so that air is blowing throught the heatsink, and out the back PC Case fan.

This is how you remove the "crazy cool" back plate....