Customer Reviews

Gigabyte Intel X58/Intel ICH10R Intel X58 ATX DDR3 2200 LGA 1366 Motherboard (GA-X58A-UD3R)

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I picked up one of these for my latest system build, and I'm pleased to say that it booted up perfectly the first time and has been running rock-solid ever since.

Here is the hardware that I'm using with it:
1) Core I7 920 CPU
2) 12GB Corsair DDR3 1600 memory (9-9-9-24)
3) Seasonic M12II 620w PSU
4) Radeon 5770 1GB (running 2 screens @ 2560x1600 & 1200x1600)
5) Intel X25M-G2 160GB SSD

I am a C programmer and I tend to use my system heavily. A typical work load would be running Windows 7 x64 with 2 copies of Visual Studio + VMware Workstation 7 with up to 4 or 5 VMs running simultaneously, and all the other source control and debug utilities that I am using at any given time. This system breezes through that like butter.

The main issue I typically have is that I keep my PC locked in an enclosed cabinet with only one 92mm intake fan and a 120mm exhaust fan vented into the garage - both are running at low speeds to keep it quiet. Because of that, my hardware needs to run solid at fairly high temps. In this system, the CPU temps have gotten as high as 160F and I haven't seen any instability at all.

I used to only buy Asus motherboards until a few years ago when their quality started to drop off. Now I only buy these Gigabyte 'durable' boards and they have all been true to their name for the kind of stress I run them under. This board hasn't had any problems at all going in or out of standby (S3) either.

Personally, I don't overclock anything anymore (I got sick of burned up hardware when I blew up my P90 system 15 years ago); but this motherboard is extremely flexible if you are inclined to do that.

Overall, I highly recommend this board if you are looking for a solid entry in the socket 1366 space.

I run a data-mining workstation and a database server so I need something stable, expandable and reliable. I've been around computers since the days of the green screens and have built my last 5 machines. I had an Asus dual-processor motherboard that died in less than a year. It wasn't terribly stable with higher-end video cards and iffy about the memory it took. (Check out reviews of the Z8NA-D6C on the web.) When the replacement Asus board failed, I decided to go back to Giga-Byte since I'd used their board on a desktop I built in 2005 - a desktop that still runs. Just looking at the board revealed Giga-Byte's attention to detail and quality. Two PCI x16 slots with enough room between and around them to handle large video cards (I have a PNY Quadro FX4700X2 quad-monitor output that takes up two card slots). 6 triple-channel memory modules that aren't all scrunched up against the CPU slot. Heat shields and heat sinks on the critical components (higher quality stuff than other boards I investigated). Multiple on-board USB connectors for the front panel. On-board voltage indicator lights (seemed gimmicky till I started overclocking.) You get the idea. I configured it with an i7 930 @ 2.8 Ghz, 24 GB of RAM, Quadro 4700X2 Card, Xonar audio card and 5 drives. Boots up without a hitch and runs flawlessly. I overclocked it using the Giga-Byte EasyTune utility, which makes overclocking ridiculously easy and is very helpful given the i7 requires adjustments to Base Clock, voltages etc. Has run overclocked without blinking and has handled everything I've thrown at it. The BIOS is quite user-friendly and will make overclockers smile. While it isn't dual-processor, overclocking, tweaking the data models to run faster and having overall system stability more than make up for the lack of a second processor. A dual-processor machine isn't very helpful if you're constantly spending time managing and/or rebuilding it.

I ended up liking this board so much I went back and bought a second board for my database server and snapped in a hardware RAID card. I know the board wasn't intended for "server-grade" stuff but it does just fine.

Overall, 5 stars.

Google "GA-X58A-UD3R Reboot loop" This is a VERY common problem with these motherboards. There is no fix for it, other than to put ANOTHER processor in the board and upgrade your BIOS. It's unacceptable for Gigabyte to be sending out boards which don't work with a VERY common CPU (I have an i950 processor). Had I known that there were processor issues I would not have bought this.

Second: Gigabyte does NOT have US phone support. Were I to want support for this board, I would have had to e-mail Taiwan and wait for them to respond to me. That is totally unacceptable. Even Asus, another Taiwanese company, has US based phone support.

Conclusion:It was between this board and an EVGA, and I stupidly went with Gigabyte because of the performance ratings of this board. Performance doesn't matter if the board doesn't work and there is no one you can contact to find out why your motherboard is in a reboot loop. EVGA has 24 hour technical support and that swayed my decision. (I had an Asus Rampage II that died and I wasn't buying another Asus).

This is an amazing motherboard. I paired it with an Intel i7 920, 6 GB of OCZ 1333 MHz memory, a 500 watt OCZ power supply and an eVGA Nvidia GTS 250. (the 1GB version). Rock solid stability and amazing performance.

I built a new system based on this board, and everything worked fine except that it won't "warm boot"; that is, after you shut it down, it won't power back on unless you unplug it first.

So I bought a new motherboard -- exact same model -- and the new board wouldn't boot at all. It lights for 4 seconds, shuts off for 4 seconds, then lights up for 4 seconds, shuts off again... etc., until you pull the power. Presumably a short in a switch somewhere (yes, I also tried it with the the case switches disconnected).

So I switched to the Asus P6X58D Premium, and my system works like a champ. I'm sure I could have gotten the Gigabyte board to work if I tried enough of them, but I'm not getting paid to QA their products for them.

When you spend weeks researching and days building, seeing your system boot ( and hearing that happy, single "beep,") the first time you mash the power button is pure pleasure.

I received Rev. 2, and I'm happy with the board. I put a Core i7-950 on it, along with 12 GB of Corsair Dominator RAM, and an EVGA nVidia GTX 460.

Gamers can tell right away from my GPU that I didn't set out to build a monster gaming machine. I just wanted something that would be fast, stable, and capable of handling any virtual machines, multimedia, photo editing, video processing, and moderate gaming I throw at it.

I'm using a Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus, which, because of the RAM, would not fit with the fan in the push position. No problem, I just put the fan on the other side of the heatsink, pulling air through. My idle temps are 36 - 37 C, ambient temperature of about 27 C. I've been watching the temps and haven't seen them go above 47 C in three days, but I have not loaded any heavy duty games, just done a lot of installing and running of office and multimedia apps.

By the way I'm using a Cooler Master HAF X, which I'm sure really helps with the temps.

Before installing Windows 7 Pro, I did read on the Web about using SATA port 0 just for the installation, and I followed that advice, later switching my twin WD Caviar HDD's to the SATA 3.0 ports. My file transfer speeds between those two HDD's now are very fast, about 90 - 105 MB per sec, depending on the number of files in the transfer batch.

My USB, SATA, and Firewire ports are all behaving after installing the latest drivers from Gigabyte. I am sticking with the current BIOS, version FE, unless problems develop.

This board is made very well. All the capacitors, connectors, and rear ports are straight, and there are no rough edges anywhere. The material of the board itself feels strong, and I was glad of that when installing the Hyper 212 Plus and seating the RAM and cables.

For me, the eSATA ports in the back were important, so I went with this over a similar board from another company.

The BIOS interface is pretty straightforward, with good explanations in the included manual.

I had no trouble with installation, the system is running fast and stable, and I have more room to add cards and drives.

I bought my first Gigabyte motherboard while in China in 2003, and I'm relieved and happy to see they have kept their high standards.

EDIT: One more feature, rarely mentioned: The sound is excellent. I have no reason to add a sound card. Much more oomph than any integrated I've heard before, oomph with quality!

Have done a lot of research and this motherboard is exactly what i was looking for. It holds up strong and has a lot of scope for future expansion. I am running i7 930, 12 GB DDR3 - Corsair High performance, 650W Thermal Take, 1 TB Hard Drive, 1 GB DDR5 Graphic. Comes with the factory gigagbyte software GUI that can tweak your mobo to run at overclocked turbo mode. Make sure you have a good CPU cooler, stock intel won't do.

OVERALL would rate it a "9/10"

it comes with a fabulous manual easy to understand... used this motherboard for my first custom built pc and everything went smoothly. i recomend it since it got good performance and good stability.

comes with alot of software you might wana intall or might not. like program wich takes about 1Gb that links your celphones bluetooth to your computer... then if you at any point are way to far away. computer will atomatically shut down. but you cant be using any other bluetooth app in your celphone. so it claims to be ecological but for me its just a waste of memory.other than that you can do overclocking with an understandable interface and got stuff that update yor bios so you can flash them later. anyway i recomend it if you trust gigabyte.

This board is overall one of my favorites. Originally I was a little iffy buying from a brand like Gigabyte, but they truly give a lot of bang for the buck.

I built my own rig with this motherboard, and what stood out the most were how many PCI (and PCI-e) slots I could utilize, the USB 3.0, and the Smart Energy Saver tech or something named similar.

Very good board. Recommended this to many people already.

I've had this board about a month. It was easy to install, it's loaded with options. It looks incredibly well built. It has an awesome "Quick boot" option which gets me to the Windows desktop in under 10 seconds.
Very cool.

The only negative thing I can say about it is that the USB-keyboard-on-boot option is off in the BIOS settings by default, so you'll need a serial keyboard adapter to get in to BIOS to change it.