Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6 Living Review

[UJM]

There's almost a £70 (GBP) price difference between the i5/750 v the i7/860 (using prices on Scan), I'm thinking that the people who fork out extra for an 860 will do so for it's hyperthreading capabilities and won't be too concerned if it isn't the greatest of overclockers. But this is the third review where I've seen the 860 struggle to reach 4GHz and I'm a bit disappointed given its price. I'm also not convinced about more and more phases on a motherboard being a good thing. I just finished reading a review on the Biostar TPOWER I55 which only has a 12 phase power system, but still managed a 4.2 GHz overclock from the humble i5/750 quite easily, and it's a reasonably priced board at £137. What I've learned from this review is if you want a decent overclock buy an i5/750, and you don't need to spend big bucks on the mobo to get there.

[supershanks]

here's almost a £70 (GBP) price difference between the i5/750 v the i7/860 (using prices on Scan), I'm thinking that the people who fork out extra for an 860 will do so for it's hyperthreading capabilities and won't be too concerned if it isn't the greatest of overclockers

At this stage I think if your thinking about an i7 your better off going x58. It may well be a revision will bring the I7-860 up to expectations.
Regarding phase, yes it does help power regulation and therefore stability, but it's only part of the mix in a decent motherboard, which means we will continue to see, as you pointed out good performance from low count phase mobos.

[UJM]

I bought the MSI P55 GD65 on the day of the promo, got it sitting on a shelf. I was seriously thinking about dropping an 860 into it which is why I'm slightly disappointed in the overclocking results of the 860 on 2 high-end boards. If I keep the MSI board my only choice is i5 /750. If I sell the MSI board I could put that cash towards a mid-range X58 board /i920 combo. Decisions, decisions!

Regarding these high-end P55 motherboards @ £200+, I suspect the more affordable mid-range offerings from the likes of DFI, Biostar, Foxconn etc, will be more than a match for them in the overclocking stakes. Anyway I did get a lots of good info from both of these P55 reviews, and whatever I finally buy will be better than my current E8400 Core 2 Duo.

[Clunk]

There's almost a £70 (GBP) price difference between the i5/750 v the i7/860 (using prices on Scan), I'm thinking that the people who fork out extra for an 860 will do so for it's hyperthreading capabilities and won't be too concerned if it isn't the greatest of overclockers. But this is the third review where I've seen the 860 struggle to reach 4GHz and I'm a bit disappointed given its price. I'm also not convinced about more and more phases on a motherboard being a good thing. I just finished reading a review on the Biostar TPOWER I55 which only has a 12 phase power system, but still managed a 4.2 GHz overclock from the humble i5/750 quite easily, and it's a reasonably priced board at £137. What I've learned from this review is if you want a decent overclock buy an i5/750, and you don't need to spend big bucks on the mobo to get there.

There's a couple of ways to look at the uses for the UD6, one one hand it is a feature packed board with a BIOS to die for and impeccable handling - there's no doubting its quality.

Or, you can pick certain features and say that you don't like/need/want them etc, in which case, a cheaper model would make more sense.

About the 24 phase thing - I agree that it is overkill, but it does run very cool indeed, and I like the idea of the intelligent load balancing, although, how much power this actually saves is impossible to measure, unless you have an identical board without this feature.

But, you are right and currently it is the CPUs that are the limiting factor, so maybe when a new stepping of chip appears, we will start to see a larger performance gap appear between the cheaper and more expensive boards?

[supershanks]

I bought the MSI P55 GD65 on the day of the promo

Did you get the promo price then, out of interest?
Yes the P55 boards i think are pretty decent, early bios as well are pretty good. It's just the hyper threaded CPUs that are at issue.

There are several mid range x58 boards that are comparably priced to the top third of the p55 boards. The i7 920 is around the same as the i7-860, if not cheaper. Tri channel kits can be had reasonably cheap, so if you spend carefully, I reckon there is a minimal premium for x58.

[tonus]

Anyone can tell me something about vdroop with LLC-standard, level 1 & level2.

[Clunk]

What do you want to know?

Tell me what you need to know and I'll test it for you.

[tonschk]

Very well done review , the reviews in this website are very detailed congratulations


It seems that LGA1156 have not very much to envy from the LGA1366 , I was reading a review somewhere else and the final Idea was the LGA1156 is not too much below the LGA1366

[Clunk]

First impressions are that the UD6 is great, but the 860 isn't so great. It was the same story when 1366 launched, the C0 stepping 920 was generally a hot running chip and then the D0 arrived and changed it all

[tonus]

I want to know what is vdroop with LLC-level2