Gigabyte z170x gaming 7 review

Gigabyte leader in the manufacture of motherboards, graphics cards and peripherals has launched a wide variety of motherboards from the Gaming series with Z170 chipset. This time it has possibly sent us to one of the motherboards with more quality and overclocking possibilities for less than 220 euros. This is the Gigabyte Z170 Gaming 7 compatible with the unlocked i5-6600k and i7-6700k processors and its 12-phase power supply overclocking potential.

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We thank Gigabyte Spain for trusting the product for its analysis:

Technical characteristics

GIGABYTE Z170X-GAMING 7 FEATURES
CPU	6th Generation Intel® Socket 1151 Core ™ i7 / i5 i3 Core ™ / Core ™ / Pentium® / Celeron® processors Supports Intel® 14nm CPU Supports Intel® Turbo Boost Technology 2.0
Chipset	Intel® Z170 Express Chipset
Memory	4 x DIMM, Max. 64GB, DDR4 3866 (OC) / 3733 (OC) / 3666 (OC) / 3600 (OC) / 3466 (OC) / 3333 (OC) / 3300 (OC) / 3200 (OC) / 3000 (OC) / 2800 (OC) / 2666 (OC) / 2400 (OC) / 2133 MHz for non-ECC, Un-buffered Memory Dual Channel memory architecture Supports Intel® Extreme Memory Profile (XMP)
Multi-GPU Compatible	1 x PCI Express x16 to x16 slot (PCIEX16) 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, (PCIEX8) 1 x PCI Express x16 (PCIEX4) 3 x PCI Express x1 slots (All PCI Express slots conform to PCI Express 3.0 standard) Support for 3-Way / 2-Way AMD CrossFire ™ and 2-Way NVIDIA® SLI ™ Technologies
Storage	8 SATA 6Gb / s connections RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5 and RAID 10 are supported. 2 M.2 connections. 4 SATA Express connections.
USB and ports.	Chipset: - 5 x USB 3.0 / 2.0 ports - 4 x USB 2.0 / 1.1 ports Chipset + Intel USB 3.1 Controller: - 1 x USB Type-C. - 1 x USB 3.1 Type-A (red) on the rear panel. Chipset + GENESYS LOGIC USB 2.0 Hub: - 4x USB 3.0 / 2.1 ports
LAN	1 x Intel GbE LAN chip (10/100/1000 Mbit) (LAN1) 1 x Killer E2400 chip (10/100/1000 Mbit) (LAN2)
Rear connections	1 x S / PDIF Out Optical Connector 1 x USB Type-C ™ Port, with USB 3.1 support 5 x USB 3.0 / 2.0 ports 1 x USB 3.1 Type-A port (network) 1 x HDMI 1 x DisplayPort 2 x RJ-45 port 1 x PS / 2 keyboard / mouse port 5 x audio jacks (Central / Subwoofer, Speaker Out, Rear Speaker Out, Line In / Mic In, Line Out, Headphones)
Audio	High definition audio Support for S / PDIF out Supports Sound Blaster Recon3Di Channels 2 / 5.1 Creative® Sound Core 3D Chip TI Burr Brown® OPA2134 Operational Amplifier
Format	ATX format; 30.5 cm x 24.4 cm
BIOS	Supports DualBIOS 2 x 128 Mbit flash License for the use of UEFI BIOS by AMI PnP 1.0a, DMI 2.7, WfM 2.0, SM BIOS 2.7, ACPI 5.0
Price	225 euros.

Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7

I did not expect less from Gigabyte and it does not make an excellent presentation of its Z170X-Gaming 7 board. It uses a large hard cardboard box, on the cover we see all the benefits of this new series, while at the bottom we have all the features more important (which are not exactly few).

The bundle is made up of:

Gigabyte Z170X Gaming motherboard 7.Back plate. Instruction manual and quick guide. CD with drivers. SATA cables. SLI bridges. Stickers and poster.

It is an ATX format motherboard with dimensions of 30.5cm x 24.4cm fully compatible with any box on the market. No place this is a high end motherboard, its looks, components and dissipation are top notch. If we look we have two large heatsinks in charge of cooling the power supply phases and the chipset (southern area). They are big and solid enough, Gigabyte has chosen the combination of black, white and red colors to give a very pleasant touch to the eye.

As in the entire Z170 series, it has four DDR4 RAM sockets that allow us to install up to 64GB with high frequencies of 3866 Mhz with previous overclocking and, as expected, it is compatible with the XMP 1.3 profile.

12 phases power and gold plated socket

It has a total of 1 2 phases of power distributed in 16 + 4 + 2. As expected, it has Ultra Durable technology with long-lasting components, among them we find 10K Chemi-Con capacitors and Turbo B-Clock technology that allows 5% more overclocking. It also features a custom socket with gold plated pins that increases processor performance and stability.

Turbo B-Clock chip

Shielded PCI Express Connections

In the PCI Express connections, it has 3 PCI Express 3.0 ports compatible with 2 Way Nvidia SLI and 3 Way CrossFireX technology that incorporate the new stainless steel shield that reinforces the connectors against heavy graphics cards.

It also has three PCI Express x1 connections to connect controllers, sound cards and tuners.

Double M.2 connection with a custom bandwidth of up to 32Gb / s that Gigabyte has standardized throughout this series. As I have commented in all the analyzes, this connection comes great to take advantage of the new SSD disks with this interface and ideal for compact equipment.

AMP-UP Audio sound card It has the Sound Core 3D chip that includes AMP-UP Audio technology with support for 7.1 channels and OP-AMPs. The latter allows us to customize the sound quality depending on personal preferences with removable chips. Obviously we found an impressive improvement in sound quality with dynamic audio and greater clarity. As we speak, it is vital to tell you about the USB DAC-UP that offers a clean, noise-free power delivery to the digital-to-analog converter. DAC (Digital-to-Analog Converter) can be sensitive to fluctuations in the power supply of other USB ports, and for this reason the GIGABYTE USB DAC-UP takes advantage of an isolated power supply that minimizes possible fluctuations and ensures the best experience audio possible.

Three SATA Express and eight SATA III connections available In the storage section, it offers 8 SATA 6Gb / s connections with RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5 and RAID 10 support. It also shares three SATA Express connections for disks with a bandwidth of up to 16 GB / s, which as of today there are no units available but it is not ruled out that in the near future it will not be good for us to have them.

Gold plated rear connections Finally I detail the complete rear connections:

2 x USB 2.0.1 x PS / 2.1 xUSB 3.0 Type C.3 x USB 3.0.DisplayportHDMI. 2 x Gigabit LAN.Digital audio output. 7.1.

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Here is a sample of how the LED system of the entire Gigabyte X99 series and Z170 Gaming works.

Test bench and tests

TESTING BENCH
Processor:	Intel i7-6700k.
Base plate:	Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7
Memory:	4 × 4 16GB DDR4 @ 3200 MHZ Corsair LPX DDR4
Heatsink	Corsair H100i GTX.
HDD	Samsung 840 EVO 250GB.
Graphic card	Nvidia GTX 780.
Power supply	EVGA SuperNOVA 750 G2

To check the stability of the processor and motherboard, we've overclocked up to 4500mhz with Prime 95 Custom and air cooling. The graphics that we have used is an Nvidia GTX780, without further distractions let's see the results obtained in our tests with a 1920 × 1080 monitor.

BIOS

Like the Socket 1150 Gigabyte, it has released a very stable BIOS with a large overclocking capacity. Screen freezing or peripheral locking no longer appear. It still maintains all its benefits: fan control, temperature sensor, excellent overclocking ability and customize any parameter to our liking.

As expected Gigabyte maintains the Q-Flash PLUS technology that it used on its X99 motherboards. This application allows us to update our equipment to the latest BIOS without the need to mount a processor or RAM memory. Gigabyte has used the ITE EC 8951E controller, which sends the signal to an LED next to the EC controller, which will notify us that the process has finished and the system can now be started normally.

Final words and conclusion

Gigabyte has defined one of the best socket 1151 motherboards for both aesthetics, components, and excellent performance. It has a very aggressive design (very Gamer-style) with 12 power phases, the possibility of mounting multiple graphics cards in SLI or CrossFire and a very stable BIOS.

Sound is one of the great strengths of this team by incorporating the Creative 3DCore chip, it also allows us to use headphones with 600 ohms of power, very complete software and USB with DAC-UP technology. It also has two network cards, the first is the excellent Killer E2400 Gigabit that will lower latency when we play and a second Intel.

Regarding performance, we have put our processor up to 4700 mhz, although we have passed the tests at 4500 Mhz. The results are very similar to the Gigabyte Z170 G1 Gaming… excellent performance. Good job!

It is currently in stores for 223 euros (Amazon) and seeing the price of the motherboards on the market seems to me one of the best quality / price boards.

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ COMPONENTS.	- USE FIXED HARDWARE ON HEATSINKS.
+ LAN KILLER.	- AT LEAST 8 SATA CONNECTIONS.
+ DUAL M.2.
+ SOUND CARD WITH AMPLIFIER.
+ PERFORMANCE IN GAMES.
+ STABLE BIOS.