GIGABYTE Tease X79 Refresh: X79 G1.Assassin 3
by Ian Cutress on September 12, 2013 5:55 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Intel
- Gigabyte
- X79
- IDF 2013
With plenty of eyes all around IDF, there are some oppertune moments to see some exciting hardware on display. Over at VR-Zone, these eyes caught glimpst of GIGABYTE's entrant into the X79 refresh: the G1.Assassin 3. This motherboard follows the G1 line of gaming motherboards with green and black styling, but one of the main additions over the previous X79 line is the OP-AMP technology as seen on particular Z87, B85 and H81 models.
Alongside using the 2011 socket and being based on the X79 chipset, the motherboard looks to support four-way SLI and Crossfire, a full compliment of DIMMs, use at least one USB 3.0 controller for a total of four onboard USB 3.0 ports, and a SATA 6 Gbps controller to total four SATA 6 Gbps ports. I would be surprised if we did not have IR3550 VRMs for the power delivery - I would expect GIGABYTE to be using either 40A or 60A versions for their 8 power phases.
The gold slot on the rear IO is a little confusing - it seems big enough for a HDMI port or a USB port, although without a higher definition image or a rear IO shot it is hard to determine. Update: the gold port would be for USB.DAC-UP, initially seen on H81, designed to supply cleaner power for USB DACs. From the image above the motherboard also comes with an 802.11ac / BT4.0 WiFi card, which I would assume comes as a seperate PCIe x1 card given previous GIGABYTE models (and the lack of antenna ports on the rear IO). We also see wording for dual NICs, one of which would be a Killer NIC shown by the logo. Despite VR-Zone stating Thunderbolt 2.0 support, I cannot see on the motherboard a TB chip nor wording to this effect - it would also prove an interesting PCIe layout which would make the board more complicated.
Despite Ivy Bridge-E being released, very few manufacturers have gone forward with an X79 refresh with their motherboards, with only a few models being launched or even known about. There are several options for these manufacturers, such as implementing new technologies (OP-AMP) on motherboards. I would assume that the G1.Assassin 3 will come with Ivy Bridge-E support out of the box as it has not been released yet. I would assume GIGABYTE were pushing the development to get it out as soon as possible.
Source: VR-Zone
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silenceisgolden - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
Tweaktown's video covering the new Gigabyte boards http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwTi_WY_Eco. Ultra Durable boards have the Thunderbolt 2 controller, x79 has dual ethernet and the USB DAC, which is explained in the video.genzai - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
Thanks for the video link. UD7 TH looks awesome. Now when the hell is someone going to release a video card with thunderbolt controller and ports on it? Seriously if the Mac Pro can have its cake and eat it it too why can't the rest of us?Kevin G - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
Thunderbolt on video cards would require a PCI-e bridge chip and Thunderbolt controllers on the discrete card's PCB. The PCB will obviously be custom and likely the cooling system will need to be custom as well as the GPU will likely need to be moved from reference designs. Power consumption will also be higher due to the extra chips on the board which could require additional power connectors depending on the base GPU (ie 140w GPU + 15w for TB chips would require two 6 pin connectors instead of just one). These extra components add a significant cost in the cut throat pricing market that is video cards.There is also the buggy support with Thunderbolt in Windows. With the new Mac Pro dropping PCI-e slots entirely, there only market going forward for a Thunderbolt video card would be the PC market.
The workstation card market could absorb the costs but neither nVidia or AMD want to support the Thunderbolt spec. As long as nVidia and AMD market workstation class cards under their own names, Thunderbolt won't be included.
etamin - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
It's good to see a dedicted USB DAC port. But only 4x SATA 6Gb/s on a top end product like this?Desiderata - Friday, September 13, 2013 - link
Two from the chipset, two from Marvell most likely.Unless you're going to be throwing more than four SSDs together in RAID, you probably won't see a disadvantage using SATA 3Gb/s ports; mechanical drives aren't renowned for their lightning speeds.
jdon - Friday, September 13, 2013 - link
There are 6, the other two connectors are hanging out at the bottom of the board.wfall - Friday, September 13, 2013 - link
But does it blend?!Eufawria - Monday, September 30, 2013 - link
Planning to get this board but there are a couple things I'm worried about (and I do know this is not the final) Watching the video, it can now support 4 way sli which is freaking awesome now as I can do three way and have a dedicated sound card but I think we need an auxiliary power to make sure card gets enough juice. Making the board E-ATX so they can cram a bit more and have the power buttons and all that on the top right instead of the bottom. And for the heatsinks, keep it simple. Maybe using something similar to the UP4 or UD5 style but now with green. These are just personal opinions and preference but that will make a huge difference