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The Gigabyte GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 Motherboard arrives in a colourful box with the name of the product on the front, as well as a list of key selling points, ideal for a retail store display.
Considering the price, the bundle is acceptable. There are several SATA 6Gbps capable cables, a backplate, user manual and software/driver disc.
The board is rather plain looking, but uses an Intel approved Intersil PWM controller that is VRD 12 (Voltage Regulator Down) compliant – it is ATX Form Factor – measuring 30.5cm x 21.5cm. The board has a dual bios configuration, in case the main bios gets corrupted it can be automatically restored from the secondary. It also allows booting from 3TB drives and is ErP Lot 6 compliant.
The GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 supports ‘On/Off Charge' which enables devices to draw more current from the motherboard USB ports than standard USB ports, so that charging from your PC can be as fast as with a charger to the mains. We have tested this system in previous reviews and it works well. LucidLogix Virtua is supported, but we have tested it in the past and avoid it when possible.
Internal connectors are as follows:
- 1 x 24-pin ATX main power connector
- 1 x 4-pin ATX 12V power connector
- 2 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors
- 4 x SATA 3Gb/s connectors
- 1 x mSATA connector
- 1 x CPU fan header
- 2 x system fan headers
- 1 x power fan header
- 1 x front panel header
- 1 x front panel audio header
- 1 x S/PDIF Out header
- 3 x USB 2.0/1.1 headers
- 1 x clearing CMOS jumper
- 1 x Trusted Platform Module (TPM) header
The GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 has four memory slots for a total of 32GB DDR3. It supports memory speeds at 2133/1866/1600/1333/1066 MHz. There is full support for Extreme Memory Profile (XMP) memory modules.
There are 6 SATA ports, the four in blue are SATA 3Gbps, and the two at the right (in white) are SATA 6Gbps rated. The board offers RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, and RAID 10 configurations.
The board is equipped with modest heatsinks to aid with cooling. There is a 4 pin CPU power connector close to the I/O panel. We noticed there were only a few 3 pin fan headers on the board, which may cause some issues for top mounted chassis fans. The board uses the Realtek ALC889 codec for 2/4/5.1/7.1-channel output.
Connection from the I/O is as follows:
- 1 x PS/2 keyboard/mouse port
- 1 x parallel port
- 1 x serial port
- 1 x optical S/PDIF Out connector
- 1 x HDMI port
- 4 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports
- 2 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports
- 1 x RJ-45 port
- 3 x audio jacks (Line In/Line Out/Microphone)
Gigabyte has cut some costs by only offering a single PCIE slot with full x16 bandwidth. In Crossfire the second blue slot will run at x4 so it will be interesting to see the results later. The PCIEX4 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX1_2 and PCIEX1_3 slots. When the PCIEX1_2 slot or the PCIEX1_3 slot is populated, the PCIEX4 slot will operate at up to x1 mode. Best just using a single or dual graphics card configuration with no other devices installed.
Above, the sub £600 system, built. Scan have updated their stock of XFX HD6870 Black Edition cards with the dual fan version, which has the same specifications, but with better (and quieter cooling efficiency). These are right at the top of the <£150 performance chart.
Overclocked CrossfireX running on the Gigabyte GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 Motherboard. Two cards at 940mhz core and 1150mhz GDDR5 (4600mhz effective) connected via a 256 bit memory interface. The HD6870 is a BARTS core with 1120 unified shaders, 32 ROPs and 1GB of memory.
Wow, that might be a ugly looking board, but great performance ! ill direct my friend to this link he was on about a new mobo and system before christmas
Great bargain. I have read an analysis before on x4 and it doesnt really make much difference for a second slot card. maybe 5% lower performance.
It is a bit stripped down, but in the right places. such as not having 12 sata ports etc. who the hell needs all that anyway.
Shame about the x4 secondary port, but ive looked at the 3dmark results and they seem pretty much on par with 2x x16 slots… very good quality board. I like gigabyte anyway.
They are selling well, most places are sold out. companies need to release more sub £100 b oards like this, huge audience.
Look at the results for instance. a 2500k and a board like this with cheap ass memory, performs well, and for gaming a 970/980/990x is a total waste of time.
proved many times. nice article
Gigabyte have good bios recovery systems, always found it with my older P67 board. I moved to asus Z68 and it sometimes craps out. has surprised me to be honest as I know they get the best name overall. ill move back to gigabyte in the next cycle.
We sell 10 of these a week. excellent product. Never used one in Crossfire, so this is a good resource.
I got one two weeks ago, but they are hard to find now in stock
Ebay sellers have them
Bought it, this week and am very happy. great review thanks.
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Hello Zardon, thank you for the very informative review but I just wanted to ask.
How did you overclock the Z68AP-D3 without an option to change the Vcore? Which setting do I change to change my Vcore? Right now I have a 2600k and I’m hoping to go at least 4.2Ghz. I’d be really grateful if you’d email or post the solution here.
The maximum selectable multiplier for me with this board is 41x. Is this a limitation of revision 1.0?