Product Listing

Gigabyte GA-965P-DQ6 (Intel P965)

By Zachary Chan - 25 Jun 2006

Layout and Overclocking

Layout

It is becoming more and more common to find PCI Express motherboards supporting dual graphics cards these days, even if the chipset the board is based on only features a single PCIe x16 interface. The GA-965P-DQ6 is no exception. The board comes with two PCI slots, three PCIe x1 slots and two PCIe x16 with the secondary slot being a shared slot that works in x4 mode. Officially, the P965 doesn't support multi-GPU configurations, but a hacked driver could probably get you a working CrossFire setup. Otherwise, you will still be able to use a dual graphics setup for quad-monitor output.

Expansion slots aplenty with a good configuration, but one more PCI slot would not have hurt.

Gigabyte has made the expansion layout such that there is sufficient room for cooling with both graphics cards as well as keeping access to both PCI and PCIe x1 slots open. However, it would have been more ideal if the board featured three PCI slots and two PCIe x1 instead of the other way around.

The GA-965P-DQ6 really has a spacious design and with its low profile heat-pipe coolers, you shouldn't have too much of a problem with it. Our only real gripe with the board is the weird location of the CMOS clear jumper and battery. Hidden well towards the back of the board, it becomes a real pain when you want to reset the motherboard in the event of a BIOS tweaking mishap, though this problem is mostly isolated to the enthusiast crowd. Still, it is a problem that could affect all users while setting or tweaking the board initially.

Low profile heat-pipe design allows for a decent component spacing. The DIMM slots have room to breath and we have a good position for the ATX header.

Strange location for the battery to be and even harder to access the CMOS reset switch.

Overclocking

  • FSB Settings: 100MHz to 600MHz
  • PCIe Settings: 90MHz to 150MHz
  • FSB/RAM Multiplier: Auto, 2.0, 2.5, 3.0, 2.66, 3.33, 4.0+
  • CPU Voltage Settings: 1.0250V to 1.6000V (in 0.00625V steps), 1.600V to 2.375V (in 0.025V steps)
  • Memory Voltage Settings: +0.025V to +0.775V (in 0.025V steps)
  • PCIe Voltage Settings: +0.05V to +0.35V (in 0.05V steps)
  • MCH Voltage Settings: +0.05V to +0.75V (in 0.05V steps)
  • FSB Voltage Settings: +0.05V to +0.35V (in 0.05V steps)
  • Multiplier Selection: Yes (unlocked CPUs only)

One look at the cooling and VRM design of the GA-965P-DQ6 tells you one thing - Overclocker. Gigabyte has also made sure that the BIOS of the board is fully equipped to handle a wide range of settings with good voltage controls. DDR2 memory can be pumped up to 2.575V and provides a generous +0.75V increase to the MCH to facilitate overclocking.

In our own testing however, the GA-965P-DQ6 falls short of the expectations that it would easily hit the 300MHz mark that many Intel 975-based boards were able to achieve. In fact, our overclocking experience with the GA-965P-DQ6 wasn't really a smooth affair. With default voltages, the board makes 280MHz (1120MHz QDR) easily, and then it hits a wall. Beyond 280MHz, we had to fight for every extra MHz. Increasing FSB voltage settings to its maximum and up to +0.35V on the MCH, we managed to get a final overclock of 288MHz (1152MHz QDR). On the memory side of things, Gigabyte does unofficially support memory speeds up to DDR2-1066 with its 4x FSB-to-RAM memory multiplier option.

One important thing to note however is that the GA-965P-DQ6 we have on hand is a pre-production sample running on an early beta BIOS. Gigabyte is still actively tweaking the board and we've been told that overclocking capabilities has improved by quite a bit in Gigabyte's own internal testing, so much so that they're expecting it to reach 320MHz quite easily. Since we've not received these BIOS updates at the time of writing though, you'd have to take Gigabyte's word for it.

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