by Doors4ever
01/04/2008 | 04:36 PM
After a while we decided to resume testing Intel P35 Express based mainboards. In fact, it is not surprising at all, although it is fairly easy to purchase an Intel X38 Express based mainboard these days, and some mainboard makers are even offering X48 based mainboards in the nearest future. Our Asus P5E Mainboard Review revealed that Intel X38 doesn’t have any significant advantages over P35, however the higher chipset cost automatically increases the price of mainboards based on it. We will still be looking at the features and performance of the new Intel X48 solution later on, however, judging by the hasty launch and some preliminary data circling around, it is none other but an X38 with corrected bugs and will hardly be any cheaper. However, the price point is an important aspect when deciding on a platform. Even AMD processor fans admit some advantages of processors on Core micro-architecture, however, they remind us that the total system cost is usually higher for Intel platforms. Usually it results from the fact that LGA775 mainboards with good overclocking friendly features are normally more expensive than Socket AM2 solutions with some overclocking potential.
<%BANNER[article]%>Our today’s review will be devoted to an inexpensive Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard based on Intel P35 Express chipset that sells at a little over $100 these days.
At first we were going to briefly discuss Gigabyte mainboards on Intel P35 Express chipset here, but there are currently 14 mainboards like that in the company’s product range today. In fact, this already big number is a few times bigger, because some of the boards are offered in several modifications, so we will hardly be able to give all of them even a quick look within this article. There is an alternative solution though. We could take a look at Gigabyte’s main marking principles instead. The implications behind the model name lettering are usually quite transparent and clear, so you should be able to get an idea of the mainboard functionality from its name only. However, this info is not available anywhere. That is why we are going to make up for this omission right now.
The name of any Gigabyte mainboard starts with GA letters followed by the chipset name, which in our case is P35. Gigabyte’s marketing people decided to assign the mainboards we are talking about today to the S series, which stands for Smart, Speed and Safe. The three words starting with S can be replaced with S3 abbreviation, so the simplest Gigabyte mainboards will be marked GA-P35-S3.
If the mainboard is built using only solid-state capacitors, there is an additional letter D in front of the name derived from the word “durable). For example, GA-P35-DS3. It differs from the previous mainboard only by the type of employed capacitors.
However, even GA-P35-S3 uses solid-state capacitors with organic polymer electrolyte in the processor voltage regulator circuitry as a very important component, even though it doesn’t have the D letter in the model name.
Mainboards featuring Silent-Pipe heatpipe cooling system for chipset cooling acquire an additional S-word and can be called S4 instead of S3. However, if the heatpipes are used only to cool down the chipset North Bridge, the board will still belong to the S3 series. For example, GA-P35-DS3P.
By the way, the letter P in the GA-P35-DS3P may have emerged from the word “pair”, as these boards feature two PCI Express x16 slots. They belong to the top of S3 series and use South Bridge chips with RAID support, just like the mainboards with the letter R in the end of their model name. For example, GA-P35- DS3R.
Intel P35 Express chipset is known to support both: DDR2 and DDR3 and Gigabyte mainboards that can work with these both memory types acquire an additional letter C after the chipset name that may have come from the word “combo”. For example, GA-P35C-DS3.
The mainboards working with the new DDR3 SDRAM have been singled out into an individual group with the letter T following the chipset name that comes from the word “three”. For example, GA-P35T-DS3P.
Of course, this naming system cannot reflect the entire variety of mainboard models out there. It doesn’t take into account additional onboard controllers, such as IEEE1394, number of Serial ATA channels, rear panel connectors, but it is nevertheless more efficient than the model names some other mainboard makers use for their solutions. Gigabyte’s mainboard names give us a pretty good idea of the mainboard functionality.
Today we are going to talk about one of the simplest Gigabyte mainboards on Intel P35 Express chipset – GA-P35-DS3L. Letter L may stand for the word “Lite”.
Strange as it might seem, the first impression from the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L (rev. 1.0) mainboard may be a little disappointing. If you go to one of Gigabyte’s official web-sites, you will learn that the same board is available in 2.0 revision. Does it mean you got an outdated product? In a way yes, but we are all in this situation today. When you buy the latest mainboard, graphics card or CPU, you get a solution that was developed at least half a year ago. By the time it arrives into mass market, it get a little outdated, because new models are being in the works already and even newer models are at a development stage. This is an endless process, so I don’t think we should get really upset about it.
So, let’s see what the differences are between various revisions of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboards:
You have to really look for the differences. Both revisions support 12 USB ports provided by Intel P35 Express chipset, but there are only four of them on the rear panel of the first mainboard revision and 6 of them on the second mainboard revision. And that is the only difference. So, there is nothing to be upset about actually.
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard is shipped in a small box of standard size for this series. The reverse side of it discusses in detail the Speed, Smart and Safe components of the series. There is a sticker with the model name and features on the front of the box.
The simple model like that isn’t expected to have rich accessories bundle, but nevertheless, the box contains a lot of goodies. The board comes with the following accessories:
When getting down to discussing a mainboard that represents the very base of the product family, most of you may get ready for the worst. In this case most makers usually try to save some textolite and fit all the necessary components onto a smaller area that may lead to funny and sometimes sad results. Supposedly, the users should put up with all the drawbacks for the sake of lower product price. However, we should give Gigabyte engineers due credit for breaking this unannounced rule: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L layout is designed in practically classical way.
Even those Gigabyte mainboards that have no letter D before the series name, use solid-state capacitors in the processor voltage regulator circuitry. As for the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L, it doesn’t have a single traditional electrolytic capacitor onboard. By the way, Gigabyte believes to be the leader in manufacturing mainboards with solid-state capacitors.
Gigabyte developers do not repeat their earlier mistake, when there were multiple contacts hanging below the LGA775 processor socket on the bottom of the PCB. If you remember, a cooler with a metal backplate could close some of these contacts and put the entire system out of order. Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L boasts clean and even surface below the processor socket. There are a few embossed contacts along the line between the retention holes, but they are unlikely to hinder installation of cooler backplates.
The chipset North Bridge is cooled with an aluminum heatsink. Despite its size, it heated up quite tangibly during our test session. The cooler ICH9 South Bridge does well with a small heatsink.
We managed to find only one eye-catching design flaw around the chipset South Bridge: very low placed IDE connector powered by the JMicron 368 controller. The cable going through the entire system case to the optical drive that is usually located at the top doesn’t look too good and hinders proper air flow inside the case. If you still have a Parallel ATA hard disk drive, you will have really hard times trying to connect it together with a CD- or DVD-ROM device. However, this will hardly be an issue pretty soon, when IDE HDDs vanish from the market and SATA optical devices become more and more widely spread.
Fewer SATA connectors (only 4) is hardly a serious issue for Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard, as there are not that many users who have more than four hard disk drives in their system. Other than that the design of the lower PCB part is excellent. We were especially pleased with three PCI slots for expansion cards. Cards with this interface are still more popular than PCI-E and two slots may be not enough in some cases, although most mainboards out there offer only two.
You will be even more excited about the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard rear panel that features a parallel and a series port, PS/2 connectors for keyboard and mouse, four USB ports, a network RJ45 connector and six audio jacks. It is nice to see the optical and coaxial SPDIF outs that are a rare thing in base mainboard models these days.
I suggest that you take another pleased look at the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L layout. Note the power supply connectors that are exactly where they are supposed to be and four fan connectors. There are not three fan connectors, like on many other mainboards, and not two, like on entry level solutions, but all four.
Mainboards do not need any additional illumination, but Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L could use at least one LED indicator for the power status. Although, this is just our suggestion, not a requirement or a flaw.
We would like to wind up our discussion of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard functionality and design with the list of its technical specs borrowed from the manufacturer’s web-site:
Take a close look at the “Unique Features” section. Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard belongs to the Ultra Durable series. Moreover, it should boast enhanced overclocking friendly options. We couldn’t really look into the durability statement during our relatively short-tern test session, but we definitely checked out the promised enhanced overclocking potential, which we are going to discuss in the next part of our article.
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard uses BIOS based on Award code. We can’t help pointing out numerous changes that Gigabyte engineers made when adapting the BIOS for this particular mainboard series.
Let’s skip the first sections with standard system configuring features. We suggest going straight to the PC Health Status page.
Surprise! Instead of the meaningless “OK” that usually stood for voltage settings on previously reviewed Gigabyte mainboards, we see specific values. Finally! Unfortunately, we still lack the chipset voltage and controlled 5V voltage, but hopefully we will see them soon in new mainboard revisions. Moreover, the mainboard allows monitoring system temperature and CPU temperature alongside with the rotation speed of four fans. By the way, unlike Asus mainboards that can no longer adjust the CPU fan rotation speed if it is connected using a three-pin connector, Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard does it easily.
Now let’s move on to the next section that very conveniently contains all the processor and memory overclocking settings. It is called MB Intelligent Tweaker (M.I.T.). The specs were telling the truth: Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L does boast very good options for overclocking.
FSB frequency can be adjusted in the interval between 100 and 700MHz; PCI-E frequency – from 90 to 150MHz with 1MHz increment. To set the memory frequency you can use one of the following multipliers: 2.5, 3.0, 4.0, 2.0, 2.4, 3.2, 3.33. You won’t need to calculate the resulting memory frequency, because this value is displayed in the Memory Frequency info string. The processor frequency is also displayed in the corresponding CPU Frequency info string. You can access memory timings adjustment only by pressing Ctril-F1 in the main BIOS menu. This is one of the few drawbacks that this solution inherited from the older Gigabyte mainboards.
Note that the list of supported parameters is quite broad. The parameters may be adjusted selectively and not all together, and the informational column will display the current memory timings. These are another three points in favor of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L.
As for the mainboard’s ability to change voltage settings, they are also quite decent. The memory can receive up to +0.7V above the nominal with 0.1V increment, which is actually even too much for DDR2. PCI-E OverVoltage Control, FSB OverVoltage Control and (G)MCH OverVoltage Control parameters allow increasing the voltages of PCI Express, FSB and chipset North Bridge by 0.3V with 0.1V increment. The CPU can receive any voltage between 0.05125V and 1.6V with an extremely small 0.00625V increment. Those of you who have some extreme cooling systems at their disposal will be able to raise the Vcore even higher by setting it to 1.8V or even 2.0V.
But these are not all the advantages of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard. By pressing F11 you can save up to 8 full settings profiles, and by pressing F12 – load any of them.
I would like to specifically mention that you can give each profile a brief description. The unused profiles are included into a sort of a stack used to automatically save the current BIOS settings after successful POST pass and recording the number of successful startups for each. This is very helpful, because Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard doesn’t stop after CPU over-overclocking, just like its predecessors. All settings, even the system time, get cleared in this case, and the board boots with the default settings. automatic settings saving allows you to easily get back to the last known successful configuration, even if you forgot to manually save it.
In conclusion I would only like to add that the built-in Q-Flash utility that can be launched by pressing F8 now reads not only floppy disks, but also flash drives. So, you can easily and quickly reflash the BIOS if necessary. We wish they would also report the info on the BIOS version reflashed and the previous version, but this is also just a friendly suggestion on our part, not a drawback.
I assume you would agree that the BIOS of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard looks very convenient and thought-through, boasts pretty good options for system configuring and advanced overclocking friendly tools. Our next part will be devoted to the practical implementation of all these features.
We are going to check out the performance and overclocking potential of Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard using the following testbed:
During the first system boot-up we experienced a small situation: we assumed that the processor fan connector was defective. The fan wasn’t spinning, but worked just fine when plugged into another connector. However, soon I remembered that Gigabyte mainboards have pretty aggressive processor fan rotation speed management activated by default. The fan starts spinning very slowly at about 40ºC CPU temperature. We often get caught unawares on this one :) We think it would make more sense to replace another sticker announcing extreme durability of the platform due to solid-state capacitors with the one warning that CPU Smart Fan Control is activated by default.
We weren’t at all discouraged by this incident. On the contrary, we were very pleased to see that the processor fan rotation speed management option works despite the 3-pin fan connector instead of four-pin one. However, the suspiciously high North Bridge heatsink temperature posed an immediate cause for concern. We hadn’t overclocked anything yet, hadn’t increased any voltages, but the temperature was high already. Although even a slight directed airflow was enough to cool things down to normal, so we installed an additional quiet 80-mm fan specifically for the chipset North Bridge.
As for the processor overclocking, it turned out so simple and quick to perform on Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard, that even a child can do it. We know what Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 processor is capable of: at 1.45V Vcore it can overclock and work stably at 490MHz FSB. These parameters were set in the mainboard BIOS, the system booted just fine and passed all tests. We only had to slightly correct the memory timings that were set automatically. The informational BIOS column stated that the memory was still working with 5-5-5-18 timings, while Windows utilities registered considerably higher 5-7-7-23 settings. So we had to adjust the timings manually.
There is a parameter called Performance Enhance in the MB Intelligent Tweaker section. By default it is set to Turbo that turned out to be very important for the overall system performance, because it can help affect Performance Level setting. The lower is Performance Level, the higher is the actual mainboard performance, but we couldn’t determine the actual value for it. If Performance Enhance is set to Turbo or Extreme, Performance Level equals 8 at 490MHz FSB – it is a good setting. If you set Performance Enhance to Standard, Performance Level increases to 12. The screenshots below allow you to estimate the actual performance difference in these two cases provided all other settings are identical. The first one stands for Performance Enhance set to Standard and Performance Level of 12, while the second one – for Performance Enhance set to Turbo and Performance Level of 8 respectively.
Well, the system is overclocked to 490MHz FSB, the memory timings are adjusted accordingly, but what is the final performance we are getting? As we know, Gigabyte mainboards used to drop their performance even before any overclocking kicked in, as soon as we switched CPU Host Clock Control from Disabled to Enabled. Moreover, the performance dropped too soon because of the FSB Strap. And although in nominal mode Gigabyte mainboards used to perform quite comparably, they were falling tangibly behind their competitors during overclocking.
To find out what the current situation is during overclocking, we performed a number of performance tests on Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard with Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 processor clocked to 490MHz FSB. These were the tests that depend on the processor frequency, memory frequency and timing settings. The same set of tests was run in exact same conditions on abit IP35 Pro mainboard. The screenshots below show timing settings for Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L (left) and abit IP35 Pro (right):
Here are the benchmark results:
As you see, Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard doesn’t yield to the competitor. On the contrary, it is even faster in some cases. Moreover, it may be faster even in the nominal mode. Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L package claims that it supports DDR2 1066 and it is really so. The mainboard set correct memory timings and 1066MHz frequency on the first boot-up.
However, it is not that hard to read the timings from the modules SPD, almost all mainboards out there can do it. However, Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L also increased the memory voltage to 2.1V – the default voltage for the Corsair Dominator TWIN2X2048-9136C5D memory we are using in our platform. Although this voltage setting is also recorded in the profile, very few boards can actually read and set it correctly. We were really impressed. So, if you compare the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard in nominal working mode against the same abit IP35 Pro, Gigabyte will most likely be faster, because the abit mainboard would set the “standard” 800MHz frequency for the memory, while GA-P35-DS3L will set it to 1066MHz with the same timings.
Frankly speaking, had the tests been completed at this point, Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L would have received the highest possible score from us. There are no ideal products, all mainboards have some drawbacks, but we simply forget about them with all the advantages we have just discussed. However, there was one more test Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L had to pass.
Our article called Multi-Core Confrontation: Core 2 Quad Q6600 vs. Core 2 Duo E6850 proved that even today, when there are very few applications that would use more than two cores, quad-core processors make a lot of sense, despite the first impression you might get. Of course, it will take some time before quad-core CPUs become mass, they are still the prerogative of computer enthusiasts, however, we cannot ignore the constantly growing group of happy quad-core owners. Overclocking a quad-core processor is formally the same procedure as in case of a single-or dual-core CPU, although the mainboard, cooling system and especially the processor voltage regulator circuitry get loaded much heavier in this case. That is why we got an Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 engineering sample on Kentsfield core B3 revision with the nominal voltage of 1.35V. Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L was the first board to be tested with it.
At first we were going to find out how far this CPU can clock without increasing its Vcore, and the system stability in this case was tested with a 15-minute OCCT run. The system passed this stability tests at 310MHz and 320MHz FSB, at 330MHz FSB the tests was passed but the result was a little doubtful. The countdown timer would freeze every now and then, stop for 10-15 seconds and then catch up for the lost time in a hasty fashion. So, we decided to continue our overclocking experiments with increased voltages.
With the Vcore set at 1.45V the system passed at 340MHz FSB, however, failed to hit 350MHz FSB. Since Core Temp reported 70ºC temperature maximum with average being around 65-66ºC, we increased Vcore further to 1.5V. After that we passed the tests at 350MHz FSB (69-71ºC, 75ºC maximum) and moved on to 360MHz surprised that the temperature hardly increased at all, when we noticed that the CPU utilization was only 77%. But of course, the CPU wasn’t running at the utmost of its potential, so the above mentioned results are of no use to us whatsoever.
The second round of tests started at 330MHz FSB and nominal Vcore setting but in Prime95 utility: although it takes longer to run, it seems to be more reliable. The system stability was tested with Large FFT benchmark that ensures the maximum CPU utilization and heating. We revealed stability issues very quickly. Even at 325MHz frequency one of the cores registered an error after 30 minutes of testing. Well, 3.2GHz at nominal Vcore is not a bad result at all for a quad-core processor. Let’s see what it is capable of with increased core voltage.
The system worked fine at 1.5V for 45 minutes loaded with Large FFT test from Prime95 utility, but the processor temperature balanced around 77-80ºC despite the Zalman CNPS9700 LED cooler working at its maximum fan rotation speed. 1.5V seemed to be too much for our cooler, so we decided to check out the performance at 1.45V maximum. The test was passed successfully, but we kept the system running idle for a while to cool down. However, after a few minutes the mainboard suddenly shut down and refused to boot up again. After clearing CMOS the board would boot, but would shut down again on loading Windows. We replaced the CPU with Intel Core 2 Duo E6300, but nothing changed.
But maybe it was not the mainboard that caused the problem? Maybe the PSU failed workload like that? At the time of tests we didn’t have a suitable PSU at hand, so we decided to see if the abit IP35 Pro would work with the same PSU in the same mode. When trying to disassemble the testbed, we couldn’t remove the four-pin ARX12V power plug from the connector on the board. After some significant effort and additional tools, we discovered that one of the plastic pin linings melted and stuck dead to the mainboard connector.
The PSU turned out OK, abit IP35 Pro mainboard worked fine with it and any processors, but our poor Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L passed away. It didn’t pass away completely, but turned into a severely crippled platform. It sometimes starts with an Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 in nominal mode, and can work for a while, but in most cases it would shut down on booting the Windows OS. While the board is working, we noticed that the ATX12V power supply connector gets extremely hot, although Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 processor wasn’t overclocked and the connector was a plastic one, not made of copper or even aluminum. We all know that it is important to monitor CPU temperature at all times, we pay additional attention to chipset and MOSFET temperatures since recently, but we have never come across a situation when we needed to check on temperature of plastic power supply connectors.
Eight-pin ATX12V connectors like 24-pin connectors instead of 20-pin ones appeared for a reason. Of course, since you can’t use a large cable, you can distribute the power among several smaller cables. However, it is the first time that we experienced issues like that during quad-core processor overclocking on a mainboard featuring 4-pin ATX12V power connector.
Actually, mainboards very rarely get out of service, even during overclocking. The only one we could remember at the time of this review was Asus P4P800 that dies on us a few years ago after being used as a test platform for a year. The Prescott processors killed it. Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L box claims that it is optimized for quad-core CPUs and boasts ultra durability, which seems quite doubtful in our case.
Today only Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L and GA-P35-S3L feature simple processor voltage regulator circuitry, all other models from S3 series feature 6-phase circuitry, and mainboards with the P index and two PCI Express x16 slots also have an 8-pin ATX12V connector. Look at the photos in the beginning of our review. ATX12V connector has two pins for the “ground” and the other two for “12V”, however, most of the power or maybe even all of it went through only one of them that melted in the end. Of course, no one is protected against a defective mainboard, we just hope that it is not a mass issue, but rather a single case of our bad luck.
We were very pleased with Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L mainboard: smart PCB design, pretty rich set of connectors, features and functions. We admired easy and quick processor overclocking procedure. We certainly noticed that Gigabyte did a great job trying to eliminate the existing issues and add more functionality to its solution. Overall, it seems that most inexpensive Gigabyte mainboards turn out very successful solutions. Of course, they have a few flaws as well, just like that high-end boards, but no one is ideal.
Moreover, everyone knows that Asus and Gigabyte are direct competitors these days. Gigabyte lost in the last round, because their Intel 965P Express based solutions had too many problems, and we even had to give up Gigabyte GA-965P-S3 that received great feedback from us at first. However, this time, the situation is completely different. None of the three Asus mainboards on Intel P35 Express chipset that we have tested so far left such a favorable impression as Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L.
However, mainboards from the same manufacturer based on the same chipset are usually very similar to one another. As a rule, they have the same BIOS features and functionality, and differ only by the number and variety of connectors, additional controllers and accessories bundle. So, we intend to continue discussing the Gigabyte mainboard lineup, but this time we will stick with the mainboards featuring 8-pin ATX12V power supply connector. And from now on we will consider a 4-pin connector to be a drawback and will make sure that we check the connector temperature, just to play safe :)