Gigabyte GA-965P-DQ6 Motherboard Review

Final Thoughts And Conclusion

This was a fun board to review. It was easy to set up, as I have found most Intel chipset boards to be, and it was just plain easy to use. Gigabyte did a wonderful job with this board. The Gigabyte GA-965P-DQ6 is a wonderful update the the first release boards that Gigabyte had. The features and layout on this board are outstanding, leaving really no room for desiring anything else.

The bundle that comes with the board is good, giving you everything that you need to get things going and then some. The packaging design was nice too, as you can tell that someone put a little thought into its design.

Performance on
the board was on par with just about everything else that we have seen in recent days. We saw a little dip in performance in the area of memory bandwidth, but it did not seem to hurt the board in other areas of our testing.

Overclocking is really where this board shines. It does wonderfully well for itself, and Gigabyte has really allowed for some great settings in the bios to allow for some extreme overclocking. One thing that I really missed on this board (and it is a chipset thing) is the ability to link or unlink the memory and the fsb. While that option on other boards (like the Nvidia 650i and 680i boards) does not kill any recommendations for this board, it does make it plain to see that Intel is ready for an update in their chipset to add this and other features.

The Gigabyte GA-965P-DDQ6 is an update to an existing board, and one must realize that. It allows support for Quad-core and 1333 fsb support, as well as Crossfire; so if you need those things, this is a great board to look at. If you are just in the market for a new board, you should not pass over this offering from Gigabyte.

Price is a little bit of a concern as we look at this board. It is going for around $230 from various e-tailers. While that is not out of range, one will have to decide if the aging Intel chipset is worth that price.

Legit Bottom Line:

The Gigabyte GA-965P-DQ6 is a good motherboard with a solid chipset in the Intel 965. It is a great overclocker and gives solid all-around performance in our testing. If the Intel chipset strikes your fancy, than this is a board you should look at