windwithme's LGA 1156 review part4-GIGABYTE P55-UD3P Parity Version OC Guide

[windwithme]

It’s been almost 2 month since Intel launched LGA1156 socket on 8th Sep

The new platform product line and market position are clearer

As my previous review, LGA1156 is still focus in between high end and middle end

 

CPU has 3 models so far. The highest is i7-870 and middle is i7-860

They both support HT which make Quad core CPU can simulate 8 cores

i5-750 doesn’t support HT and it’s the most entry model now. The price is around 200USD

 

MB Chipset is P55 and all MB makers also launched the products at the same time

Currently, the P55 MB price is between 160~280 USD

If you want to buy LGA 1156 platform, i5-750 plus 160USD P55 MB is the best C/P

Certainly, if you need HT and also affordable, you also can consider i7-860

Merely, i7-860 price is very close to LGA1366 platform

 

The MB this time is GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD3P, price is 5200NTD

This is entry price level for P55 MB so far

First of all, it’s the package. UD3P is not GIGABYTE high end series, so the box is not so big

 

Accessories

Product Manual、Smart6/Smart TPM Guide、Driver CD and IO Shield.

SATA cables are 2 standard and 2 vertical head

 

GIGABYTE P55-UD3P Body

 

 

Lower Left Corner

2 X PCI-E support CrossFire and SLI technology and the bandwidth is X8+X8

1 X PCI-E X1

4 X PCI

Realtek 8111D LAN Chip

Realtek ALC888 supports 7.1 channel and High Definition Audio

 

Lower Right Corner

6 X Blue SATAII supports RAID 0， RAID 1， RAID 5 and RAID 10

2 X White SATAII supports RAID 0， RAID 1 and JBOD

Dual BIOS, dual protection

 

Upper Right Corner

4 X DIMM DDR3 support 800/1066/1333/1600. The maximum DDR3 capacity is 16GB

DD3 2200 is after overclocking spec. DDR3 has extra 2 phase PWM and 24-PIN head near by

1 X IDE, GIGABYTE SATA2

 

Upper Left Corner

LGA 1156 CPU Socket

UD3P CPU PWM is 8 phase and VTT is 2 phase

 

IO

10 X USB 2.0

1 X RJ-45 LAN

2 X eSATA/USB 2.0 Shared

1 X S/PDIF Fiber /Coaxial output

 

Close look to the components surround by CPU

[windwithme]

P55 Heatsink

 

Audio、LAN Chip

 

 

P55-UD3P Boot Screen

 

M.I.T. Menu

 

CPU.DDR3 Clock current status

 

Adjust CPU clock ratio, QPI clock ratio and BCLK

 

CPU Core Feature

Turbo Boost Tec is auto OC feature in Intel Core i7/i5

 

DDR3 Setup

 

DDR3 parameters page

B2B CAS Delay is the P55 exclusive item for DRAM performance

The range is 1~32 and Auto is around 1~3

The higher number means looser. Sometimes, you even see 1xxx MB/s which is lower bandwidth than DDR.

However, it’s also the key factor for pulling DDR3 clock

 

Voltage page

Load-Line Calibration Disable will raise CPU voltage as full speed/Enable will lower CPU voltage as full speed

CPU Vcore 0.50000~1.90000V

QPI/Vtt Voltage 1.050~1.990V

PCH Core 0.950~2.000V

CPU PLL 1.600~2.540V

DRAM Voltage 1.300~2.600V

[windwithme]

PC Health Status

 

All above are BIOS screen and also my OC setting for P55-UD3P

XPU/DDR3 is 200/200 ratio.

The OC setup may be different as depending on your components combination

Even the same model and period Core i5-750, the OC ability are vary.

Users need to find your best voltage setup by your own.

 

 

Configuration

CPU: Intel Core i5-750

MB: GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD3P

DRAM: CORSAIR DOMINATOR-GT CMG4GX3M2A2000C8

VGA: MSI R4890 CYCLONE DDR5 1GB

HD: CORSAIR CMFSSD-64GB2D (RAID 0)

POWER: Antec TruePower New TP-750

Cooler: Mega Shadow(Deluxe Edition)

 

CPU 200 X 20=> 4000Mhz 1.35000V

DDR3 2000 CL8 8-8-24 1T 1.500V

 

Hyper 4 X PI 32M=> 9m 57.216s

CPUMARK 99=> 621

 

Nuclearus Multi Core => 7618/11364/33466

Fritz Chess Benchmark => 24.76/11886

 

CrystalMark 2004R3 => 313013

 

CINEBENCH R10

1 CPU=> 5707

x CPU=> 20405

 

PCMark Vantage => 14916

 

3DMark Vantage => 13038

 

P55-UD3P can reach 200/2000 easily. Of course, CPU and DDR3 quality is also very important

UD3P doesn’t lower the OC ability as the price is cheaper.

The OC range is very wide

 

DDR3 OC ability

Combine with the professional extreme memory maker CORSAIR latest product which supports P55 dual channel

DOMINATOR-GT CMG4GX3M2A2000C8

Black and Red collocate makes GT be more attractive

 

Clock is DDR3 2000, parameter is CL8 8-8-24 and voltage is 1.65V

[windwithme]

DDR3 2000 CL8 8-8-24 1T, BIOS set as 1.500V

SP2004 2 X Blend mode, 3.91GB full load stabled

 

Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 24479MB/s

EVEREST Memory Read - 18556MB/s

 

DDR3 2160 CL8 8-8-24 1T，BIOS set as 1.600V

SP2004 2 X Blend mode, 3.90GB full load stabled

 

Sandra Memory Bandwidth - 25230MB/s

EVEREST Memory Read - 19354MB/s

 

DRAM doesn’t need 1.8-2.1V as LGA775

As Core i5/i7 bulit-in Memory Controller, the new DDR3 platform only needs 1.65V

DDR3 2000 CL8 needs only 1.50V and DDR3 2160 CL8 also needs only 1.60V

Above DRAM test, DDR3 quality is key factor, but also need good DDR3 OC MB to bring it out

 

Pull up both CPU/DRAM

CPU 216 X 19 => 4104Mhz

DDR3 2160 CL8 8-8-24 1T

 

Hyper 4 X PI 32M=> 9m 45.063s

CPUMARK 99=> 638

 

Nuclearus Multi Core => 7816/11660/34409

Fritz Chess Benchmark => 25.42/12200

 

CrystalMark 2004R3 => 319963

 

CINEBENCH R10

1 CPU=> 5851

x CPU=> 21272

 

PCMark Vantage => 16033

 

3DMark Vantage => 13119

 

Compare to 200/2000 test, CPU only raise from 4G to 4.1G, so the CPU performance is not big jump

However, as DDR3 2160 and also raise CPU clock and frequency, the overall performance still enhance quite much

CPU clock can pull to 219Mhz, but it’s not very stable. So I don’t put in this report

[windwithme]

GIGABYTE GA-P55-UD3P

Good

1.GIGABYTE parity P55 product still have good package and components quality

2.2oz PCB, 100% Japanese made solid capacitors, and plenty of software

3.P55 supports both ATI CrossFireX and Nvidia SLI

4.Rich BIOS items, wide voltage range and great OC ability in CPU/DDR3

5.Built-in 8 SATAII, 10 USB and 2 USB/eSATA combo ports

 

Bad

1.SATAII position will interfere with long VGA card as GTX260

(Even though GIGABYTE has 2 vertical SATA cables for compensation)

2.Just launched platform has less CPU for choice. Currently, there are only 3 CPU

 

 

Performance ★★★★★★★★★☆

Components ★★★★★★★★☆☆

Specification ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

Outlook ★★★★★★★★☆☆

C/P Value ★★★★★★★★★☆

 

GIGABYTE has launched 4 P55 models in the market which are UD3P/UD4P/DU5/UD6

The price is between 5200NTD to 9000NTD that equal to 160~278USD

UD3P is the current lowest price model, however, the OC ability is not far away from the others

During the performance test, UD3P performs in pretty high standard in OC

 

P55-UD2 is GIGABYTE Micro-ATX P55 product but still don’t see any in the market yet

For this kind of mid-high segment, Micro-ATX is always launched slower

I do hope see this kind of product more. The full product line is also a good weapon to compete with the other brands

 

Core i5-750 plus P55-UD3P is the cheapest LGA 1156 combo so far

For LGA775 users, upgrading to Q8400 and Q9550 is the cheaper solution.

However, if you are looking for new middle end PC, Core i5 is your must consideration

The future CPU and 32nm manufacturing technology will bring you more visions