Legit Reviews

Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-DS4H AM2+ Motherboard Review

Today we have Gigabyte's GA-MA790GP-DS4H motherboard for review. Equipped with the AMD 790GX north bridge chipset and the AMD SB750 south bridge, this board makes for an excellent candidate for an HTPC while packing enough of a punch to handle the fastest chips AMD has to offer.

AMD's Phenom II has proven to be quite a remarkable chip. Even though I consider AM2+ to be a stop-gap, Gigabyte has produced a quality board that will let you get a taste of Phenom II. Comparing the GA-MA790GP-DS4H to similarly priced 790GX motherboards, it falls right in with every other board on features, price, and layout.

Article Title: Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-DS4H AM2+ Motherboard Review
Article URL: http://legitreviews.com/article/908/1/
Pricing At Time of Print: $139.99 plus shipping

Solid performance! I've read online that the DS4H had some minor issues after it had been out for a while, so the GA-MA790GP-UD4H is a refresh of it. If it's any indication of how the NB/SB chipsets perform on the DS4H, I'm sure my experience with the UD4H will be just as good.

I only had one issue with the board, and it was while benching with LN2. Past ~4.5GHz and 3GHz Northbridge, the thing will boot, stall, boot, stall, boot, and then complete POST. Makes each reboot a ~90 second process. Only experienced past ~4.5GHZ though, so not a huge issue. Still don't know what causes it though, happens every time though.

What a terrible location for the USB port connections. Other than that it seems like a very solid motherboard.

And this goes for all motherboards - ditch the FDD connection and throw in a few extra SATA plugs.

Thanks for the review