A trip down (overclocking) memory lane at ABC!

I recently spoke to Nick Ross from ABC in Australia who wanted to tell his audience about Ivy Bridge and general recent brief history of overclocking and how different platforms shone over the years and were hailed by geeks as the next best thing and their rise or fall from grace. I hope it’s an interesting read for some of the older geeks out there who were into all the different platforms mentioned. Nick gives the article an introduction in the preface (for full story visit this link):

Overclocking is when you alter computer settings to make processors run faster. At a basic level this can mean boosting a computer's performance for free. At an extreme level, this can mean using liquid nitrogen to obtain speeds that perform set tasks in world record times and doing this has become a globally-competitive 'sport'. Through establishing which components most-easily break in their quest to push performance boundaries, overclockers have helped make consumer-level computers become faster and more stable. These guys are the Formula 1 of computing. So when Intel formally launched a new processor last night, these guys with their push-to-the-limit benchmarking techniques, were the people to answer the question, "is it any good?"

Sniper M3 is a pure gamers’ board says Atomic Magazine, how about Sniper3?

John G from Atomic put together an interested read recently about GIGABYTE G1 series of products. Big John, his nickname in Taiwan, is a well versed journalists and has a good eye for detail. He writes for one of premiere gaming mags in this region and has noticed some differences in GIGABYTE’s gaming series of boards.

Big John is a fan of the Sniper M3, the size, features and price provide a perfect cocktail for a decent gamers’ board which you can’t argue against.

The G1.Sniper M3 is a markedly different board (and in our minds more suitable for gamers) than the more expensive ASUS ROG Maximus V Gene, which combines gaming and overclocking features in one package.

G1 Sniper is moving towards overclocking somewhat more with Z77 range and John’s of the opinion it should be purely for gamers. What are your thoughts guys, should we include OC features or leave it to the OC boards instead?

I felt during my feedback on what to improve was to give a couple of useful features to the board (readout points, power/reset) as Ivy Bridge brings back the extreme OC platform into light again. The reason was obvious to incorporate it into design for those crazy extreme OC guys or high end PC builders looking at 4WAY SLI or Xfire. I do however think gaming and OC boards should serve different purposes and totally different groups of buyers generally and for real heavy OC features like OC Touch and others, “OC style” boards are still the way to go when it comes to ultimate OC powerhouse boards.

I’d love to hear from you guys and your thoughts on GIGABYTE’s G1 series and what works for you as well as OC range, do you want to see a powerhouse OC board back?!?

GIGABYTE G1. Sniper M3 takes Gold at Vortez.net

Vortez main man Dave Michelson just published his review of our G1. Sniper M3, the first G1. Killer gaming series board designed in the more compact Micro-ATX form factor. The idea of course, is that are some serious gamers out there that prefer to build themselves a more portable Micro-ATX system that they can take to their buddy’s house, LAN parties or where the competitive action is. So as with all of our G1.Killer series boards, you’re getting real discrete-quality audio from the onboard Creative Sound Core3D audio processor and a slick Intel Gigabit network controller, but wrapped in a more compact board that still handles SLI and CrossfireX VGA configurations.

We’re really pleased to see the G1.Sniper M3 is proving to be a hit with reviewers, and it’s especially great to see Dave give it the the Gold award. Here’s a taste of what he had to say:

“There is no doubting that Sniper M3 looks the business. …Looks are one thing but how does this motherboard perform? Well, let me tell you Sniper M3 topped most of our benchmarks and even beat the much revered ASUS Maximus V GENE. The Sniper M3 excelled in this department and showed that for its size it can still pack a punch.

Priced at approx. £139.99, Sniper M3 is a great pick for those wanting a slice of Z77 under MATX form factor. Many will compare this motherboard to the ASUS Maximus V GENE and whilst it does lack the functionality of onboard power/reset buttons, LED debug and a few other features it’s the performance that delivers the trade-off. If you don’t need some of these features then it’s a no brainer.”

To catch the review and peruse the benchmarks in full, head on over to Vortez.net

More details about the G1.Sniper M3 can found on our site here.