mobo PCB Breakdown: Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UP7 // The most overkill motherboard ever made

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[@golfclapper686]

IR engineer: 'So, how many power phases do you need?' *awkward silence...* Gigabyte engineer: 'Yes'

[@AstolfoGayming]

IR engineer: "I don't think yes is an answer to how many phases we need.." Gigabyte Enginner: "DID I FUCKING STUTTER?"

[@BitterCynical]

This kind of looks like an engineer made a 10x power calculation error and nobody bothered to ask why the hell there are so damn many phases.

[@nocturnal0072]

Sounds like they were all in agreement. 😂

[@Bengt.Lueers]

44:44 (4*4 + 4*4 = 32) 32 phases for 4 cores. Video length checks out.

[@GurkenkoenigZ]

69 upvotes lul

[@theunholybakery1990]

That's 8 phases for 1 core

[@gmt-yt]

Imagine how many LEDs this would have if it were made today.

[@FatalTaco]

Asus Engineer: Alright we'll give this CPU 8 phases and adequate cooling. We'll also include a simple bios switch and place readers and buttons sendibly. I think it's best we design our board smartly. Gigabyte Engineer: *ANUU CHEEKI BREEKI IV DAMKE BOARD NEED 2 BE STRONK LIKE COMRADE I GIVE 32 PHASES BLYAT I DON'T CARE WHERE YOU PUT THE BUTTONS AND READERS CYKA CHUCK THEM ALL IN. NO I DON'T KNOW WHAT CPU GOES IN HERE IDI NAHUI I DON'T CARE BLYAD*

[@kingofnfsfan]

*THE PERFECT BOARD TO OVERCLOCK YOUR IGPU* and also your CPU.

[@alexisleftist778]

*casually puts over 100 watts through the intel igpu*

[@Melamamoduro]

@@alexisleftist778 We modern Apple macbook now.

[@theunholybakery1990]

@@alexisleftist778 *INTEL GRAPHICS STOPPED EXISTING*

[@bryantallen703]

2000watt VRM for a 77watt 3770K. Makes perfect sense.

[@YTHandlesWereAMistake]

2600k was 95W I think.. also soldered and raisable to 7GHz or so under enough cooling. Absolute beast of a chip, can regularly run about 4.5-5.0GHz under water...

[@Madmax0620]

@@YTHandlesWereAMistake still this board makes no sense ...

[@RealHumanDave]

95W and True... 24/7 at 5.1Ghz

[@jameshogge]

I want to see what happens if 2000W passes through a 3770k

[@theunholybakery1990]

@@jameshogge and that, is how the sun was made.

[@ActuallyHardcoreOverclocking]

first

[@SparkysAdventure]

Not quite

[@matt4193]

DANGIT

[@byCDMC]

there was a mix up, this was suppose to be an AMD FX board lol

[@vicdez]

Still running this board today lol. 3770k 4.8ghz 1.38v , corsair platinum 2400mhz cl11. Gigabytes auto dual bios is a pain on this board, switches set to main bios and single bios mode since 2013. lol

[@LoftySkinner]

Edit: nvm, thought you said 3570K

[@bojackhorseman9162]

same, to THIS day. lol. 3770k @5ghz since 2012. 1080ti seahawk x :) happy gaming

[@canirunit8162]

This board should handle 9980XE / 9990XE under LN2 without problem.

[@DazzaDirect]

this board is a LGA1155 "SandyBridge" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGA_1155

[@InvidiousIgnoramus]

@@DazzaDirect That wasn't really his point though.

[@gamegame2179]

What if you soldered the power pins to the end of the vrm and just run this static.

[@gamegame2179]

Or you could solder together a bunch of components and run it statically.

[@tomstech4390]

And then you see people put a 9900k in a gigabyte z370p D3 with a 4 phase. If I take good quality pictures of my 990fxa-UD7 and Crosshair 5 without the heatsinks any chance we old schooler can get a breakdown for them? I'm wondering if thier vrm phases are 4+1 x2 and how they're going to handle 4.5Ghz fx8's today (I'm running 4x gtx480's, They're not my main machines). Once TMPIN2 hits 55*c they max out the fans which is annoying.

[@ubuntulinuxrules]

This, I have the 990FXA-UD3 Rev 4 with the upgraded 8+2 for the 9590, and that board had a fantastic VRM that I'd love to see broken down.

[@tomstech4390]

@@ubuntulinuxrules nope. 4+1vrm with doublers (likely same as me hence I ask). IR3564B 4+1controller going to 5x IR3598 dual-mosfet drivers used as doublers. (Revisions 3 and lower were analog yours is digital). www.modders-inc.com/gigabyte-990fxa-ud3-rev-4-0-motherboard-review/2/ Had an "8 phase" 970a UD3P with a similar setup. Is it bad? No you still have 10 separate power stages and it's better than a fat 4+1 with no doublers and just everything doubled. Albeit our transient response may be lower Hence Asus loves fat stages. Compare it to other boards that have a 6+2 for example like m5a99x boards. Swings and roundabouts. The *msi 970 gaming* board with its "8 phase" is actually a 3+1 with doublers and is using niko mosfets. If anyone reads this and noticed leaking by the audio ports under the vrm that's because the thermal pad is weeping from heat. It works but isn't good and you should probably back off your overclock and undervolt as much as possible. I've used 4 of those in builds for people before I found out. They're still working but had I know I wouldn't have pushed them so hard. I should probably stop here because I'm on my phone.

[@tomstech4390]

Just found a 5 year old post from "the stilt" using a ud7 to get 8.1ghz 1st place superPi and congratulations from steponz, massman, Flanker and der8auer. A few names AHOC viewers should recognise.

[@ActuallyHardcoreOverclocking]

I already have 990fx-ud7 pics

[@tomstech4390]

​@Lolled9991 Is that chipset northbridge (big heatsink in middle) or cpu-nb (memory controller in cpu die)? The maximum spec for the chipset northbridge is 95W tCase and are only rated up to 115W Tjunction above which they'll get damaged. Section 5.2.1 www.amd.com/system/files/TechDocs/48691.pdf I'd plug in a small 70mm fan (low rpm) into SYSfan2 and have it blow over the vrm/chipset area to be sure, maybe double check other things aren't being overvolted? It doesn't take much airflow to drop temps significantly and tower coolers tend to blow past the vrm not onto it.

[@pyric]

Can't wait to see some LGA1155 and DDR3 stuff! I actually have a UP5 lol and you don't see much overclocking on the older intel junk

[@RichardDower]

PLX chip was very expensive, did they use copper heatsink?

[@Begleitkubus]

Thanks to this video sparking my interest in that board I bought one with a broken socket (bend pins, touching pins; it was really bad) and saved it by replacing the whole socket. Now it´s working again and in a really good condition too :) Really looking forward to run it myself, even tho I don´t have access to extreme cooling... yet.

[@jbgreen27]

Nice to see a breakdown of a board a actually own.

[@andljoy]

So am i right in thinking that if you can cool the power stages that VRM is theory 1920 AMPS ?

[@alexisleftist778]

just enough for the tr 1920 x gtx 1080 pc for ultimate 1080 gameplay

[@gamegame2179]

Maybe a 56 core Xeon W-3175X with 6Ghz DDR4 at 1.8V and 2.2V respectively.

[@thephi303]

It's 1:27 am I am supposed to sleep... But buildzoid hammered out a 44min piece on gigabyte hardware... Dammit.... Core I7-3770K...

[@metl_play]

This Board can overclok all pc's in your House without installing it in one of this Computers...

[@brandonhowes5364]

1155 is a fun platform in terms of overclocking as long as you can keep it cool. I had a 2600k at @5.1 1.4125v daily. Putting it under aida with a 240clc would get it up to mid 90s.

[@eekpanggang]

Performance and clock ceiling wise, yes, LGA1155 is fun but really limited to K CPUs only. I personally liked the LGA1156 more because you can put any CPU there and OC it with BClk.

[@RealHumanDave]

My man! Same clocks here.

[@gamegame2179]

Power consumption?

[@RealHumanDave]

@@gamegame2179 lots lol

[@Willhemmens]

I have two of them and I absolutely love them!

[@manrom3039]

my Asus P8Z77-I wont make it past Loading screen :-(. thanks for the z77 content, it helps me cope with the loss.

[@giglioflex]

The words you were looking to use to describe the use of the PLX chip is that it allows you to use more x16 expansion cards, SSDs, ect at full bandwidth so long as you do so Asynchronously.

[@suneelseethamraju]

Finally a ray of hope...I was hesitant to ask anyone (comment requesting for) in this day and time for this but, I have an X79 system (Rampage Extreme) with 4930K. I am still using it by overclocking it as I cannot afford to get a new PC. I tried searching for an overclocking guide that for quite some time but are of no use... Everyone just puts in there own voltages and values without any explanation for why. Could you please consider doing a video explaining what does what and what needs to be done to get a save and proper overclocking of CPU, RAM, and stuff? I have been watching your videos and I like the way you explain in your own natural way. Please consider doing a video even if it is a small one. Thank you for your time.

[@IK4MS]

The real question is, why not quadruple iGPU and VCCIO voltage? I mean 32+12+8 looks better than 32+3+1 :alzaface:

[@gamegame2179]

Gigabyte Z77 Performance Gaming eXtreme UltraPower now with 52 phase advanced titanium German VRM.

[@matt4193]

*HOLY FUCC THE T-TOPOLOGY ACTUALLY HAS A "T" ON IT WHOOOAAA DUDE*

[@-eMpTy-]

Hey Buildzoid, could you make a video about EEPROM programmers? Maybe a little tutorial on how to flash the bios with them while the actual bios chip is still on the board, using these test clips? I don't know if you have experience with them but would appreciate it either way if you could make a video about it.

[@nocturnal0072]

I here all the cool kids are using raspberry pi's at the moment.

[@young-mi3824]

Hi guys i'm needing your guidance to learn more about GPU/MB PCBs, i currently realy like Buildzoid breakdowns but i Don't realy follow everything he says. I'm kind of a beginner on VRM, mosfets, drivers, voltage controlers and chips and so on… Even if i'm studying electronics at univercity, it doesn't help me that much to know what it's going on here for the most part. So, where should i learn about "reading" components on such PCBs, cant even find a datasheet? I'm not an English speaking native also, and searching infos like this in french realy sucks because there is none or are hardly findable :D Ofc i know the basics, like understanding the specs of GPU/MB/RAM etc... like everyone here i think.

[@CroatianGamer97]

where did u get all those knowledge about chips and circuits lol

[@ericbromm7524]

Why would anyone dislike a buildzoid video?

[@Knaeckebrotsaege]

33:44 Not Panasonic/Matsushita, those are still Sanyo OSCON SEPC series. Panasonic nuked the Sanyo branding and shuffled some series/specs around only several years after this board came out. Sanyos electrolytics series (including the once super popular WG) were rebranded SUNCON (if anyone cares)

[@arevel5713]

I could buy one of these for 120€. Is it worth it?

[@andysim232]

Chuck Norris checks under his bed at night incase this board is there.

[@mxthunder2]

my favorite motherboard of all time!! It is an 11 layer PCB, the label is in the bottom left. Checkout Sinhardware for a more in depth review.

[@lamqshack]

yea i have it and still ROCK ! :D

[@golfclapper686]

if you dont spill coffee over it you can hand it down to your grand grand children

[@adrianstan5794]

Looking forward to an overclocking session on this board ! :D

[@GodOfGamingBG]

I own this board for many years now, love it, but Im starting to think of upgrading to X79 with 8-core ivy bridge xeon, but I will feel bad for selling it, I kinda want to keep it since its so cool

[@johngermain5146]

I've had nothing but boot cpu/memory timing issues with gigabyte 1155 motherboards. I use an I7-3770k cpu and several motherboards...switch bios back and forth refusing to get timing correct to boot. There are many google posts where others have the same problem. I had one board that booted after 8 hours of reboots which displayed the bios settings errors prevented booting, set to default and as long as I warm booted the board would post but the 1st cold boot killed the board again. Several days later I repeated the process but used @bios to upgrade the bios without rebooting. That one board continues to work but every so often it has serious boot retries before finally posting. Both the UD5 and UD3 have same issue.

[@ionstorm66]

The z87 was not as robust. I went from this board to the z87 oc and I blew vrms off of 3 of the 87s. Also some cases have fans on the back of the sockets. I have had a few different AMx boards that got hot at the socket area. Never had the issue with lga though. But with a fan back there the power stages would be fine.

[@YTHandlesWereAMistake]

True. Back in the day cases like Cooler Master 690 were available which had mounting holes in the side panels to attach fans to the sides of the case..

[@sophustranquillitastv4468]

Why no one produce a motherboard like this anymore? Current generation use much more power than anything in Ivy Bridge era but there is no one design a motherboard like this. I think another motherboard with this much power phases is Asus P7P55D Premium but the design is not as good as this.

[@theunholybakery1990]

Could this thing get a 28c to 5ghz? With the right socket obviously and a lot of cooling.

[@gamegame2179]

Yeah! That thing may pull 700W+, but hey, this vrm is similar to the ones on the new C621 boards (but with worse components). Note:the new boards for the 28c have stupid overkill vrms, which only really come in handy (compared to a 12 phase on say a gigabyte z390) on DICE, LN2, or LHe.

[@Rocky-bz8wr]

I have the Z77x-UD5H rev1.1 board from Gigabyte of this era with a Sandy Bridge i7 2600K@5.1GHz and even the board I have over clocks the old Sandy Bridge to 5.1Ghz with ease and the VRM's stay very cool under full system load. I almost bought this board you just did the break down for but it looked like crazy over kill for my shiny new i7 2600K back in 2012. To me this is when Gigabyte were at their best and still built things to last I am not sure what their new stuff is like though. I am going to be in the market for a new system platform upgrade very soon and I hear Gigabyte has a new x570 board that is gonna be pretty crazy as well for being built to the max. For the 0.095 imc voltage yea on Sandy Bridge i7 2600K I found trying to change that voltage never really paid off in any meaningful way. You might get a small bump in stability if raise it very slight so if it ever vdroops it won't go below the standard voltage I just never played with that setting after finding it did not really change anything for the over clock.

[@mnllr]

The dual bios switch is so nice to see. I have the b350 g3. Oh you changed your cpu? F U then bootloop for life. Overclocking your memory? F U too. Changed your gpu? Same F U for you. Nah dude. Clear cmos doesnt work for me. You have to search the internet for 2-6 hours to learn how to use the dual bios. 20-40 seconds reset +power button works. So yeah....

[@hubertcumberdale8175]

gear button, if it is the same as their OC touch panel, changes the step size of the + & - buttons. Meaning it goes from 0.1 BCLK steps to 1 mhz steps.

[@folterknecht1768]

People have been bitching about the shitty GB DUAL BIOS implementation for at least 10 years ... . It 's not only a problems related to RAM OC, it 's also related to the famous GB boot loop.

[@pininfarina575]

this board is like the SRT Demon... it will win you the dick measuring contest of the mainstream middle class of the market. it's got huge power, but it's still the "mainstream" car / board.

[@InvidiousIgnoramus]

It's completely unnecessary, but now my motherboard feels woefully inadequate.

[@danishblunt9698]

Ok so I came in so see what this was about, then buildzoid zoomed out and I was done, holy mother of god, wtf :'D

[@cekocaptain]

Could you make a video about the DFI P45 T3RS? The world of oc is a worst place without this company around any more.

[@colin8601]

Dumb question....do modern boards have plx chips? Or is their use outdated? Nowadays, you could raid nvme drives and not saturate all the lanes then? Or do I have that wrong

[@CarbonPanther]

Yes modern boards still have them, but nearly only on workstation boards like the ASUS WS Z390 Pro.

[@BillyONeal]

Gigabyte's software dual BIOS seems to make sense for non-expert users who don't ever want to open their PC. It's not that it's stupid, it's just that it's not targeted at your use case.

[@SparkysAdventure]

This board is just silly. 32 phases for a quad core.

[@seant9790]

Nothing wrong with over kill. Under built is silly. This thing is like for a quad core if you're set up by a volcano or in the desert or whatever you could think of. Using a PC in a sauna.....

[@Testbug000]

Sean T yeah. But this isn’t overkill. 16 phases would have been overkill. 32 here is... OverOverkill?

[@seant9790]

@@Testbug000 It is overkill, I'm saying overkill is much better then underbuilt, so my point is - we shouldn't complain about overkill.

[@BloodpactORG]

Don't forget ASUS made a 10+2+2 VRM mini-ITX board, also on Z77. And AsRock made a board with like 18 SATA ports on Z77. Z77 was wild.

[@nicholaspeyton5460]

Can you do some comparisons on an oscilloscope to show less ripple on these mega-size VRM boards? Thannks.

[@kelvinyonger8885]

Wait... can you chain doublers? i. e. 35201 *4 *2 = 64 phases?

[@plonk420]

why would they skimp out on a shitty Foxconn socket??

[@raulfernandezperez73]

can u do that with a z77x-ud3h ? its the one i have (3 years and running)

How much should i sell my 3770k for ?

[@ZackMartin177]

I paid for 2,000 watts. Im going to use the entire 2,000 watts.

[@BS-zc4zo]

Have you ever looked at the Gigabyte X58A-OC?

[@Samey44]

pls overclock a 2500k to the moon on this :)

[@mateuscampello]

21:40 *EXTREME LN2 iGPU OVERCLOCKING*

[@mor8286]

how much ram capacity can the gigabyte z77 take??

[@Eli_Kennemer]

The human finger can only see 24fps anyways.

[@mtunayucer]

2:49 and bam you got yourself a space heater :)

[@jli8225]

Tuna Yücer 4x R9 295X2 for 8 way xfire!

[@jli8225]

Actually a space heater is a 9900k

[@mckayver1306]

Does anybody know what this means for my RMA, the AMD chip on your motherboard is faulty and is being replaced. It's a gigabyte x470 gaming WiFi 7 and that sounds super serious so now I don't have confidence that it's going to last when I get it back.

[@saultube44]

The automatic BIOS change an be useful, and that is solved with the second switch so it's not a problem, I like the flexibility of it, the MoBo will help you diagnose when a BIOS is unbootable, so I think it's better this way, but yeah the placement should be practical for the Boot codes and switches. That thing has 36 VRMs or 18 dual VRMs, I don't understand why

[@granthampson5917]

Can you do a PCB Breakdown on Gigabyte Z97X Gaming GT/7. Nice blast from the past. Interesting how things have changed over few years.

[@adamlaker7106]

Hi Buildzoid, you talking about the dual bios and switch's on gigabytes powerful mobo's, i have a Gigabyte Z87X-OC and it beeps constant with code 15 on display, and switches the bios all the time will not post no matter what ive tried, everywhere ive looked and the solutions that have been flagged the best have been unsuccessful, any chance you would have any suggestions i can try? i thort it may be the ram so im look at finding ram that has the exact code on the support list from gigabyte, and im using a orig haswell cpu not a refresh as im unsure as the bios version.

[@filds1]

That board was overkill considering they were only 4 K cpus with 95w. IDK who would buy this board? Maybe the overclocking teams but im guessing this board was not your average gaming board with that many phases

[@Fee.1]

Do you have any Vpro boards? I imagine many of the high end intel ...well no I think it’s a corporate feature only so it comes on like dells...but I want Vpro for gnarly WOL & virtualization support

[@0s0sXD]

Keep up the daily uploads. I love your aura in your videos

[@blodstainer]

Also remember this was the first PCIe 3.0 gen and 4 way SLI/Crossfire was pretty much impossible on older p67 boards where pcie 2.0 x8 was very limiting for a single GPU

[@joesaiditstrue]

Is it more insane than the Maximus V Extreme, also a Z77 board, the one I've been rocking for about 5 years now

[@thetrashman5252]

Yes

[@gamegame2179]

This is more powerful than the X570/Z390 MEG Godlike.

[@0ADVISOR0]

wut? you're not running your mobo's on lava? huh... well I guess I'll still stick to the nichicons cuz dave jones told me to!

[@itsgriff]

slight step down from this but my 3570k loved my GA-Z77X-UP 5 th rig still runs like a beast

[@blodstainer]

I had no idea this was this good, bought this used a few years back and ran a delidded 4.5GHz 3770k in it and sold it with a 1070 for a decent amount of money.

[@werewolfmoney6602]

I showed my 4 and 6 year old that the remote control car they took apart (seemingly) uses the same kind of oscillator caps as this motherboard (to the left of the pcie slots) and now they're asking me why their rc car's pcb can't play Minecraft.

[@0x8087]

Speaking of most powerful CPU Vcore VRM, take a gander at the power delivery on the IBM Z9 mainframes

[@impo997]

wow that looks fucking amazing

[@bardacuda82]

Holy shit how much did this thing cost back in the day? Actually how much does it cost now? Do I even want to know? Is this too many questions?

[@lulink99]

My dad has one of these mobos. Bought it after the first board got bricked. He uses it with an i5-3570K @ Stock and doesn't plan on overclocking any time in the future. Now talk about overkill xD (But it was cheap at the time)

[@jordibt1789]

I was wondering i there was any possible way to run a multi iGPU setup of some kind in a multi socket MoBo

[@nocturnal0072]

"Gotta live up to the name."

[@blodstainer]

The problem would be the NVMe PCIe support for this generation of chipset

[@emperorSbraz]

so much current that you could run wires from this vrm to another board with a busted vrm and make a dual socket beowulf :D

[@givemeajackson]

That would be way too awesome to comprehend

[@gamegame2179]

Or just use it as a E-power board.

[@tamtgirl]

i'm still using my Z77 asus MvE that until very recently had 3 msi 670's in SLI. now i'm using a EVGA gtx 1080 SC2. my 3770k has been running a 4 mhz for, umm like 6 years

[@theunholybakery1990]

Wait... what?

[@tamtgirl]

@@theunholybakery1990 what what?

[@najirulislam3444]

Imagine if they remake a similar board for ryzen 3rd gen 👀

[@UltraDXSASC]

I remember my old X97 Soc Force, but it got 2 bad slots I have to sold it with my 4790K :/

[@abcdefg9613]

The question is, did the mobo fail or the cpu memory controller? Having two slots fail means one channel no longer works.

[@emperorSbraz]

i saw a video of a guy resetting the bios switching by shorting 2 pins on the legs of the bios chips

[@emperorSbraz]

something so bold must come from an employee that added a zero to a quantity during a mosfet order..

[@sanadanosa]

Virtu Lucid lol.

[@agfa1854]

Great vid! have a 3570k that’s yours if you want it.

[@jcoc8877]

I want one. Lol

[@izopi4a]

great vids, could you help me pick the best RAM for reasanable price ( expensive but not overpriced ) ?

[@gamegame2179]

For Micron E-die the cheapest is the Ballistix Sport LT 3000Mhz CL15.

[@felentus]

I've used a gigabyte board and did some memory overclocking. After a few hours, I called the seller and informed them, that the board is DOA... It didn't have dual bios.

[@GinoCruzVlogs]

Mine died. User fault btw.

[@Hostilenemy]

But can the IGP Run 3Dmark2001 and get 20K+ points?

[@Ogk10]

What do you think about the asus z77-v pro?

[@thephi303]

Xeon E3-1290?

[@saeedoc]

do Maximus IV Extreme next . pretty pls!