GIGABYTE Intros H170-Gaming 3 D3 Motherboard for Budget Upgrades

GIGABYTE introduced the H170-Gaming 3 D3 motherboard to help you better spread your upgrade budget. Say you just bought a fast 16 GB dual-channel memory kit recently, to use on your older machine, and want to upgrade to Core "Skylake," choosing a DDR3-based socket LGA1151 motherboard will let you spend the money saved on buying a DDR4 memory kit on a better processor. The H170-Gaming 3 D3 is built in the ATX form-factor, taking in power from 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS power connectors. It uses a 7-phase VRM to condition power to the CPU. The CPU is wired to four DDR3 DIMM slots, and one PCI-Express 3.0 x16.

Other expansion slots include a PCI-Express 3.0 x16 (electrical gen 3.0 x4, wired to the PCH), and two each of PCIe 3.0 x1 and legacy PCI. Storage connectivity includes two M.2 32 Gb/s slots, two SATA-Express 16 Gb/s, and six SATA 6 Gb/s. USB connectivity includes eight USB 3.0 ports (four on the rear panel, four by headers). Display outputs include one each of HDMI, DVI, and D-Sub. The AMP-UP onboard audio solution combines a 115 dBA SNR 8-channel CODEC with ground layer isolation, audio-grade capacitors, and a user-replaceable OPAMP chip. Networking is care of Killer E2200 NIC. UEFI dual-BIOS makes for the rest of it. Expect this board to be priced around $100-$120.