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Gigabyte P965-DS3 Motherboard Overclocking Review

Motherboards/Intel S775 by KeithSuppe @ 2007-07-29

The Gigabyte P965-DS3 is arguably the very best 965-based overclocking platform available. Today were dusting off a Rev.1 board which has been replaced by the DS3 Rev 2.0 and 3.3 models. While the board is technically obsolete she´s almost identical to her siblings and they even share many of the same BIOS versions. There are a large number of Rev 1.0 boards at the heart of many systems; this overclocking article is for them and anyone considering a Gigabyte P965-DS3.

P5W DH vs. P965-DS3 3D Results

Asus P5w DH vs. GA P965-DS3 3D Results

We begin with Maxon's CineBench which is a freeware/shareware benchmark anyone can download and run. The benchmark is available from Maxon. The benchmark renders in OpenGL and software shading tests based on massive polygon counts. This is one of few 3D tests where the 975X as housed on the Asus platform lives up to its expectations for Intel's still current flagship NB.

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Most of you are familiar with PCMark05 Basic Edition 1.20 which is also available in a freeware version which can be downloaded from multiple host sites through Futuremark (PCMark05). Here we see the P5W DH does keep ahead, but when we consider the differences in these boards these are surprising results.

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3DMark2001 has been discontinued (at least any support for it has) but you can still find this classic benchmark at Futuremark here 3DMark2001 Basic Freeware Edition v.3.3.0.. Here the P965 pulls ahead.

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3DMark06 was the last benchmark released by Futuremark and there should be a 07 version soon. You can download 3DMark06 Basic Edition 1.10 here. Once again the budget chipset based board is slightly ahead.

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FEAR has become a very popular title and Multi-Player Demo has its own built in benchmark. You can find the demo here at Sierra's download section under FEAR MPDemo. Here's we see the P965-DS3 simply allows the Leadtek 7950GX2 to fly.

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Above was the Average score run for FEAR below we have the Maximum score run. Once again the results favor the single PCIe budget platform based on the 965.

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The 3D results are quite surprising. The PCIe bus seems to open up on the 965-chipset perhaps because the 965-chipset isn't suffering from the infamous North Bridge Bootstrap theory imposing tighter latencies on the Memory Controller Hub. Although the chipset bootstrap issue was questioned as soon as it was published it seems to me this provides even further proof of it's existence and it's effect on performance. The memory and timings were the same for both motherboards yet the GA P965-DS3 clearly pulls ahead making this budget board an even greater value as its price drops.

Overclocking from the Desktop EasyTune results ->

Comment from Rutar @ 2007/07/29

I digg their bios update utility too.

Comment from Kougar @ 2007/07/30

Nice review of my board, I own the Rev 1 version.

I would like to mention that no one should consider buying any 965P-DS3 unless it is the Rev 3.3 version, which ClubIt has long been selling for the same price as the other models. The Rev 2 added another much needed VRM module to the board to help provide CPU power. Three VRM regs alone is not enough for best results and vdroop. Rev 3.3 adds true FSB1333 support and changed some of the board trace layouts and cap placements to do so.

It is a little strange you had so much issue with your RAM using the F10 or later BIOS's, as I see you did set "Option 2" for the RAM DLL setting. I can say that the Rev1 DS3 did not give stable RAM voltages for me, any voltage setting over 2.1v was unstable with my Corsair ProMOS RAM. I tested the RAM again on a P35-DQ6, and it was stable at 2.15 and 2.2v settings, so clearly the DS3 cannot handle high voltage DDR2 well. Again is why I mention users should only look at Rev 3.3 boards, if not P35 boards instead. Also the DS3 would not support RAM clocked above 1100Mhz, however the DQ6 has no issues running the same Ballistix kit above even 1220MHz.

My top 24 hour Prime stable CPU overclock on the DS3 was 501 FSB x 7 = 3.5GHz, but nothing higher. Link (Sidenote, active NB cooling required) Dropping the CPU to a 6 multipler got the FSB over ~540FSB stable, but the board would finally throw in the towel a bit above that. Top OC required 1.475vCore to remain stable, compared to the 1.4375vCore my P35-DQ6 requires at the same exact overclock. It will also continue to overclock my E6300 to 3.8Ghz, but 540FSB is the absolute FSB ceiling of the P35-DQ6 at any CPU setting.

Comment from MakubeX @ 2007/07/30

The best thing is that the DS3 is dirt chap compared to other 695p OCing boards. However, at time I wouldn't get a 965p board, I would save up for a good P35, like the Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R or DS3P. Still reasonably cheap and are also very good overclockers; plus you got support for Penryn.

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