GIGABYTE G1 Sniper M3 Review

A Micro ATX Intel Z77 motherboard is on the test bench and under the spotlight. Will this LGA1155 board from the G1 Killer series destroy the competition?

Product on Review: G1.Sniper M3
Manufacturer and Sponsor: GIGABYTE
Street Price: £139inc. VAT (At time of review)

GIGABYTE’s G1 Killer Series represents the very best of what the brand can offer in their motherboard category. Their previous endeavours for the X58 and Z68 chipsets have had high praise over the years have bagged many an accolade, today we shall be delving into the G1 Killer arena to examine their efforts with the new Intel Z77 chipset.

It was back at CeBIT 2012 that the Sniper M3 appeared and ever since we have been itching to get our mitts on the motherboard. Sniper M3 is the first MATX motherboard to feature in the G1-Killer Series. Boasting a black PCB, luminous slots and premium sound quality via Creative Sound Core 3D, the Sniper M3 may have some features trimmed back compared to its full-sized sibling but the foundations for a powerful gaming system are all there. Join us as we explore the Sniper M3!

GIGABYTE’s take on G1 Sniper M3

The G1.Sniper M3 is the first m-ATX gaming motherboard of the GIGABYTE G1-Killer series, which have been designed from the ground up to provide the winning edge in a close 3D gaming contest. Precision is the watch word in all areas of the motherboard’s design, with as much attention to detail paid to the motherboards aesthetic qualities as to its technical prowess.

Equipped with the latest Intel Z77 Express Chipset, the G1.Sniper M3 motherboard harnesses the outstanding performance of the new 3rd generation Intel® Core™ processors. With an exclusive ‘Digital’ VRM design; GIGABYTE 3D Power and GIGABYTE 3D BIOS (Dual UEFI), The G1.Sniper M3 motherboard ensures exceptional power delivery and absolute control.

Technical Specifications

CPU
Support for Intel® Core™ i7 processors/Intel® Core™ i5 processors/ Intel® Core™ i3 processors/Intel® Pentium® processors/Intel® Celeron® processors in the LGA1155 package

L3 cache varies with CPU

Chipset
Intel® Z77 Express Chipset

Memory
4 x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32 GB of system memory

Dual channel memory architecture

Support for DDR3 2400(OC)/1600/1333/1066 MHz memory modules

Support for non-ECC memory modules

Support for Extreme Memory Profile (XMP) memory modules

Onboard Graphics Chipset
1 x D-Sub port
1 x DVI-D port, supporting a maximum resolution of 1920×1200
* The DVI-D port does not support D-Sub connection by adapter.
1 x HDMI port, supporting a maximum resolution of 1920×1200
1 x DisplayPort, supporting a maximum resolution of 2560×1600

Audio
Creative CA0132 chip
Support for Sound Blaster Recon3Di
High Definition Audio
2/5.1-channel
Support for S/PDIF Out

LAN
Intel GbE LAN chip (10/100/1000 Mbit)

Expansion Slots
1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x16 (PCIEX16)
* For optimum performance, if only one PCI Express graphics card is to be installed, be sure to install it in the PCIEX16 slot.
1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX8)
(The PCIEX16 and PCIEX8 slots conform to PCI Express 3.0 standard.)
* The PCIEX8 slot shares bandwidth with the PCIEX16 slot. When the PCIEX8 slot is populated, the PCIEX16 slot will operate at up to x8 mode.
* PCIE Gen.3 is dependent on CPU and expansion card compatibility.
1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x4 (PCIEX4)
1 x PCI Express x1 slot
(PCIEX4/PCIEX1 slots conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)

Multi-Graphics Technology
Support for 2-Way AMD CrossFireX™/NVIDIA SLI technology (PCIEX16 and PCIEX8)

Storage Interface Chipset
2 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors (SATA3 0/1) supporting up to 2 SATA 6Gb/s devices
3 x SATA 3Gb/s connectors (SATA2 2~4) supporting up to 3 SATA 3Gb/s devices
1 x eSATA 3Gb/s connector on the back panel supporting up to 1 SATA 3Gb/s device
Support for RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, and RAID 10
* When a RAID set is built across the SATA 6Gb/s and SATA 3Gb/s channels, the system performance of the RAID set may vary depending on the devices being connected.

USB Chipset
Up to 4 USB 3.0/2.0 ports (2 ports on the back panel, 2 ports available through the internal USB header)
Up to 10 USB 2.0/1.1 ports (4 ports on the back panel, 6 ports available through the internal USB headers)

Internal I/O Connectors
1 x 24-pin ATX main power connector
1 x 4-pin ATX 12V power connector
2 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors
3 x SATA 3Gb/s connectors
1 x CPU fan header
3 x System fan headers
1 x front panel header
1 x front panel audio header
1 x USB 3.0/2.0 header
3 x USB 2.0/1.1 headers
1 x Clear CMOS jumper
1 x Trusted Platform Module (TPM) header

Back Panel Connectors
1 x PS/2 keyboard/mouse port
1 x D-Sub port
1 x DVI-D port
1 x HDMI port
1 x DisplayPort
1 x eSATA 3Gb/s connector
2 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports
4 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports
1 x RJ-45 port
1 x optical S/PDIF Out connector
5 x audio jacks (Center/Subwoofer Speaker Out, Rear Speaker Out, Line In/Mic In, Line Out, Headphone)

I/O Controller
iTE I/O Controller Chip

H/W Monitoring
System voltage detection
CPU/System temperature detection
CPU/System fan speed detection
CPU overheating warning
CPU/System fan fail warning
CPU/System fan speed control
* Whether the CPU/system fan speed control function is supported will depend on the CPU/system cooler you install.

BIOS
2 x 64 Mbit flash
Use of licensed AMI EFI BIOS
Support for DualBIOS™
PnP 1.0a, DMI 2.0, SM BIOS 2.6, ACPI 2.0a

Unique Features
Support for @BIOS
Support for Q-Flash
Support for Xpress Install
Support for Xpress Recovery2
Support for EasyTune
* Available functions in EasyTune may differ by motherboard model.
Support for eXtreme Hard Drive (X.H.D)
Support for Auto Green
Support for ON/OFF Charge
Support for Q-Share
Support for 3D Power
Support for EZ Setup

Bundle Software
Norton Internet Security (OEM version)
Intel® Rapid Start Technology
Intel® Smart Connect Technology
Intel® Smart Response Technology
LucidLogix Virtu MVP
* Make sure the monitor cable has been connected to the integrated graphics port on the back panel.
cFosSpeed

Operating System
Support for Microsoft® Windows 7

Form Factor
Micro ATX Form Factor; 24.4cm x 24.4cm

Packaging & First Look

Sniper M3 is presented in a military styled box. Being featured in the G1-Killer Series, GIGABYTE has stamped technology logos such as VIRTU MVP, Sound Core 3D, NVIDIA SLI, AMD CrossfireX and other gaming related features clearly in view on the front.

The back of the box has a diagram of the motherboard and major features have been listed – along with more detail to explain particular features.

Packaging for Sniper M3

Within the box are various items including the following:

• Documentation – User manual, installation guidebook
• Software CD – drivers and utilities
• 6x SATA cables (6GB/s)
• Flexible NVIDIA SLI bridge
• Rear IO shield

The accessories bundle

Also included in the bundle is a large wall poster with military stickers – something we have seen bundled with other G1-Killer motherboards.

A large poster and military stickers for the kid in you

And the finally we get our first glimpse of the Sniper M3. The colour configuration is something we have seen on previous Sniper motherboards with the ‘toxic look’ being given to PCI-E slots, memory slots and GIGABYTE branding. GIGABYTE have given the Sniper M3 a matt black PCB to If you hadn’t already guessed from the size of the packaging Sniper M3 is MATX. The ‘M’ in the name signifies MATX whilst the ‘3’ shows that this new wave of Z77 motherboards feature the 3rd generation of the Sniper Series.

Being within GIGABYTE’s gaming series, the Sniper M3 is pitched to be a direct contender for ASUS Maximus V GENE. So it will be interesting to see how the features and performance compares. On the next page we will move in for a closer look at the various elements of the Sniper M3.

An overview of Sniper M3

Closer Look

Sniper M3 is LGA1155 and uses the Intel Z77 chipset meaning it has full support for Intel’s 3rd Generation CPUs – Ivy Bridge. There is also support for Sandy Bridge too of course.

As we saw with Z77MX-D3H there are less heatsinks around the CPU socket because GIGABYTE are using Lower Rds(on) MOSFETs which don’t generate as much heat – only a vertical heatsink is required. This does make the Sniper M3 less aggressive but if it isn’t actually needed then there is no point in sourcing materials and slapping on more than is necessary. There is a 6+2 phase power design used on Sniper M3 and a single 4-pin CPU power socket sits just behind the heatsink covering the MOSFETs/VRM.

The CPU socket for Sniper M3

Moving our attention to the memory slots there are 4x slots for dual channel DDR3 – with support for Intel XMP and a maximum capacity of 32GB. There is support for 1066MHz kits all the way up to 2400MHz (OC).

Next to the memory slots is the native USB 3.0 header for getting USB 3.0 functionality at the front of your computer chassis.

Dual Channel DDR3 support – 1066MHz up to 2400MHz (OC)

Next up is the HDD storage which is in short supply. There are 2x ports for SATA 2 (Black – 3GB/s) and 2x ports for SATA 3 (White – 6GB/s) – via Intel Z77. There is also another SATA 2 port just behind the ports but ideally, we would have liked to see another 2x ports to give the motherboard a bit more flexibility since most will be using an optical drive plus primary OS drive (usually a small SSD) and this only leaves another two ports free.

2x SATA 2 and 2x SATA 3 ports

On the other side of the SATA ports is the Intel Z77 chip with a substantial, passive heatsink covering it. In the picture below you can see the SATA 2 port next to the front panel header.

The Intel Z77 chip covered with black heatsink

Casting our eyes over the PCI-E section of the Sniper M3, for a MATX there are quite a nice selection of slots. At the top is a green PCI Express x16 slot running at x16, beneath this is a black PCI Express x1 slot and a further 2x PCI Express x16 slots have been placed at the bottom. These run at x4 and x8. These PCI-E x16 slots are all Gen 3 ready – you just need an Ivy Bridge Processor, if you are planning to run a single graphics card configuration then the top slot is best one to use but if you are using a dual card configuration then the top and bottom slots are the best options to take since this will only bring the speed down to x8. The middle (green) PCI-E x16 slot is x4 – so if you do happen to go with Quad-SLI or Quad-CrossfireX then x4 mode is the only viable option.

PCI-Express slots with Gen 3 support

Earlier we saw the SoundCore 3D logo on the packaging. This alludes to a collaboration with Creative, GIGABYTE have used the CA0132 chip on Sniper M3 and have given this section an EMI shield for preventative measures. There are also some Nichicon Audio CAPs (significantly less compared to G1 Sniper 2 though.

Audio by Creative with EMI shield

Lastly we come to the rear IO ports on Sniper M3 and for a MATX motherboard there are quite a generous assortment. From left to right:

• 2x USB 2.0 ports
• PS2 keyboard/mouse
• VGA/DVI ports
• HDMI/Display port
• 2x USB 2.0 ports
• 1x eSATA 3GB/s
• Gigabit LAN (RJ45) port
• 2x USB 3.0 ports
• 5 audio jacks with optical S/DIF

Lots of choice on the rear IO

Ultra Durable 4 – Features

Continuing their series of “Ultra Durable” components and features, GIGABYTE offer Ultra Durable 4 with their Intel Z77 motherboards. This encompasses the following feartures:

Humidity Protection

Those in certain climates will have to deal with humidity on a daily basis. As a result this can damage components and cause electrical shorts. GIGABYTE have implemented a Glass Fabric PCB which is designed to combat this problem, by using this material there are less gaps between the spaces on the PCB filaments and this in-turn prevents humidity causing problems.

Electrostatic Protection

The next feature is Electostatic Protection. GIGABYTE have armed their Z77 motherboards with High Resistance ICs. Put simply, these help protect against electrostatic discharge!

Power Failure Protection

On GIGABYTE Intel Z77 motherboards, GIGABYTE have implemented dual BIOS so that even if there is a power surge or another type of fault – the secondary BIOS is used and avoids having a complete system shutdown. Anti-surge ICs have also been included to prevent power surges from taking place.

High Temperature Protection

The last feature concerns high temperatures. There are solid CAPs used throughout GIGABYTE’s Z77 motherboards and low RDS(on) MOSFETs work well with high-temperatures. This provides added high-temperature protection and up to 50K hours of component lifespan.

GIGABYTE 3D BIOS

At the tail-end of last year (2011) GIGABYTE displayed their new 3D BIOS. GIGABYTE were late to the UEFI party this 3D BIOS hopes to satisfy GIGABYTE fans who thought they were missing out.

For those who want to see a working version of this BIOS, check out GIGABYTE’s video tour of 3D BIOS below:

GIGABYTE 3D BIOS have two different modes which you can switch between. The first mode is below with an illustration of the BIOS which requires you to move your mouse over various parts to get more info and tweak settings.

The second mode is what most will be familiar with. In this mode you can alter various settings and there is a great BIOS update tool for flashing to the latest version as well as a feature that allows you to screenshot (these images were taken using this feature) to a USB stick.

I’ll be honest with you, after using other vendor’s BIOS and then coming to 3D BIOS I was a little underwhelmed. The illustration of the motherboard in the first mode feels like a gimmick. Moving into the second mode the navigation of the mouse isn’t as smooth as I would have liked. This is the second time I have used the GIGABYTE 3D BIOS and after the 1st occasion its clear that improvements have been made as the gaming mouse I am using now works 100% of the time, it didn’t in the first instance over a month ago.

GIGABYTE need to work on the navigation of their BIOS. It needs to be more fluid, afterall there is tough competition in this area with other vendors. Users, especially advanced users will want to get in and out of the BIOS quickly and at the moment – certainly from my experience it isn’t as responsive as it could be.

Lucid VIRTU MVP

An interesting feature that first appeared on the desktop environment with the Sandy Bridge architecture was the integrated graphics on the CPU. This meant that regardless of if you had a discreet graphics solution you always had the ability to use “Built in” processing power to watch movies, view 3D content and take part in some casual gaming.

With Ivy Bridge, Intel have stepped up with new graphics architecture by delivering full DX11 functionality. With HD-4000 there is a significant increase in execution units which mean even greater performance enhancements when compared to HD 2000/3000 – found on Sandy Bridge CPUs. To the end user this should translate to being able to handle 1080p movies, more complex gaming titles and even more intense 3D renders.

This motherboard has HDMI/VGA/DVI ports to allow connectivity to Intel’s IGP with support via Lucid VIRTU MVP. What VIRTU does is – it allows the user to utilise both discrete GPU and Intel’s IGP (built in graphics on the CPU) without the need to change hardware or switch the outputs.

VIRTU brings in many unique features, a great deal of them are associated with power management – relating to heat, fan speed, and other useful elements. There are two different modes to use when considering VIRTU:

i-Mode
This provides the user with Intel features and power saving options when not being used for 3D gaming. Display must be connected to video output on the motherboard to use this feature.

d-Mode
This mode allows gamers to enhance their 3D experience and performance – combining a discrete graphics solution and the iGPU. In this mode we can use VIRTU to assist with things like transcoding and media encoding in general. The overriding thought on this is that even entry level AMD and NVIDIA graphics cards have their own technologies for handling media encoding such as AMD Stream and NVIDIA CUDA – both of these technologies are deemed as being exceptional alternatives and don’t offer any real advantage over VIRTU using IGP for these types of task.

Display drivers for discreet graphics card must be installed prior to VIRTU drivers.

For more information on VIRTU please go to: Lucidlogix Virtu MVP

Test Setup & Overclocking

CPUs Intel Core i5 3570K (3.40GHz) Ivy Bridge
Cooling Alpenfohn K2 – Mount Doom
Motherboard GIGABYTE Z77 G1. Sniper M3
Memory Corsair Vengeance 8GB 2133MHz CL11 DDR
Graphics XFX R7970 Black Edition
Storage Kingston HyperX 240GB SSD
PSU OCZ Fatal1ty 750W

Benchmarks

Cinebench 11.5 – CPU Score
x264 HD 4.0 – 1st and 2nd pass encoding
SiSoftware SANDRA 2012 – CPU & Memory benchmarks
AIDA64 – CPU benchmarks
3DMark 11 – DX11 3D Performance and Extreme preset
Games – DIRT 3, Skyrim and Battlefield 3

Other Software
Core Temp
LinX stress Test
CPU-Z

Overclocking

As previously mentioned in our Intel Core i5 Sandy Bridge Roundup – overclocking with Ivy Bridge is identical to Sandy Bridge. It is achieved by altering the multiplier rather than the BCLK. So the BCLK stays at 100MHz and the multiplier is modified. So if we have 100MHz on the BCLK and 40 for the multiplier this will obviously output 4GHz.

For this section of the review the maximum overclock was achieved by using the Intel Core i5 3750K and monolith CPU cooler – Alpenfohn K2 with 2x 120mm and 1x 140mm fans. We’ve seen in previous reviews how the 3570K usually responds well to a vcore of 1.40v so instead of starting at a lower frequency I pushed the Sniper M3 to establish the best results. 4.8GHz is the best overclock we have had with this chip and to make things realistic we never push the 3570K beyond 1.40v since this will reduce the longevity of the chip. With 48 (4.8GHz) and 1.40v the system would POST but on entry into Windows the system would BSOD so against my better nature I pushed the vcore up to 1.42v in an attempt to reach the milestone but this did not alter anything. So I then nudge the frequency back to 47 (4.7GHz) and this booted no problem and was stable after a thorough test using LinX. So establishing that 4.7GHz was possible I then began nudging the voltage back until I hit a brick wall at 1.38v – the temperatures at full load with these settings, using LinX revealed temperatures of around 70-75C.

This maximum overclock will be used throughout our benchmarks – as well as stock 3570K frequency with turbo boost enabled.

Power Consumption

It’s interesting to note the power consumption across all motherboards. Although they are using P67 and Z68 chipsets, energy results can fluctuate between manufacturers due to the features and specifications that are integrated. First of all, for the idle tests the system is cold booted into Windows and no additional applications are executed – the watts are noted on the external energy monitor we use and then the system is loaded with 3DMark 11 – watts are again monitored for the duration of the test and the highest rated wattage result is then noted down. Below are the results of this energy test.

Benchmarks: X264 HD

Simply put, this test measures how fast your machine can encode a short, DVD quality MPEG-2 video clip into a high-quality x264 video clip. What’s x264, you ask? It’s more or less the next-generation Xvid/DivX codec. I think it’s ideal for a benchmark because the application (x264.exe) reports fairly accurate compression results (in frames per second) for each pass of the video encoding process, and it uses multi-core processors very efficiently.

x264 HD gives results for 2 passes when compressing an MPEG-2 clip into x264. It presents 4 separate results for each pass giving a total of 8 – all results are given in FPS. For each pass I have averaged out the results.

Benchmarks: AIDA64

Get your copy of AIDA64 here!

This simple integer benchmark focuses on the branch prediction capabilities and the misprediction penalties of the CPU. It finds the solutions for the classic “Queens problem” on a 10 by 10 sized chessboard. At the same clock speed theoretically the processor with the shorter pipeline and smaller misprediction penalties will attain higher benchmark scores. For example — with HyperThreading disabled — the Intel Northwood core processors get higher scores than the Intel Prescott core based ones due to the 20-step vs 31-step long pipeline. CPU Queen test uses integer MMX, SSE2 and SSSE3 optimizations.

Benchmarks: Cinebench

CINEBENCH can measure systems with up to 64 processor threads. This test scene contains approximately 2,000 objects which in turn contain more than 300,000 polygons in total, and uses sharp and blurred reflections, area lights, shadows, procedural shaders, antialiasing, and much more. The result is displayed in points (pts). The higher the number, the faster your processor.

Benchmarks: SiSoftware SANDRA 2012

SANDRA isn’t always a benchmark that is included in hardware reviews but I believe it shouldn’t be ignored. SANDRA provides a vigorous package that tests your system in a rather large array of benchmarks. There are many aspects of benchmark that can be executed. We will be considering – CPU and memory tests.

Benchmarks: 3DMARK 11

Designed to measure your PC’s gaming performance 3DMark 11 makes extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to consistently and reliably test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.

3DMark 11 is a very popular 3D performance benchmark suite and needs little introduction. For the test settings both Performance and Extreme presets are run with ‘benchmark only’ being selected. This provides good analysis. Many will only test the performance preset, using the extreme mode we can examine the board under much more severe stressing – at 720p and 1080p.

Benchmarks: DIRT 3, Skyrim & Battlefield 3

It’s important for us to perform a number of game benchmarks as well as the synthetic tests because gamers will want to know if there are any significant benefits. So here we have a selection of popular gaming titles, critically acclaimed and action-packed.

Settings
DIRT 3 – 1680×1050 4xMSAA – Ultra Quality *Benchmark tool*
Skyrim – 1680×1050 2xAA – Very High Quality *FRAPS – 1st episode*
Battlefield 3 – 1680×1050 2xAA – Ultra Quality *FRAPS – Sepur Fedelis*

The gaming titles selected demand GPU power over CPU power – in each test the difference is rather marginal.

Conclusion

So we’ve already looked at one of GIGABYTE’s entry level MATX Z77 motherboards but now we come to a product that is aimed a little higher, targeting the avid gamer and a predominant model from GIGABYTE’s notorious G1-Killer Series.

GIGABYTE has refined the aesthetics on their Sniper M3. Gone are the gimmicks of old but here to stay are the dazzling colour configurations appeals to a broad spectrum of users. 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.

Though I’m not a huge fan of the BIOS, using it to overclock was very easy. Sniper M3 realised an impressive 4.7GHz overclock with our Intel Core i5-3570K – overclocking this chip with the Sniper M3 demonstrates some significant benefits indeed. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, go back a few pages and check the benchmarks.

The Sniper M3 has recently seen a significant price-drop making it even more appealing to discerning gamers and enthusiasts alike. 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.

Using the 6th revision of Sniper M3 BIOS I did notice some improvements in the BIOS which is very pleasing. Against the Z77X-D3H which I recently reviewed (where the mouse would sometimes work and sometimes not) the mouse now works, but navigation still needs perfecting. Navigation during my experience wasn’t the most fluid, the BIOS needs refining if it is to keep up with other vendors.

Sniper M3 raises the bar for MATX lovers who want a slice of Intel Z77. Out of the box there are impressive results to be had in terms of performance and overclocking only helps to extend this. Recent price-drops make this motherboard a great choice for those wanting to build a compact rig.

Pros
+ Affordable
+ Pleasing to the eye
+ Top performance
+ Overclocks well
+ Ultra Durable 4 feature-set

Cons
– No LED Debug
– No Onboard power/reset buttons
– 3D BIOS needs improving