It’s been called the best looking gamer motherboard series since modding a PC became an in thing. GIGABYTE G1.Killer series has a tight hold on this market segment and doesn’t show any signs of loosening up on the rope. There are plenty of gamers thoroughly enamoured by the fine gaming features of the series such as Super Sight, Super Hearing and Super Speed. Today, we take another look at their latest Assassin 2 with its Super Shield theme featuring the new Intel X79 chipset. It’s similar to the original Assassin but with a few more updated bells and whistles. It’s time to take out those elite MSI video cards and Kingston HyperX quad channel DDR3 memory for some testing!
Features Overview
The Assassin 2 gets a boost in the PCI Express bandwidth and offers quad-channel memory support as per the features in the new INTEL X79 Platform. That means, instead of running triple channel DDR3, we’re now able to utilize quad channel DDR3 and access four memory modules at once. If you missed our Intel Sandy Bridge-E and X79 launch article, the chipset specifics are there. To put it all into perspective, we’ve got one of our full video overviews below…
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEhyS5t0aRE&w=689&h=417]
So overall, there’s a few things new, and a few things the same when compared to the original G1.Killer Assassin. The biggest change is of course the downsizing from XL-ATX to a regular ATX form factor. This will allow the new Assassin 2 to fit in more cases than the original. Now we’ll go into a bit more detail about what those buzz words from GIGABYTE mean.
Super Sight is simply the platform’s 3-way NVIDIA SLI and AMD CrossfireX PCI Express 3.0 support. Pile up to three elite PCIE 2.0 or 3.0 video cards when they become available. Naturally, PCIE 3.0 means there is plenty of bandwidth available even more so than X58 offered. Pack this board as you see fit.
Super Hearing is of course the integrated Creative Labs X-Fi 20K2 audio processor. It’s arguably the best bang for buck gaming audio processor that supports EAX and all manner of high definition audio up to 7.1 channel. Nichicon processors ensure there’s plenty of clean power to create crystal clear frequencies via the integrated audio amplifiers. There’s an Entertainment, Audio Creation and Game mode built in to the Creative software. Game, DJ or get your game groove on as needed.
Super Speed imbues the motherboard with a Killer E2100 (embedded or integrated) network processor. The E2100 eliminates the Windows network stack cutting back latencies and offers full gaming network data control. Prioritize your games or supporting programs to get the most bandwidth if needed. Block out the others that leech off your connection.
Super Shield is their grand weaponized theme. Naturally, the X79 platform utilizes a lot more low profile components thus there’s less need for big heat sinks. That has helped cut back on costs. Still, you get the green on black theme along with a scope and hand gun heat sink. It’s a gamer board, so it has to pimp accordingly.
That’s it! Training over. Let’s get to the good stuff like the test system, overclocking and benchmarks!
Test System
We’ve already established a good performance base line in our Core i7-3960X Sandy Bridge-E and X79 motherboard launch article. Here is the test system to beat.
- Processor: Core i7-3960X Sandy Bridge-E
- Motherboard 1: Intel DX79SI Extreme
- Motherboard 2: GIGABYTE G1 Killer Assassin 2 (as tested)
- Memory: Kingston HyperX Genesis 16GB Quad Channel @ 1600MHz (CAS9)
- Graphics: 2 x MSI GTX 560 Ti Hawk Edition
- Power: Thermaltake Tough Power Grand TPG-1200M
- Storage OS: Seagate 500GB SATAII
- SATA2 and SATA3 Test: Kingston HyperX 120GB SSD
- USB 2.0 and 3.0 Test: Rosewill RX-358-U3B w/2TB WD Caviar Black
- OS: Windows 7 Pro 64-bit
- Monitor: LG W2600H 1920 x 1200
Some BIOS settings can influence the overall results. Thus, features like Turbo, memory frequencies and timings were checked to make sure they match. Thermal throttling was also disabled to make sure it doesn’t automatically scale back during testing. Keep in mind that some motherboards use a more aggressive BIOS that we do keep an eye out for when testing. We don’t want to rob a platform of its full stock potential. However, both our boards here share similar BIOS tuning.
UPDATE: GIGABYTE has informed us that a new BIOS was released to address overheating issues created by the original BIOS. The new BIOS that corrects the issues is called F7. You can find out more about this update right here. It is a critical update so we recommend that you update your board before driving it to the outer edges of overclocking.
Overclocking an Assassin 2
Sandy Bridge-E LGA2011 is a little different than regular Sandy Bridge LGA1155. You can tweak the BClock and Base Clock Gear Ratio to squeeze out more frequency while keeping the PCIE locked. Using a 1.5 CPU VCore and other minor tuning, I was able to get the system to 4.7GHz stable. I could almost get 4.8GHz perfectly stable but just couldn’t seem to find the right settings. Your results may vary with more patience and perhaps a more willing CPU. This brings us to the BIOS commentary.
Working within the Assassin 2 F5 BIOS was a bit cumbersome. The mouse and keyboard interface is sluggish which is evident while observing the mouse cursor, making it hard to find the target line. There was also some slow 3-10 second setting access times when double clicking or hitting enter when selecting settings in the MIT page. I often thought the BIOS had locked up or was having trouble. No one likes a “laggy” interface. Especially in a traditionally quick area like a BIOS.
There are some important settings that simply don’t have any notes in the information bar on the right. Since MIT settings are quite important to enthusiasts, there should be more information to make it more easy to understand. Granted, there is also the manual but one positive aspect of the UEFI BIOS is to offer a more intuitive and informative interface. Hopefully, a new BIOS concentrating on the software aspects speeds things up soon.
Benchmark Suite Notes
The software test suite includes PCMark7, CineBench R11.5, SANDRA Mathematical & Multimedia, 3DMark11, Unigine Heaven Demo 2.5, Metro 2033, Batman Arkham Asylum and City, RightMarkAudio, CrystalDiskMark, Network and Power Consumption. The final notes include motherboard quality where I look for things like crooked, scratched or low quality components. Your hard earned money should be rewarded with a quiet, stable, responsive product.
PCMark7
PCMark7 utilizes 7 different productive benchmarks to get an overall system score. It breaks them down individually as well. Trial demos give you just an overall score, but it’s good enough for comparison.
It was all pretty uneventful when staring at the benchmark in progress. However, you can see the performance differences between all of the platforms. While I’m not exactly sure why, the DX79SI lead the computational and productivity benchmark. Otherwise, the Assassin 2 scored the overall best by just 24 points. We know Intel makes fantastic motherboards and seeing the Assassin 2 just edging past is a testament to its quality as well.
3DMark11 – Performance Setting
I used performance settings so that you can give the trial download a run in case you wanted to compare your results. You’ll get an idea of where your system’s current graphics capabilities are on the food chain.
Scores are very close when you consider all the PCIE tuning and implementation. Still, the updated X79s were only separated by about 10 points at the most on the average. The MSI GTX 560 Ti Hawk really make the scores look good too!
Cinebench R11.5 – Multi & Single Core Tests
This benchmark renders a very large file picture using raw CPU power measuring single core and multi-core performance. Frequencies heavily influence the overall score. Naturally, the higher the score, the better.
It’s nice to see that both the nicely tuned DX79SI and Assassin 2 are close when it comes to multi-core testing. The surprise here is the single core score where it is noticeably quicker than the SI. BIOS tuning typically has a lot to do with this.
SANDRA CPU Math & Multmedia
This benchmark software can actually reveal some of the refinements that we can’t visibly see when it comes to CPU tuning. A platform’s fine CPU tuning heavily influence the scores. CPU thermal monitoring was disabled as well. Let’s see how it does against the DX79SI and previous Assassin.
The Sandy Bridge-E multimedia (MM) trend continues with the scores about double what the Gulftown/Assassin combo offers in that respect. Otherwise, it’s a little closer through the rest. Overall, the Assassin 2 slightly outpaces the DX79SI which is good to see.
Unigine Heaven Demo 2.5 – DirectX11 Max Settings
This is one of my favorite free to download and use 3D benchmarks as it can test your system’s graphics in DX9, DX10 and DX11 and give you an average frame rate performance. It’ll also give you an overall combined rendering score as well.
Single graphics scoring is quite close. However, the PCIE improvements are again evident with the Assassin 2, scoring slightly higher. Keep in mind these scores are with killer DX11 settings. Stock Unigine scores will actually be quite a bit higher.
Metro 2033 – DirectX 11 Max Settings
Metro 2033 is one of the toughest DirectX11 games for any gaming system to handle. It’ll bring just about every current NVIDIA and AMD video card to its knees especially at 1080p or higher resolutions.
What this tells us is that tuning again favors the X79 duo. The Assassin 2 is a couple frames faster if that. However, the X58 Assassin isn’t far enough behind to cause anyone to run out and upgrade for gaming. If you’re sitting on that board for gaming like I am, it’s perfectly fine.
Batman: Arkham Asylum and Arkham City
I’m tossing in one last DX9 video game just in case you are or plan to use a similar elite gaming system. There are plenty of these games still online and this highly detailed DX9 game is the standard. These are SLI scores as well.
Maximum game settings on any 1920 x 1200 monitor can make video cards crawl. AA is very smooth on all three boards. After averaging up the frames, the Sniper 2 seemed slightly more eager benchmarking AA. However, it seems that the bandwidth hungry Arkham City favored the Assassin 2.
Now that the software performance is covered, let’s check out how the hardware stands up to scrutiny and take it home!
RightMarkAudio – Good or Bad Audio?
RMAA is a handy tool for revealing the quality of most any audio card or integrated audio processor. The Creative Labs X-Fi 20K2 audio processor integrated in to the Assassin 2 fits right in to the test. Let’s take a look at the test results of the 24/192Hz report (click to make it larger).
This is actually a better score than the X58 Assassin. In fact, this score closes in on the ASUS Rampage III Black Edition and its Xonar audio card. Engineers did a great job better implementing the X-Fi audio processor. Based on these results, you can expect very good clean responses, clean audio and rich volume levels. No doubt, this is due to better implementation during the design phase of the PCB and placement of components. This makes the GIGABYTE “Super Hearing” a good value.
Input/Output Performance – Crystal Disk Mark
One of the things I didn’t completely cover in the Intel Sandy Bridge-E X79 launch article was a detailed look at input/output performance. If you’ve seen one USB or SATA, you’ve seen them all right? Well, that’s not the case this time around. The X58 and Z68 platforms use ASMedia, NEC and/or Marvell. However, the Assassin 2 use updated Marvell SATA3 and Fresco USB 3.0 controllers. Here are the interesting results.
The Marvell controller actually offers slightly better IO due to better firmware. The smaller 4K data block rates are only a few MB/s different which is why boot times were very close. USB 2/3 performance was comparable to previous controllers.
Network Examined
Assassin 2 uses the Killer E2100 embedded network processor as does the X58 Assassin. Intel naturally uses their own Intel LAN Pro while other manufacturers implement Realtek and Broadcom. Here are some transfer rates and latency scores.
Naturally, any network processor with its own memory can skip the Windows stack altogether eliminating latency. Programs that need immediate net traffic and/or priority naturally get just that. The E2100 still continues to offer very low latencies, priority to game programs yet not very high web data rates as it’s not the priority of this particular component. For gaming though, it’s easy to see a potential benefit.
Power Consumption and Quality Control
The system was left to sit idle and run full load for 3 hours each. The wattage was recorded at 30 minute intervals to get the average. Keep in mind that you may see much lower power consumption depending on your video cards.
You’ll notice that consumption isn’t any higher than the original Assassin or Intel DX79SI motherboards. Overall, the X79 platforms are pretty well tuned despite faster processors. in terms of quality, the Assassin 2 is top notch once again. We’ve seen GIGABYTE’s factory first hand have come to expect nothing less than great from their most flagship products.
Final Thoughts
When comparing the Assassin and Assassin 2, I found myself missing the more obvious weaponized heat sinks on the original Assassin. The hand gun heat sink at least made it obvious this is a Killer series motherboard though. And, the X79 component design is quite a bit more low profile with less need for the larger heat sinks. That in itself is a testament to component quality and performance advancement. My green sleeved LED kit from NZXT goes very well underneath the board too.
Quality and performance have improved when it comes to the Assassin 2. It’s good to see the Marvell controllers ramping up the small data block transfer rates which improves overall OS and program performance. The integrated Creative Labs X-Fi implementation really provides an all around great gaming experience. It’s clear that GIGABYTE engineered the placement a bit more, offering their flagship better quality audio than the original, despite the use of the same audio chipset. I really enjoyed the clarity and rich volume during Metro 2033 and Battlefield 3 (now that it’s running properly.)
On the performance side, the Assassin 2 also supports the Core i7-3960X processor nicely. Scores were slightly higher against the Intel DX79SI which is a great board in its own right. However, some will see the lack of 8 memory slots a detriment, but in reality, for a gaming board, four memory slots is more than enough and will ensure that it isn’t held back when overclocking.
When it comes down to pricing, the Assassin 2 is a bit less than the original Assassin at its launch simply due to the fact there are less heat sinks and lower fabrication costs. At a respectable $379.99 from the usual online retailers, all of the integrated extras do make this a good quality premium gaming motherboard. And, that’s the target market they’re zeroing in on with the G1 Killer series.
Pros
- Great audio and network performance
- 3-way NVIDIA SLI and AMD CrossfireX
- Respectable overclocking capabilities
- Extra Features definitely worth the cost
- Innovative 3D BIOS
Cons
- Lacks the character/design of last generation
- 3D Bios sluggish/missing key information
Overall Rating 8.5 / 10.0
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