EDITOR’S CHOICE
AWARD
Value Award
GIGABYTE X99
SOC CHAMPION
ERP: $299.99 | Website: www.gigabyte.com
Test Machine
• INTEL Core i7 5960X
• CORSAIR Dominator
Platinum DDR4 3200 C16
• EVGA GTX 780TI K|NGP|N
Edition
• SAMSUNG PX941 512GB
• CORSAIR AX1500i
• Windows 8.1
L
ast issue I looked at the
GIGABYTE X99 UD7, you
may read the review
here. I’ll not state again my
verdict on that motherboard
as it's right there. Suffice to
say, since I believed it to be
the best GIGABYTE X99
motherboard at the time - it
was only fitting to compare the
X99 SOC Champion to
it. Perhaps a little unfair given
that the former is exclusively
a power user/gaming
motherboard, while the SOC
Champion is geared
specifically for overclocking.
That distinction works well on
paper, but the reality is that
24 The OverClocker Issue 33 | 2015
the vast majority of well-built
motherboards are perfectly
capable of some extreme
overclocking with enough time
and tuning and modifications
where necessary. Features
wise, you will lose out plenty
when overclocking with a
regular end user board, but
at the very least you should
not be buying any board these
days that behaves erratically
or unpredictably when doing
any extreme overclocking.
In that regard, I had to take
into consideration that for
all intents and purposes the
X99 SOC FORCE was actually
a lesser motherboard than
the UD7 and as such it is
best to use the best efforts
from GIGABYTE prior to this
motherboard for comparison.
This allows me to see relate
the progress that has been
made in a straight forward
manner without having
to account for too many
superficial differences
between the two.
You will notice that the SOC
is a simple motherboard.
You’ll not have read too much
about it and there are certainly
motherboards from GIGABYTE
that garner more attention on
the all relevant publications.
The X99 chipset is niche to
begin with and an overclocking
orientated motherboard within
that small market is even
more exclusive, thus
it’s understandable if you’ve
never come across it before.
If you’re an overclocker that
spends plenty of time on
the technical forums where
extreme overclocking is a
regular occurrence (most
certainly on HWBOT) then
you’re very familiar with
the results that have come
about all underpinned by the
SOC CHAMPION.
Results however, as we’ve
seen are hard to contextualize