Gigabtye Z68 G1.Sniper 2 Unboxing

Hi guys, this time around, I got in contact with the folks from Gigabyte and let me drool… I mean take a look of their new version of their gaming/high performance enthusiast motherboard: the Gigabyte G1.Sniper 2.

The new board uses the Z68 chipset (Cougar Point series) from Intel and is compatible with the 2nd Generation Intel Core i processors. Part of the 2nd Gen Core series include built in graphics processing from the processor itself, the board contains LucidLogix Virtu GPU Virtualization. This graphics controller manages the swtiching of graphics with the built in GPU and that of the discrete GPU from our video card/s, providing savings to energy consumption. Others include: Bigfoot Killer E2100 chip for LAN, X-Fi Extreme Fidelity Audio, dual BIOS chips (though the board now runs an EFI inside upon start-up), Intel Smart Response Technology (for setting up RAID systems) and SATA III and USB 3.0 support.

 

Gigabyte continues to use the motif of guns and weapons in designing the board. References to parts of a weapon like the M4/CAR-15 is found throughout the board. The board takes on a Green and Black scheme, but the green is quite neon, not quite the olive drab paint that I’m expecting. It comes in a big cardboard box with lots of details regarding the features inside the board. Headlining it are the Creative X-Fi and Killer Bigfoot LAN chips, badges from Intel on the chipset and supported processors up on front.

The board has a plethora of ports behind ranging from the PS/2 keyboard/mouse port, SPDIF (optical audio), eSATA, Overclocking button, HDMI port, RJ-45 (LAN) port, USB2 and 3 ports, and audio jacks.

As stated earlier, the G1.Sniper2 is a high end motherboard and the parts found on the board speak highly of the quality Gigabyte has given in building the board (and enough to justify the price). Also, the board comes with the Virtu graphics virtualization chip that saves power by switching graphics between Intel’s own graphics (in the Core processor) and that of the installed Graphics card.

I brought out my Airsoft M4 CQBR and took some shots to give some comparison to which parts the board based its parts off.

My rifle’s upper receiver (the front part) matches with the Heat sinks around the CPU slot. It makes up the top hand guard, the barrel, and the lower hand guard. Since the CAR15 design is licensed, I assume Gigabyte just played around with the design. I’ve also paired my Airsoft M4 standard STANAG magazine to show the difference in scale (note that my airsoft magazine is 1:1 in size with the real one). One funny bit is that they included a dummy bullet on top of the heat sink magazine…

 

Also found inside the box are some of the propaganda and accessories included in the package. There are stickers for the PC case, manuals, drivers, a front bay panel for the USB 3.0 ports, rear I/O shield, SATA cables, and SLI cable. They even included a large poster for the motherboard… which is a paper target with the logo of the G1.Sniper2.

As for the performance, it’s been widely tested over the internet and for a more detailed account, I recommend to look at the review in

guru3d

overclock3d

BTW, I’ll be doing my own Z68 performance review next time (The return of the Foxconn Z68), unfortunately, I’ll be returning this board to Gigabyte when I get my test units here. I’ll be reviewing some games soon… I hope, I’ve been waiting for October for my copy of Battlefield 3 to arrive and so on and so forth.