Gigabyte Z87X-UD3H (Z87) Motherboard Review

I started this review by saying that we wasn’t expecting too much from the Z87X-UD3H as it’s not a high-end board, and with that, we expect performance to be dramatically lower than the other offerings we have from Gigabyte and their competitors. Now I’m not one to eat my own words generally, but I will quite happily do it because of this review. The Z87X-UD3H has certainly surprised me in so many different areas, including features, performance and overclockability.

Feature wise, we knew what we were dealing with in terms of DualBIOS, USB 3.0 functionality, SLI/CrossFire support and a small amount of overclocking features for those wishing to try their hand at pushing the most performance out of their system. For a mid-range board, the UD3H still offers a lot, and as long as the price is good, then it should offer fantastic value for money, and in this economical climate, that is a very important factor when looking at buying new components.

Performance wise, the UD3H really did hold its own and kept inline with the other more expensive, more feature rich boards showing that it’s not all about pure power, but how it delivers it depending on the task at hand. We test a variety of different areas of a motherboard, and each one, the UD3H managed to surprise us and one of the main areas for us was how far it could be overclocked.

Overclocking it generally something that is luck of the draw and comes down to some many varying factors including if your processor can be pushed, the motherboard you use, the cooling, and the power delivery. We knew for a fact that our CPU could be pushed, so it was down to the motherboard to see if it could deliver the voltages cleanly to the processor and this will provide stability when under load and the board was able to deal with this perfectly. The improved cooling around the VRMs were cool to touch, even when pushed and with an overclock of 4.7GHz which is pretty impressive, we started to see the true potential of this board and who it may be aimed at. Market wise, we can see this board doing extremely well with system integrators such as DinoPC or PCSpecialist as it will offer value for money, strong performance and a modest overclock for those consumers who may not be comfortable with doing it themselves.

The Z87X-UD3H is a strong board with great performance and some high-end features, and if the price is right, which we believe it should be, then this board could be a dark horse in the Z87 range, and as Gigabyte pride themselves on being extremely competitive, then this board should offer the whole package for a very attractive price point.

Pros

• Black PCB reinforces new design
• SLI/CrossFire support
• Improved cooling solution
• Feature-rich for a lower-end board
• Should be competitively priced
• Perfect for system integrators
• Ultra Durable components gives the best quality and stability

Cons

• None

eTeknix Says: If you are wanting to move to a Z87 based system and want the very best features, while on a budget, The Z87X-UD3H offers high-end functionality, stylish design and stability even when pushed to the limits, allowing even novice users the ability to get the very most out of their system. System integrators will find this board perfect to offer pre-overclocked systems to their consumers.

Thanks to Gigabyte for providing this review sample.