Gigabyte LGA2011-3 Intel X99 SLI ATX Motherboard GA-X99P-SLI

My system:Intel i7 5820K (stock 3.3 ghz, overclocked to 4.2 ghz)MSI 980 TI GPU @ stock32 GB (8 x 4gb) Corsair DDR4 3200 mhz ramSamsung 850 Evo SSD (512 GB) as boot drive, 2x Additional SSDs from the house and 1x 3TB Seagate Barracuda HDDNoctua NH-D15 Premium CPU Cooler (2x fans)Creative Sound Blaster Zx PCIe Gaming Sound Card (with audio control module)Corsair RM series 1000 Watt PSU (gold certified)TP-LINK Archer T9E AC1900 Dual Band Wireless AdapterNZXT Sentry 3 5.4-Inch Touch Screen Fan ControllerThermaltake A71 Chaser CaseOS: Windows 10 Pro, 64 bitNote: the sound card is unnecessary. The motherboard includes a Sound Blaster chipset and Sound Blaster Recon 3Di control panel. This is a very nice chip to have in a motherboard compared to generic sound controllers (I had it in a laptop previously, you hear a huge difference in sound quality with it on vs. off). I only purchased a dedicated sound card to further enhance my sound quality, since I like to listen to music while playing certain games.When I was looking for a motherboard, this was not the only one that could have worked for me. I selected this one because it is relatively cheap for a 4-way SLI motherboard (these easily reach $400 to $500), And it was compatible in every way I needed it (LGA 2011 socket, DDR4).Be sure to verify your CPU will fit into this motherboard (LGA 2011), your system is using a DDR4 configuration, and your case supports an E-ATX motherboard. ATX cases will NOT work! E-ATX, or Extended ATX, only!This was my first ever PC to be built by hand, so overclocking was well out of my mind. Just getting the PC up and running was step one, which is a lot simpler than I expected. But, this motherboard will allow you to literally perform a one-click overclock. I downloaded the utilities that come with my motherboard, opened "EasyTune", clicked on one of 3 overclocking options (3.8, 4.0, and 4.2 Ghz), and simply clicked "restart". When I restarted, my CPU was going at 4.2 Ghz. Note: I did start at 3.8 Ghz, followed by 4.0, and finally 4.2 to verify I wouldn't overheat. If you are interested in overclocking, but do not really know how, this motherboard is perfect for you! Overclocking the ram is simple, too. Simply move a slider or select a speed from the drop down via the BIOS. Let the motherboard handle the voltage!This is a very user-friendly motherboard. If you know what you are doing, you will appreciate the easily-navigated BIOS. If you are like me and know a lot less about overclocking, this motherboard will do most of the work for you. Just make sure you don't overheat!I am very pleased with this motherboard. I definitely recommend it.

I knew what i was getting into with this board. Tons of bad reviews regarding the bios everywhere, which out of the box means this board is impossible to post (crazy I know). It goes into a constant reboot loop no matter what you do.The solution is to literally have nothing mounted on the board, no CPU, no memory, no PCI boards, only a USB mouse and keyboard plugged in. You download the more recent bios from Gigabyte's website, extract it, rename it GIGABYTE.BIN, put it on a FAT32 formatted USB stick (nothing else on the stick), insert it into the special 'bios' USB port on the back of the motherboard, turn the board on, and wait. Supposedly the light next to the USB port on the MB indicates when the bios update is complete, but this seemed to be on constantly from the beginning. I just waited five minutes and then switched off. The next time I booted, it all worked.It took me a few hours to figure this all out... you're welcome!

The media could not be loaded. Original review date: 11/17/2016:So far, I have had ZERO issues with this board. This is my setup:[...]I run a small production studio for audio recording and video editing. I have been building gaming and multi media PCs for 10+ years now, and about 3 months ago I bought my first motherboard that was NOT a Gigabyte board. And boy was I disappointed. I bought a MSI X99A gaming pro carbon board, and had NOTHING BUT ISSUES WITH IT! The first board had USB error issues popping up every 3 seconds. I had to return it for a new board. That board lasted 2 months before it started dying, and then eventually wouldn't post. Had to RMA it.After that, I looked around online, and found this Gigabyte board. I installed the F5 bios right out of the box without any issues and I am using 32GB of quad channel DDR4 ram from g.Skill and a Intel core i7 6800k CPU. I am running a Samsung M.2 950 Pro 512GB SSD drive in this board and it is screaming fast!I am about 2 weeks in with this board, and zero issues have surfaced thus far. I have ran digital audio workstations with USB recording interfaces from Focusrite on it, as well as used Handbrake and Vegas 14 pro for video rendering. So far so good.The LED functions are pretty basic. You have steady on, breathing/fading mode, and then when you have the on board audio selected as your main audio device, you can set the LEDS to flash with the music/audio you have playing. Pretty neat. I have not added LED strips to the board yet, but I am looking to do so. I will report back in the coming weeks with an update on the longevity of this board, but so far, so good!