On the downside (Gigabyte GA-5AA (Rev 3.2))

Name: marchup

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Product:	Gigabyte GA-5AA (Rev 3.2)
Date:	18.01.01 (367 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Reliable, good bios that allows POST to take place if memory goes wrong

Disadvantages: Wont take a VOODOO III 300 AGP reliably!

Yes the GA5AA is a good value motherboard, I built one of my PC's and one for someone else using the same. As boards go this one was easy to setup except for the placing of the IDE cables as they have to go right accross the top of the CPU cooling fan( the ones supplied with the board are not long enough to be strapped out of the way!). They would have done better to move the ide plugs over even at the expense of making the board slightly larger.

Functionality of the board is superb once it has been installed with an easy to use BIOS setup utility which - unlike the majority of boards would let you get through the POST even if the memory you were using was faulty. This makes it possible to see whether the whole amount of your memory is faulty or just part.
It is a work horse and extremely reliable....until you insert a VOODOOIII 3000 AGP graphics card. At first everything is fine, but one day you switch on and your screen doesn't look quite righ, you know blocks of colour which in some circumstances even start to fall down and off the screen.

Whats the problem? Faulty graphics card? no the problem appears to be in the design again, the cpu sits nice and neatly close to the AGP slot and as both your CPU and the Voodoo give out quite a bit of heat it affects the circuitry which if left too long (as discovered by a friend )appears to blow something on the motherboard. We know it was the motherboard as the graphics ard was put into someone elses pc and worked so well that they aid only around £2.50 less than retail price for a new one on the spot!

If you are looking for a reliable workstation GO for it!

Games machine Try another S7 motherboard!

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