Final Thoughts
When I first took a look at the X99-UD4 from Gigabyte I realized this board was not made for one specific type of person (Gamer, Overclocker, etc), but to be a great overall motherboard and it really fits in the category perfectly. If you are thinking about what you want out of the X99 platform this motherboard has it. You have 4-way graphics card support, M.2 support, SATA Express support, and of course a great BIOS. This is the baseline of the X99-UD4 and with that said there really is not much to complain about.
Of course Gigabyte has added their own flare to this board with the quality components they use. You have 6x(30µ) Gold Plating for CPU socket, Memory DIMMs and PCIe slots, long lifespan durable Black Solid caps, an all digital power design, and more. Talking about flare did I mention the PCH heatsink, rear I/O shield, and PCB isolation on the audio solution light up. And the lighting can be controlled too! The board looks pretty badass all lit up! Gigabyte has also sleeved the SATA cables, which makes for a good overall look.
I do like the BIOS and motherboard companion software that comes with the X99-UD4. Although it is not as polished as what I’ve seen from other manufacturers. The companion software really allows you to do everything that you would in the BIOS in a Windows environment, which many people will appreciate.
When it comes to stability the board was pretty solid. I had no problem bringing out Core i7-5960X up to 4.4 GHz, which seems to be the limit so far on the X99 platform with our current setup. The board even booted much higher, but was not all that stable.
Now this is a more budget board, if you want to call it that so I guess you could say it is missing some things. I immediately noticed that there were not power, reset, or clear CMOS buttons on the board itself. A post code display is also missing. You only have a single Ethernet port inside of two and WiFi is missing, although there is a M.2 PCIe slot for a WiFi card.
At the end of the day the X99-UD4 is a solid performer and looks great too. If you can go without certain features you are really going to enjoy this board. The board is currently selling at my favorite online retailer for $242, which is not a price you can complain about either. Overall ThinkComputers gives the Gigabyte X99-UD4 a 9 out of 10 score.
Pros:
– 4-way SLI support
– Solid BIOS
– I/O shield, PCH heatsink, and audio PCB layer all light up
– Build with quality materials
– Solid performer
– Good companion software
– Sleeved SATA cables
Cons:
– WiFi should have really been included
– No power, reset, or clear CMOS buttons on the board
