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The Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 3 motherboard is to be considered the more affordable solution in that enthusiast segment X299 series motherboards. But this should not be confused for a low value option. The Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 3 is still built using the Ultra Durable 3 standard, assuring high reliability and proper components. Quick note, the four red blocks behind the audio capacitors to get a different color are actually WIMA film capacitors, these are high-end grade Polypropylene Capacitors. The motherboard includes all of the standardized X299 enhancements like two M2 SSD slots and will support SLI and Crossfire. Your PCie lane configuration will be highly dependant on the processor your purchase, unfortunately. Only that 10-core CPU will get a full 44 PCIe lanes available.
The I/O panel of the Gigabyte X299 Aorus Gaming 3 reveals eight 3.1 ports with one type-c connector. Intel still does not have native USB 3.1 Gen 2 support from the processor hence Gigabyte makes use of external 3rd party controllers like ASMedia 3142. USB 3.1 is coming from the chipset though. The motherboard features five PCIe x16 Gen 3.0 expansion slots. A Realtek ALC1220 audio codec is the source for audio which will be enhanced quality capacitors following the AMP-Up logic that gigabyte offers on most motherboards these days. The board gets one 10/100/1000 Ethernet controller. There is a single PS/2 combo port that can be used for either a keyboard or mouse, lacking are optical and/or coaxial SPDIF out ports.
The board is powered by one 8-pin ATX power header to the processor. A small detail, see the two metal protected PCI-Express slots ? These actually have LED strips along side of them and this light up:
You will hopefully agree with me that once powered up the aesthetics change quite a bit. The board has 2x four DIMM slots. Depending on your processor you can opt dual- and quad channel memory. Kaby Lake-X is limited towards dual-channel and Skylake-X processors will support quad-channel memory. This board supports up-to Support for DDR4 4333 MHz memory (overclocked), you may install up-to 128 GB of it.
