Conclusion
That is a wrap folks, another high-end motherboard, another pile of pages of us picking it apart. Sure, there were some harsh words in this review when it came to the memory clocking and heat sink setup of the GA-EP45T-Extreme, but that is what we are here for. We don't review hardware as a paid advertisement with a cheque in our pocket from the manufacturer, we review hardware from the user’s perspective and the issues we pointed out all warrant the flogging they got. On the other hand, this motherboard has a ton of great qualities that are there within your grasp but before we get to that, let's get something off our backs...
The heatsink / heat pipe design is terrible, you can't argue it and if you do, then you are looking at the wrong photos. Are there positive things about the heat sink setup on the GA-EP45T-Extreme? Absolutely. Unfortunately they all get cancelled out by the major design flaw of having cooling fins sitting directly on top of the heat source preventing any kind of thermal transfer to the rest of the exceptionally well made heat pipe setup. This massive oversight has added cost to a motherboard that is already near the upper end of the market, ASUS "super boards" and NVIDIA failures aside. So many power users in the forums have openly exchanged the heatpipe setup for small, efficient little heat sinks that do a fabulous job cooling the chipset under the most extreme conditions. Hopefully these cries for the heatpipe madness to stop don't fall on deaf ears.  The memory overclocking is the last major gripe we had and in the course of a few weeks we had spent with the motherboard, BIOS updates had vastly improved upon that so we can only hope Gigabyte continues with progress in that area. We really have to give Gigabyte credit for not leaving users with a motherboard with limited potential since they continue to aggressively release new BIOS revisions.
Negatives aside, did the motherboard do anything we were impressed with? Again, absolutely. The GA-EP45T-Extreme is a very rich package that is loaded with great features which are actually a joy to use since they work very well. It also seems that unlike so many other manufacturers' products, the software package that comes with this motherboard is actually useful and very well designed. Far too often this isn't the case with motherboard software but not here. We also commend Gigabyte for designing an overclocking and over volting tool that works well in Windows, another first for us.
Believe it or not, the GA-EP45T-Extreme also has one of the best BIOSs we have ever worked with. It is clearly layed out in a fashion that we wish every other manufacturer would follow. Couple this with some solid overclocking and a layout that should keep most people happy, and it seems that Gigabyte has got most things right with this board.
As you can see we didn't hate everything about this motherboard but there did seem to be a lot of drawbacks to a number of the positives. Of course, every user is going to have a vastly different needs list so it will be up to you to decide whether the faults we found will hinder you as much as they did us. If not, then the GA-EP45T-Extreme is a great looking board with plenty to offer. If you found yourself agreeing with all the things we didn't like about the board, then perhaps there is a better option out there for you. At this price range there are other options and X38/X48 motherboards aren't a whole lot more expensive to jump up to.
All in all, this is a very good board with a bevy of amazing features which unfortunately can't quite live up to the Extreme moniker Gigabyte's marketing department has saddled it with.
Pros: - Feature set that goes on and on
- Well laid out board, particularly PCI-E slots
- Great BIOS, best I have used to date
- Software from a manufacturer that works, and works well
- Good FSB clocking
Cons:- Heat pipe/heat sink assembly is poorly designed
- The design of the heat sink also unnecessarily costs end users money
- Memory clocking is very poor right now, BIOS revisions have helped but still plenty of room to go
- BIOS updates take too long to reach the Gigabyte website
Thank-you Gigabyte for making this review possible!
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