Introduction
Gigabyte 8IPE775-G 'Springdale' MotherboardThe last few months has seen Intel re-position its top-line consumer platform with the introduction of a couple of chipsets that use brand-new technology. I'm referring to the emergence of Alderwood and Grantsdale chipsets, characterised mainly by LGA775 sockets with in-built pins, DDR2 RAM, and PCI-Express for both peripherals and graphics cards.
So a user migrating to an i925X/925P platform generally needs to start afresh, effectively rendering useless regular DDR1 memory and expensive AGP cards. Intel reckons the sacrifice is worth it in the long run, but motherboard manufacturers, seemingly, are less inclined to agree. The financial burden imposed on the upgrading enthusiast is too heavy a price, they say. Instead, a raft of makers have introduced a number stop-gap LGA775 boards that are architected to make use of widespread DDR1 RAM and AGP graphics.
Gigabyte is one such manufacturer which feels that there should be some middle ground between S478 and LGA775 platforms. Gigabyte's LGA775-equipped Springdale motherboard sounds oxymoronic in nature, but it's the company's way of bridging between old and new technology with minimal expense. Sounds interesting, doesn't it?. Let's take a closer look.
