Gigabyte G1-Killer Assassin Preview

Gigabyte G1-Killer Assassin Preview

Manufacturer: Gigabyte

Not content with just launching a brand new range of mostly black P67 motherboards, Gigabyte has introduced a whole new brand at CES, dubbed G1-Killer.

We've already seen teasers about this new board, but this time we got a chance to sit down with the team to not only photograph its new board, but also to discover what Gigabyte is planning for this year.


Gigabyte is launching two new product-lines under the G1-Killer brand. The first is its gaming series, which will feature three boards with the overly masculine monikers of Assassin, Sniper and Guerilla. The second product line is under wraps at the moment, but we’re told that it will feature at least one overclocking-orientated board, and maybe as many as three.

All of the boards will use Intel's LGA1366 socket and X58 chipset, until LGA2011 replaces this platform in the fourth quarter 2011. This is despite the awesome power of Intel's new Intel's Sandy Bridge chips.

Both of the G1-Killer ranges will have a distinctly different colour scheme, most of which appears to be borrowed from the defunct DFI LANParty series of boards. As such, the gaming series is clad in lime-green and black, while the 'OC' range is styled in orange and black.


The Assassin (shown here) launches first, with the Sniper and Gorilla following later in the year. The Assassin features Creative (PCI-E) audio, with five sets of amplifiers built into the board. There's even a Killer NIC built in too, which Gigabyte claims is better than its discrete alternative, but that remains to be tested.


It's interesting to note that Gigabyte pays about $15 for the Killer NIC hardware, rather than the $80 Bigfoot Networks charges for the discrete product. Some of this saving comes from Gigabyte only needing to buy the chip rather than a whole PCB, with the other ICs, capacitors and so on.