Overall and Final Verdict

So while I thought the X299 Prime Deluxe board from Asus was a great board, it didn’t agree very much with my wallet. So when the X299 Aorus Gaming 3 came in I was excited to finally see what X299 had to offer in the lower priced boards. This is actually Gigabytes lowest priced board currently, they have a non-gaming themed board coming later with who knows what else still unannounced. That said with this board coming in at $279.99 it is much cheaper than the Asus Deluxe board. So what does that get us? Well beyond getting you an LGA 2066 socket and eight DIMM slots you do get all x16 length PCIe slots. Of course, half of those ram DIMMs don’t work if you go with a cheaper Kaby Lake based 2066 CPU, nor will most of the PCIe slots as well. Of course, that’s not on Gigabyte, it is on Intel. You do get a CRAZY number of 4-pin fan headers with a total of 8 around the board. The performance was really good in our testing including the network card. I also love that they included a few of the new USB 3.1 gen 2 ports on the rear I/O with one of those also being a Type-C for those who need the latest and greatest connector.

I was a little disappointed in the overall number of connection on the rear I/O. It looks a bit like someone just went through and deleted all of the extras from the high-end X299 Aorus boards like an additional wired NIC, Wireless, and a clear CMOS button but they forgot to fill that space with anything. The rear I/O isn’t too bad but a stack of additional USB 2.0 ports would have been nice and it would have filled out the space a little. I was also hoping the BIOS would be a little different. This is basically the same setup as on the B350 boards, an Aorus themed BIOS would have been better. More importantly, they could make a few quality of life changes in there like with the way things are organized and it would make navigation easier. Having the longer of the two M.2 slots under the first PCIe x16 wasn’t a good choice as well.

Overall though, you are getting a solid board. While this might be on the lower end for X299 it is still a lot like the mid/high range boards from the B350, X370, and Z270 platforms. You get the new wRGB digital headers, shielded memory slots, a rear I/O cover, and a lot of connection options across the board on the internal headers. They didn’t skimp on cooling and really the new color neutral look looks great and lets the RGB lighting set your theme. At its price alone this board is a decent entry point into the X299 platform that is overall considered very expensive. But Gigabyte did help a little with that. At least right now they have deals with some vendors to include other swag and hardware with the boards for free. Newegg, for example, has this:

Newegg X299 Aorus Xperience Pack Includes

Sennheiser CX3.00 In-Ear Headphones

Aorus Hoodie

Launch Edition Mouse Pad

12-Months of XSplit

Launch edition Cablemod light strip

Just about everything on the list individually adds value to the purchase. The in-ear headphones might not be my first pick but hey they are free. They will also help block out all of the comments from people asking how you got a kickass Aorus Hoodie. With the Xperience pack added into the overall cost, the X299 Aorus Gaming 3 is about as close to a value as I think Intel will allow on the x299 platform. The board has a good mix of features and it has the connection options available for just about any crazy build. Not to mention it should look good in just about any case as well. More importantly, the money saved by going with a Gaming 3 over the Gaming 9 or the Prime Deluxe is enough money to go with the Core i7 7820X over the Core i7-7800X, giving you two more cores, more cache, a higher clock speed, and Intel Turbo Boost 3 for even more performance. 

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Author Bio
garfi3ld
Author: garfi3ldWebsite: http://lanoc.org
Editor-in-chief
You might call him obsessed or just a hardcore geek. Wes's obsession with gaming hardware and gadgets isn't anything new, he could be found taking things apart even as a child. When not poking around in PC's he can be found playing League of Legends, Awesomenauts, or Civilization 5 or watching a wide variety of TV shows and Movies. A car guy at heart, the same things that draw him into tweaking cars apply when building good looking fast computers. If you are interested in writing for Wes here at LanOC you can reach out to him directly using our contact form.

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