Introduction

Intel and AMD have been on the opposite sides of the CPU world for more than 20 years. Going all the way back to the days of the 2x86 when AMD had a license to make the Intel based CPU, we have seen these two companies play a game of cat and mouse in terms of CPU technology (if not performance).

Lately the challenge has been to find an efficient way to mate a powerful CPU with a powerful GPU. AMD calls this Fusion while Intel calls this Sandy Bridge. Sandy Bridge represents an evolutionary change to Intel's CPUs. With it we find even higher-end CPUs with a built in GPU. The new silicon requires a new socket and of course a new chipset. This is the P/H/Q 67(5) Chipset. As the date nears for the release of Intel's new CPU, we are starting to see the influx of motherboards built around the new P6x chipset. Interestingly, GIGABYTE was the first out of the gate with early "preview" samples. We have had a few days to take a deep look at the new P67A-UD7 and to see how it is put together.

Unfortunately, we cannot give you any performance numbers, but we can tell you about how it is built and also what you will get with it when you pick it up.