Introduction

The GIGABYTE X58A-UD9 has shown us that it is one serious motherboard. We have now put it through our normal battery of tests with our stock motherboard test setup and have even run it through our new extended motherboard graphics tests. So far the UD9 has shown that it is a benchmarking monster with some extra room for desktop and even workstation performance.

Now we come to another test; can the X58A-UD9 really handle Quad SLI with four GTX 480 GPUs? - This is a bigger question than you might think. While we know that GIGABYTE dropped in two NF200 chips (each with 32 PCIe 2.0 lanes), what we do not know is if the power regulation, capacitors and other components can truly handle the current and wattage draw from four GTX 480s along with everything else that would be needed to run the board.

That is what we are going to find out today. Well, that and what kind of performance you can expect if you choose to head down this particular path. So, shall we break open the boxes containing four brand new GIGABYTE GTX 480s and fire up the test bench? - The fire extinguishers are standing by for today's testing runs.