Gigabyte LGA 1155 DDR3 2400 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Extended ATX Motherboard GA-Z77X-UP7

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Price: $359.99    

Product Feature

• Windows 8 Ready
• CPU: Support for Intel Core i7 processors/Intel Core i5 processors/ Intel Core i3 processors/Intel Pentium processors/Intel Celeron processors in the LGA1155 package
• Memory: 4 x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32 GB; DDR3 2400+ (OC)/1600/1333/1066 MHz memory modules
• 1 x Atheros GbE LAN chip (10/100/1000 Mbit) (LAN1); 1 x Intel GbE LAN chip (10/100/1000 Mbit) (LAN2)

Product Description

Supports 3rd Gen. Intel 22nm CPUs and 2nd Gen. Intel Core CPUs (LGA1155 socket) GIGABYTE All Digital Power with GIGABYTE 3D Power GIGABYTE 3D BIOS (Dual UEFI) GIGABYTE Ultra Durable 5 technology Innovative 32+3+2 Phase VRM Design GIGABYTE Bluetooth 4.0 and Wi-Fi Card Onboard mSATA slot for mSATA SSDs PCI Express Gen 3.0 support 4-way SLI and 4-way CrossFireX multi-GPU support Lucid Virtu Universal MVP GPU virtualization support Dual LAN (Intel Gigabit + Atheros Gigabit Ethernet controllers) Realtek ALC898 with High Quality 110dB SNR HD audio GIGABYTE On/Off Charge with 3X USB Power

Gigabyte LGA 1155 DDR3 2400 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Extended ATX Motherboard GA-Z77X-UP7 Review

INFO:
This board has the sturdiness and weight of slate rock! Although the board is stated as an Extended ATX, it's width is really only 1.5" wider then standard ATX boards and as such, it can seemingly fit inside a Cooler Master HAF 922 ATX case. Gigabytes states this is great/OK if you can fit the board inside a mid-size case, which is common with today's cases. Also, compared to the ASUS P8Z77-V motherboard, I can now perform "make -j8" on the Gigabyte instead of only being limited to "make -j6". This doesn't seem reasonable as it's the same bus & CPU, only lacking the legacy PCI bus. As far as Linux, everything works to the best of my knowledge. All chips appear recognized within Linux, although I haven't thoroughly tested the Marvell storage, Atheros wireless or Atheros/Lite-on bluetooth chips as I haven't had a chance to test since I don't use wireless here. Other posts cite they do work with in kernel drivers.

The two other likely motherboards this board is competing against, are the ASUS P8Z77-V WS (has COM, similar PCIe slots) and ASUS Maximus V Extreme (lacks COM/DVI/BIOS LED/etc, has PCIe 16x/PCIe 4x instead of two PCIe 1x). Since the ASUS P8Z77-V WS has been out of stock and little consumer response has been seen, think the GA-Z77X-UP7 is a good working board that has COM/Serial & DVI ports.

Intel Core i7-3770K Quad-Core Processor 3.5 GHz 8 MB Cache LGA 1155 - BX80637I73770K
Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus CPU Cooler with Four Direct Contact Heat Pipes (RR-B10-212P-G1)
Corsair Vengeance 32 GB DDR3 1600MHz PC3 12800 Quad Channel 240 Pin Desktop Memory CMZ32GX3M4X1600C10
Seagate Barracuda 7200 3 TB 7200RPM SATA 6 Gb/s NCQ 64MB Cache 3.5-Inch Internal Bare Drive ST3000DM001
Pioneer Electronics USA Blu Ray Computer Drive, BDR-2207B5PK
Cooler Master HAF 922 Mid Tower Computer Case with USB 3.0 Ports (RC-922M-KKN3-GP)

PROS:
1) Almost all features are focused on a stable platform and includes the COM/Serial port for us low level programmers. (Includes Keyboard and DVI ports.)
2) Board is well marked with voltage test points or an "Onboard Voltage Measurement Module". The box included extension wires for directly connecting to each voltage test probe. (Now I can easily monitor power for my blu-ray writer and determine if the manuf is just making up excuses concerning a lack of power.)
3) All plugs have caps on the rear ports for preventing dust when not used.
4) Board includes six 6G SATA cables.
5) On-board LED detailing BIOS POST Codes! (ie. I easily diagnosed IDE problems during an installation of Windows XP.)
6) Website drivers and utilities are easily downloaded with direct links to files. (ie. wget --continue --input-file=list.txt for unattended downloading) The 7z compressed driver files can be easily uncompressed, and only the drivers can be installed instead of installing the entire software package. The Gigabyte drivers and utilities CD/DVD allows users to have explicit control of installing only certain utilities and drivers. (I still recommend only manually installing the driver by uncompressing the 7z downloaded web driver files, avoiding bloat ware -- for which I just successfully did here avoiding all the extra not-needed software.)
7) BIOS seems to have many more options then ASUS boards and faster line scrolling -- possibly due to basic font used. Boot order and on-demand booting selection seem far better engineered compared to ASUS's BIOS.
8) BIOS automatically adjusts fans for reduced case noise, and also appears to reduce the volume of the annoying dumb beep on boot. (Should be a switch to turn off the beep.)
9) The simple, no eye-candy utilities include a software voltage monitoring application. (ie. Verified my Blu-Ray Writer was getting 100% stable current.)
10) Board also includes dual USB 3.0 ports for mounting inside a 3.5" drive bay. (I have no mounting hardware for converting from a 5" bay.)
11) Board includes rear dual SATA + Power expansion port plate with external connectors. (Attach standard SATA hard drives.)
12) A quick benchmark with RMAA and the RealTeck ALC898 chip using optical digital, RMAA reports almost identical, if not identical performance to the ASUS STX sound card. This motherboard also uses a standard S/PDIF optical port, versus ASUS STX's integrated mini-optical S/PDIF with RCA digital port. Based on SNR values though, expect the STX card to sound a little better with analog output. Also, the microphone recordings of the STX contained a little more bass, or fuller frequency range of sound. All in all, a very good audio chip. I just dislike mini jacks, and prefer RCA or atleast phone plugs. The ASUS STX also provides better control over output resampling levels, including ASIO, versus letting Windows do whatever it wants with these settings. (Linux ALSA already provides the user with explicit control with what gets resampled and at what rate.)

CONS:
1) For Linux users or users wanting to upgrade the BIOS prior to OS installation -- and is sometimes needed to fix hardware conflicts, Gigabyte only provides a 7z Self Extracting *.exe file for a BIOS file. To extract the files from the 7z SFX container, do the following using a p7zip (app-arch/p7zip) distro provided binary/executable:

$ 7z x mb_bios_ga-z77x-up7_f5f.exe

(*NOTE: the *f5f designates a beta bios version, and the *f4 version is the latest stable for which my board already had installed.)

This extracts the following files for this version:
59K Aug 7 00:21 Efiflash.exe
20 Oct 31 21:52 autoexec.bat
8.0M Oct 30 22:56 z77xup7.f5f

Copy the 8.0M Firmware/BIOS file named "z77xup7.f5f" to a USB flash drive and use the Q Flash within the Gigabyte BIOS.

2) A few minor manual/documentation English grammar errors. (Similar to ASUS.) The manual (on p24, 1-9) designates the white boxes as the switch toggle instead of the black squares. Depending on your perspective, this reverses the apparent on/off switch. To ensure you have the switch at the proper position, verify with the circuit board imprinted 1 and 3 numerals. The M/B, SB, and LN2 switches should be set to "1" as their optimal/default position. The Again, they did a great job labelling the board, as well as providing a lot of additional documentation within the manual.

3) The "Onboard Voltage Measurement Module" (ie. the plugs for the extension wires for voltage testing probes) can be very easily pulled out! When you are pulling the wire plugs out of the on-board plug, it is probably best to pull the male plug by the wire to prevent doing so. I was only pulling the male plug attached to the wires in an attempt to remove the wires from the female plug, and the on-board female plug easily bent over and detached itself from the board. On second glance, it looks like these on-board female plug modules are removable. Used some tweezer to reinsert -- hoping I'm correct here.

4) Dual BIOS/Firmware chips are soldered to the board and are not installed in a socket for easy replacing. Hopefully I don't need to replace them if I ever install LinuxBIOS/Coreboot. (Not a fan of EFI/UEFI as it looks and still acts like the limited, slow and old BIOS which has a long history of being poorly maintained.)

5) No easy brick type plug to easily plug in case panel LED lights and buttons to the motherboard like ASUS boards. Likely not bothersome once connected, will likely never be disconnected.

6) In order to use the onboard Realtek HDMI for audio output along side an addon card such as NVidia graphics adapter; for each HDMI port, you need to go into the Control Panel > Display > Change Display Settings and extend the desktop to the device you are wanting to output audio to. As such, the Intel iGPU/iGFX also needs to be enabled within the BIOS. This really isn't an issue specific with Gigabyte, but with the HDMI Specification. Every HDMI audio output, requires outputing video. Else, the HDMI channel or device will be shown as disabled within the Sound Properties. The same for Linux, Linux requires X/Xorg to be running in order for the NVidia HDMI audio output to function. Same with Windows NVidia drivers, you need to extend the desktop to the device within the NVidia Control Panel. It took me several months to figure this out, as this isn't commonly provided as a solution to No Audio problems! I also just learned, if the video DPMS sets the diplay to off due to power saving, the audio will also be canceled! Hence, use SPDIF/TOSLINK for general use and music!

7) If configuring for SLI, many video cards these days are double width and block the adjacent PCI-E slot. So if you're planning on doing SLI with two video cards, you'll may likely be using and blocking up to four PCI-E ports!

CONCLUSION:
So far, not many negatives. And still no negatives after setting the board up for the past several days. This seems more like a motherboard a store like Home Depot would sell vs. ASUS boards, but that's just my overall opinion. Gigabyte tech support was also a pleasure to talk to with little wait time, especially when compared to ASUS tech support.

ADVANCED DETAILS:

On-board chips not completely specified:
Atheros 8161-BL-3A or AR8161 Ethernet Controller (The Atheros chip looks like it has less pins and surface area then the Intel chip. Use alx driver from compat-wireless)
Intel 82579V Ethernet Controller (Likely use this, #2 port, as the primary Ethernet port. e1000e in kernel driver.)
VIA VL-800-Q8 USB 3.0 Host Controller (Near rear ports)
Etron EJ168 USB 3.0 Host Controller (Near internal ports)
ASMEDIA 1442 x 2 HDMI Chips
Marvell 88SE9172(-NNX2?) x 2 Storage Controller chips

Add-in 802.11 & Bluetooth PCIx card:
Atheros AR5B22 (or ARB522, see AR9462 for specs?) mini-half-sized card with 802.11 & Bluetooth (04ca 3006), with blue tooth being attached to internal USB port.

# lspci -v
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v2/3rd Gen Core processor DRAM Controller [8086:0150] (rev 09)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5000]

00:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v2/3rd Gen Core processor PCI Express Root Port [8086:0151] (rev 09)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport

00:14.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB xHCI Host Controller [8086:1e31] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5007]
Kernel driver in use: xhci_hcd

00:16.0 Communication controller [0780]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family MEI Controller #1 [8086:1e3a] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:1c3a]

00:19.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation 82579V Gigabit Network Connection [8086:1503] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:e000]
Kernel driver in use: e1000e

00:1a.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #2 [8086:1e2d] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5006]
Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd

00:1b.0 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller [8086:1e20] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:a002]
Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel

00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 1 [8086:1e10] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.1 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 2 [8086:1e12] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.2 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 3 [8086:1e14] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.3 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 4 [8086:1e16] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.4 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 5 [8086:1e18] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.5 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 6 [8086:1e1a] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.6 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 7 [8086:1e1c] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.7 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 8 [8086:1e1e] (rev c4)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport

00:1d.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #1 [8086:1e26] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5006]
Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd

00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation Z77 Express Chipset LPC Controller [8086:1e44] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5001]

00:1f.2 SATA controller [0106]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family 6-port SATA Controller [AHCI mode] [8086:1e02] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:b005]
Kernel driver in use: ahci

00:1f.3 SMBus [0c05]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family SMBus Controller [8086:1e22] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5001]

01 -> Discrete Video Card usually inserts here.

03:00.0 SATA controller [0106]: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE9172 SATA 6Gb/s Controller [1b4b:9172] (rev 11)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:b000]
Kernel driver in use: ahci

04:00.0 PCI bridge [0604]: PLX Technology, Inc. PEX8112 x1 Lane PCI Express-to-PCI Bridge [10b5:8112] (rev aa)

05 - Discrete Sound Card may insert here.

06:00.0 USB controller [0c03]: VIA Technologies, Inc. VL80x xHCI USB 3.0 Controller [1106:3432] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5007]
Kernel driver in use: xhci_hcd

07:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9462 Wireless Network Adapter [168c:0034] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Lite-On Communications Inc Device [11ad:6621]
Kernel driver in use: ath9k

08:00.0 USB controller [0c03]: Etron Technology, Inc. EJ168 USB 3.0 Host Controller [1b6f:7023] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:5007]
Kernel driver in use: xhci_hcd

09:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Qualcomm Atheros AR8161 Gigabit Ethernet [1969:1091] (rev 10)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:e000]
/* alx driver */

0a:00.0 SATA controller [0106]: Marvell Technology Group Ltd. 88SE9172 SATA 6Gb/s Controller [1b4b:9172] (rev 11)
Subsystem: Giga-byte Technology Device [1458:b000]
Kernel driver in use: ahci

# lsusb
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087:0024 Intel Corp. Integrated Rate Matching Hub
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 8087:0024 Intel Corp. Integrated Rate Matching Hub
Bus 005 Device 002: ID 2109:0811
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 006 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 007 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 008 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 003: ID 04ca:3006 Lite-On Technology Corp.

2012.11.06 - This board will fit within a Cooler Master HAF 922 ATX case. The HAF X (E-ATX) is almost identical except for >2" space between the bottom of the board and the power supply when the board is mounted. All expansions slots line-up with the HAF 922 ATX case, and the extra expansion slots on the HAF X will go unused at the bottom. There appears to be 1/4" less room between the right side of the board and the optical mounts on the HAF X, and this, was the clincher for me as it's already difficult to plug-in the SATA plugs into the board with the HAF 922. Also, it looks like Cooler Master has upgraded the HAF 922 to include USB 3.0 ports on the front panel. Basically, from what I've heard, the GA-Z77X-UP7 is not a true Extended ATX board as it's width is less then the width of an E-ATX board -- hence, it fits in this ATX case. The HAF X is much larger and much heavier then the HAF 922, so I say buy the mid-sized case if you're not over-clocking. If you're definitely water cooling, then go with a full-size case also, and save your money until you actually buy water cooling as there might be better cases later. I just talked to Gigabyte Tech Support and they stated if the board fits within a mid-size case, there should be no issues. Gigabyte only stated the E-ATX specification to make buyers aware the motherboard is (1.5") slightly wider then standard the standard ATX design. Gigabyte was completely aware the board would likely fit within a standard ATX case and had absolutely no concerns. I conclude, the specifications stating the board as an E-ATX had unintentionally implied an E-ATX case were absolutely necessary with this board. Just make sure the mounting plate within the case can support the 1.5" wider board, as most ATX mid-sized cases apparently can these days.

2012.11.15 - The Atheros AR9462 Wireless Network Adapter works very well under Linux using the in kernel ath9k module/driver. (Bluetooth also appears to work using the in kernel USB Bluetooth module/driver. No Bluetooth devices to test with.)

2012.11.23 - This motherboard works well with an NVidia PCIE video card alongside the Intel iGPU. However, in order for Linux to suspend-to-disk and power-off the LCD display properly, the iGPU needs to be disabled within BIOS. If iGPU is left enabled, the display does not power-off on suspend-to-disk. Since I only have one display hooked-up to the PCIE graphics card, I'm not too sure if this will be the same effect with display connected to both video ports. Also, I have tried Virtu MVP Graphics Acceleration, using both PCIE and iGPU to gain frame rates, but I saw no improvement. It was likely due to buggy Virtu MVP software broken when using MS Internet Explorer which was required for a game. As such, not sure if Virtu MVP was even working. I saw the same Virtu MVP bug with the ASUS motherboard as well. Other then this, I'm very please and everything is still working, including apparently working well with Linux. Also, I just noticed one scenario you might be required to have an Extended ATX case, is if you install and use all four graphics cards. The bottom video card appears to hang slightly below the bottom edge of the board if you're using double width video cards. Double width video cards seems to be the normal width these days, in which the card overlaps a PCI port making it unusable.

2013.01.16 - The Atheros WiFi/Bluetooth add-in card hooks into the USB port. The on-board USB port I hooked into was the Intel xHCI USB-3.0 port/chipset. First, you need to install the drivers for this xHCI USB 3.0 port before the Atheros drivers can find their devices. These xHCI USB 3.0 drivers are only available from the intel.com website as they are not included within the Gigabyte drivers for some odd reason. Once you install the xHCI USB 3.0 drivers, the Atheros chip will then be found by the Atheros drivers or setup.exe. The Gigabyte manual also notes, you can change the xHCI USB 3.0 ports to Auto or Smart Auto modes within BIOS. This may allow a fallback to USB 2.0, for Windows XP operating systems. But you also need to right click on the unknown device within the device manager and manually install the USB 2.0 chipset driver from the downloaded Gigabyte intel chipset drivers package. Also, the intel.com xHCI USB 3.0 drivers are only available for Windows 7 and Windows 8, and not for Windows XP. Again, weird. I haven't tried yet, but maybe could hook into another onboard USB port, avoiding this xHCI USB 3.0 driver issue. Also, official Atheros drivers are also not available for Windows XP, but there might be some hacked .inf files providing some basic functionality for the Atheros drivers from a 3rd party website. I haven't tried this later solution, as I use wire Ethernet here. Apparently, these are Atheros and Intel specific issues, as they're not providing drivers or have licensing issues, maybe preventing Gigabyte from packaging them. Anther tip, if you're installing Windows XP, hook the drive to the Marvell SATA ports when installing and using Windows XP. The Intel SATA drivers only gave me blue screens here, and will likely be an issue with any Z77 motherboard, as I've also tried a popular ASUS board. Using the Marvel SATA ports for Windows XP, I had little to no issues, switching over to AHCI mode, including using larger >2TB hard drives, unlike the Z77 Intel SATA ports. I should also note, LINUX does not have these xHCI USB-3.0 problems that I know of. The fore-mentioned, are Windows only issues.

2013.01.26 - I've scanned through some of the reviews on newegg.com stating problems with this board and looks like the writers were not very computer literate as they posted no details of their problems. They just basically state, "It doesn't work." and mentioned their favourite motherboard maker. I think I've detailed any of the possible issues with the board within my review to some extent, and they seem to be mostly external or non-Gigabyte related. I think the only issue Gigabyte would be liable for is an explanation of the problems. However, if you have some experience with computers, you should be able to easily mitigate these issues as I did. The board works excellent using Fedora-17 and Fedora-18 and using all open source drivers. Problems start to arise only with Windows Operating Systems and the Windows Drivers. So again, before complaining, try another Operating System such as Fedora. (Although I use Gentoo here, Fedora seems to be a good rock stable binary only Distro for testing motherboard stability with minimal fuss.) This board is still rock solid for me, providing all the ports I could ever dream of unlike my Asus experience. I think another hiccup people witness, is the language barrier with non-speaking counter parts. However, they improperly conclude that a manufacturer doesn't provide support. I'll probably silence myself on this topic as I'm not a salesman -- probably one of the worse due to my honesty. ;-)

2013.02.7 - For users who purchased optimized memory modules, you'll need to edit the BIOS settings to enable using the optimizations.

2013.04.11 - Add Pro for RealTek ALC898 sound chip, and notes on RMAA comparison with ASUS STX card.

2013.04.22 - Added lspci and lsusb output. Moved detailed info to the bottom of the page, preserving essential feedback at the top of the review.

2013.04.27 - Add note, how to enable onboard HDMI alongside other video card adapters.

2013.05.21 - Added HDMI audio cancels on DPMS or power saving. Added double width video card uses or blocks two ports. Still rock solid and performing wonderfully!

2013.08.17 - Board has been back and forth from the shop to get two rear USB ports fixed, within the rear four USB port block of the same chipset. Also note, the "GA-Z87X-OC Force" appears to be the successor of this motherboard.

2013.09.07 - Finally fixed! On about 29 Aug 2013, I finally received a replacement board with all working USB ports. Tip: If you have bad ports or are aware of a bad part on electronic devices, mark the board with a labelled piece of masking tape instead of trying to describe the ports or part within a letter! The first RMA or return shipping, I guess they didn't recognize the problem, while the second RMA or return shipping effort they replaced the board. Apparently tested everything via software, and every feature appears to be in good working order now. This could have been averted earlier if a tracing diagram showing which ports are controlled by which USB chips was provided. Instead, we have pretty much have no idea which ports are controlled by which chip (and including which driver), making troubleshooting troublesome within Linux. (Windows is even worse with troubleshooting such issues.) Many thanks to Gigabyte for resolving this issue.

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