General formula: GA-[power saving method + chipset name + form factor + specific feature]-[main features +minor feature]
1. Available 1st segment abbreviations
- If “A” appears after the chipset code, it has the 333 onboard acceleration (USB 3.0, USB Power X3, SATA 3.0 6 Gbps)
- If “M” appears after the chipset code, it is a mATX board.
- If “N” appears after the chipset code, it is a Mini-ITX board.
- If “M” appears in front of the chipset number it means it is for an AMD processor, but has a non-AMD chipset.
- If “MA” appears before the chipset number it is for an AMD processor and has an AMD chipset.
- If “E” appears beofore the chipset number it has Dynamic Energy Saver as energy saving method. ie: (GA-EG45M-UD2H)
2. Chipset used
3. Available 2nd segment abbreviations
- E – If it appears as the first letter in the third segment (ie.GA-EG45-EUD2H),it means it has Easy Energy Saver feature.
- T – Only DDR3 SDRAM support (i.e: GA-MA770T-US3)
- C – Both DDR2 and DDR3 SDRAM support
- F – Includes FireWire port and header (i.e: GA-EG41MF-US2H)
No T or C abbreviations mean that the motherboard only has DDR2 SDRAM support.
4a. Available 3rd segment abbreviations
- D (Durability) – Indicates that the motherboard uses only solid state capacitors.
U/UD (Ultra Durable 3) – Introduces 2 ounces of copper for both the Power and Ground layers. - USB3 – Indicates that the motherboard fetaured Ultra Durable 3 and USB 3.0 support
- S2 (Smart, Safe) – Various features such as Q-Flash BIOS etc.
- S3 (Smart, Speed, Safe) – Same as above, but includes overclocking features.
- S4 (Silent Pipe, Smart, Speed, Safe) – Same as above, but uses heat pipe cooling.
- S5 (CrossFire, Silent Pipe, Smart, Speed, Safe) – Same as above, but with CrossFire support.
- Q6 (Quad BIOS, Quad Cooling, Quad E-SATA 2.0, Quad Triple Phase, Quad-Core Optimized, Quad DDR2 Slots) – Indicates quad-core optimization.
4b. Available 4th segment abbreviations:
# (2, 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7) – Compares boards of same class. (i.e: GA-P55-UD3)
4c. Available 5th segment abbreviations:
- R – 2 extra SATA 2.0 ports and possibly RAID support. May have FireWire port. May not have ATI CrossFire support. (i.e: GA-P35-DS3R)
- G – Solid capacitors for the CPU Volt Regulator Module.
- H – HDMI port. Possibly Changing, Using it for DisplayPort if HDMI port standard (i.e.: GA-H55-USB3 has HDMI)
- L – Probably “Lite”. Fewer SATA 2.0 ports. No RAID support. No FireWire ports. No ATI CrossFire support. Heatsink cooling. (i.e GA-P35-DS3L). It could also indicate Gigabit LAN (as in GA-G31M-S2L, versus GA-G31M-S2C which has support for 10/100 Mbit/s Ethernet). (L” / “C” / “E” / “G” means minor/customized spec change version)
- P – Silent Pipe, RAID, Extra PCI Express slots, extra SATA 2.0 ports. (i.e: GA-EP45-DS3P)
