Pros: see prior reviews

Cons: see prior reviews

Overall Review: I wanted to update my reviews regarding the bluetooth problems I was having. I finally heard back from Gigabyte support and the reply instructed me to do two things: 1. reseat the daughterboard 2. install a new driver (one that wasn't available on the downloads website) Reseating the daughterboard requires removal of the motherboard as it is held in place by a retainer with screws through the bottom of the motherboard. So it was a bit of a hassle to disassemble everything to reseat the daughterboard. Reseating the daughterboard cause the system to work for a few minutes and then stop. In fact, you could sit and watch the device manager where the device would work, then cease working, then work and so forth. Installation of the new drivers seemed to fix the problem. So far so good. I'm not sure if the package they gave me is a beta package or not, but it seemed to fix whatever issue I was having. One more egg added since everything seems to be running correctly. -1 egg total for how difficult of installation this has been.

Pros: Large disk space

Cons: So the replacement disk also died. Every Hitachi drive that I purchased has now died - well before their rated lifecycle. I think I've purchased my last Hitachi drive. This was my first Hitachi disk drive purchase, and I haven't been totally happy. The first drive immediately started throwing RAID errors. However, Hitachi has no software to diagnose their 3TB drives (Really!). So it was impossible to tell what was really going on. I RMA'd the drive by their recommendation. The second drive shows similar symptoms. I moved it from my desktop system to my Synology NAS to see if it was the system. It tends to hang my NAS as well. After a long RAID test, it seems to do some sector remapping and work ok for a while, then back to problems.

Overall Review: I purchased 4 Hitachi drives of various sorts and they all have died well before their rated lifecycle. I had at least one replaced under warranty that also died. So, no more Hitachi drives for me. I've pretty much standardized on the Seagate NAS drives (ST4000VN000) which have run cooler and worked without a hitch, unlike the Hitachi drives which had trouble from the start and wen't downhill from there.

Pros: Small, wifi integrated on board

Cons: The BIOS is a mess and lots of little issues.

Overall Review: So I've bought two similar boards: The H97N Wifi and Z97N-Wifi. They are pretty good little boards, but I've had some issues with them that were not expected. For example, when I first brought the Z97N up, I had problems with the bluetooth connection. It kept dropping and it took me a lot of trouble shooting to track down the issue. In the end, I had to get an unreleased driver direct from Gigabyte to solve that one. <br><br>With the H97N, the board has been up and running in a system I built for less than 6 months. Already the little coin battery that keeps the bios information valid has gone dead. At least I think that is all that is happening. It could be a bios issue. If it is only the battery, it is a little thing, but seriously? Less than 6 months and a dead battery?<br><br>My overall assessment is that this is a pretty good little board, but little things keep it from being great. Once I close up a system, I don't want to have to keep opening the box to fix this or that. I've always had good luck with gigabyte board reliability and have built many systems using their boards. The jury is still out on this one, though. Update: I wanted to update my review with the issues I'm having with the bios battery. I've come to the conclusion something must be wrong with the motherboard. After having the battery go dead, I replaced it. That one went dead also. I plugged the new battery in, set up the BIOS again, shut things down. Turned off the power supply, waited over night. In the morning, the new battery was dead and the BIOS (of course) had lost its settings again. So I ordered a battery holder that could easily take the coin batteries. I've tested at least two new batteries: measure the voltage on the battery (3.1-3.2v). Put the battery in the system. Boot. Set up the BIOS. Boot again. Shut down. Turn off the power supply & unplug the system. Wait 2 min or so. Plug everything back in, turn everything on. BIOS settings lost. Turn everything off. Remove the battery, measure the voltage (2.7-2.8v). So basically, the battery gets drained sufficiently in a few minutes. I've repeated this several times. I suspect that something is wrong with the board. The only thing I can think of is that \the positive and negative terminals on the socket have somehow been reversed (socket placed on the MB backwards during manufacturing). I suppose I could test by installing the battery in the holder backwards, but I'm hesitant to do so lest something fry on the MB and it becomes unreturnable. It is undiagnosable with the equipment I have as there is no voltage on the pins when the MB is in operation. Perhaps I'm also the victim of bad quality control like someone else here. Color me very frustrated. Dropping the rating to one egg.

Pros: Large, cool running, fast

Cons: None so far

Overall Review: This drive replaced a 3Tb Hitachi HDS5C3030ALA630 drive that never worked right (you can see my review of that drive over under the product page). All I can say is wow! what a difference. This is the fastest and coolest running drive in my NAS. I think I've found a new drive type to use. Of course, installing it in the NAS deleted any software that they included (NASWare). :)

Pros: Large

Cons: Not very reliable. Won't quite fail, but won't really work either.

Overall Review: I first purchased one of these drives to replace a aging WD drive that had started to fail. The first drive started throwing random SMART errors that were not consistent or reproducible. I contacted the manufacturer and was told that their diagnostic tools would not work with the 3Tb drive. I looked for other ways to test and make sure it was working properly. It would test good one day and fail the next. Finally in frustration I contacted the manufacturer who replaced the drive under RMA. The second drive had a clicking sound as the head would repeatedly reset itself over and over. I migrated the disk to a NAS as part of a raid array to get a different format on the drive (ext4 vs. NTFS). The tendency of the drive to repeatedly reset the read head did not stop and I would get sometimes 30 sec. to 1 minute pauses while the head was repeatedly reset. Meanwhile the drive would sometimes pass the smart tests sometimes fail (abort the test). I finally pulled the drive and replaced it with WD Red. I'm much happier now.

Pros: Quiet, cool and fast. These drives seem to be working well, unlike the example of their 3TB older brother (separately reviewed) which I've had nothing but trouble with.

Cons: None so far

Overall Review: The world wide disk manufacturing problems have put lots of disks into circulation that have had lots of problems. However, these seem to be doing very well in my Synology NAS. I have 3 of these, a 3TB Hitachi (with lots of problems), and a 1.5 TB Western Digital that has lots of miles on it. Of all, these 2TB drives seem to be performing the best. Quietest, coolest and fastest of the bunch. I'd definately purchase again. Now about that 3TB drive . . .