Analyzing Z370 for Intel's 8th Generation Coffee Lake: A Quick Look at 50+ Motherboards
by Ian Cutress, Anton Shilov, Joe Shields & Gavin Bonshor on October 20, 2017 2:00 PM ESTEVGA Z370 Micro
EVGA’s third board is the micro-ATX form factor Z370 Micro. Though smaller than the ATX format, the Z370 Micro offers an external clock generator, 2-way SLI support, wireless connectivity, and an M.2 slot for high-speed storage. It has plenty of USB support, however, it does not have USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) ports without buying an add-in card. It looks like a lot of considerations went into cable management by the use of horizontal headers on the bottom of the board as well as the unique notching for the 24-pin ATX connector and the supplemental 6-pin PCIe header on the bottom of the board.
Like its ATX brothers, the board is black and does not have any designs on the PCB. The power delivery heatsinks are black with some extended surface area - the chipset heatsink is also black with a few lines cut out giving it a bit more surface area. A debug LED and power/reset buttons are in the upper right-hand corner by the dual BIOS switch. Also noteworthy is the addition of an optional 4-pin EPS 12V by the CPU, alongside a regular 8-pin. From the images we have, there doesn’t appear to be native RGB LEDs, however, it does have two RGB headers for adding LED strips.
Contrary to other micro-ATX boards in this roundup, the Z370 Micro only has two memory DIMM slots instead of four, but both of these are reinforced. Only having two slots means that the maximum memory support is 32 GB, and EVGA is quoting a maximum memory support up to DDR4-4133. With the memory slots reinforced, there are also two full-length PCIe slots that are also reinforced, supporting x16 or x8/x8, and is good for 2-way SLI or Crossfire. The final PCIe slot is a PCIe x4 from the chipset.
The Z370 Micro supports six SATA ports and a single M.2 PCIe 3.0 x4 slot between the PCIe slots that will fit up to an 80mm module. For system cooling, the board has six 4-pin PWM headers around the board to attach compatible fans. Audio duties are handled by the Realtek ALC1220 codec., although there does not appear to be distinct PCB separation or EMI shielding, both commonly used by motherboard manufacturers to reduce signal interference in the audio. Networking comes via a single Intel I219-V GbE.
The rear panel is one of the few Z370 boards that has no video outputs, requiring a discrete graphics card for some video output. On the rear panel we find a Clear CMOS button, two USB 2.0 ports, a combination PS/2 connector, six USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) ports, the Intel network port, and the audio jacks with SPDIF. There is also a slot for an M.2 E-Key device, which usually takes the form of a Wi-Fi module. Users will have to supply their own (as far as we know).
EVGA Z370 Micro | ||
Warranty Period | 3 Years | |
Product Page | Link | |
Price | N/A | |
Size | ATX | |
CPU Interface | LGA1151 | |
Chipset | Intel Z370 Express | |
Memory Slots (DDR4) | Two DDR4 Supporting 32GB Dual Channel Support DDR4 4133+ |
|
Network Connectivity | 1 x Intel I219-V 1 x M.2 Key-E for Wi-Fi |
|
Onboard Audio | Realtek ALC1220 | |
PCIe Slots for Graphics (from CPU) | 2 x PCIe 3.0 x16 slot (x16 or x8/x8) | |
PCIe Slots for Other (from Chipset) | 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 | |
Onboard SATA | 6 x Supporting RAID 0/1/5/10 | |
Onboard SATA Express | None | |
Onboard M.2 | 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 | |
Onboard U.2 | None | |
USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) | None | |
USB 3.1 (5 Gbps) | 6 x Back Panel 1 x Header |
|
USB 2.0 | 2 x Back Panel 2 x Headers |
|
Power Connectors | 1 x 24-pin EATX 1 x 8-pin ATX 12V 1 x 4-pin ATX 12V |
|
Fan Headers | 6 x PWM | |
IO Panel | Clear CMOS 1 x Combination PS/2 2 x USB 2.0 6 x USB 3.1 (5 Gbps) 1 x Intel Network Port Audio Jacks 1 x M.2 Key-E for Wi-Fi |
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Hxx - Monday, October 23, 2017 - link
no they're not. the gigabyte gaming 5 is $200 the gaming 7 is $250 (just so happen I was looking at some gigabyte boards). Those prices are as high as z270 when it came out. In comparison, you could get a z270 gaming 7 for like 150. That's just one example I'm sure there are others. There is definitely a premium built into these boards for something that is nothing more than a stop gap and that will become obsolete 6 months from now.Hixbot - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
Only one board with 10GBE? That's dissapointing.pvdw - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
I'd really like reviews of the mITX boards, particularly the ASRock Z370 Gaming-ITX/ac. I'll be building a portable gaming + workstation to go in this case when it comes in January: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/33753221/dan-...Thanks!
pvdw - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
mITX -> ITXTwister292 - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
The Aorus Gaming 5's M.2 slots are actually 2x110mm and 1x80mm accoding to the manual. It's also visible...the M2 slot at the top and the middle slot have 4 positions for the screws, the bottom slot has only 3.takeshi7 - Monday, October 23, 2017 - link
Asus, stop putting electrolytic capacitors on your TUF boards. The main reason I buy TUF boards is for the all solid caps. I don't care about "Nichicon gold" audio caps, and anyone who's serious about audio will have an external DAC or another sound card anyways. STAHHHP!Samus - Monday, October 23, 2017 - link
Having a "quick look" at 50 motherboards is somewhat an oxymoron, isn't it?tezpez - Tuesday, October 24, 2017 - link
May have spotted an error in the article - Asus Strix 370-F doesn't have wifi, whereas this page says it does: https://www.anandtech.com/show/11860/z370-motherbo...number58 - Tuesday, October 24, 2017 - link
The pictures for the Gigabyte Z370 Gaming K3 are actually some MSI mini itx board.pjcamp - Tuesday, October 24, 2017 - link
No, question 1 is "do I give 2 sh!ts about gaming?" How about a little help for people who are NOT twitch fanatics?