Intel Z77 Panther Point Chipset and Motherboard Preview – ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI, ECS and Biostar
by Ian Cutress on April 8, 2012 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Intel
- Biostar
- MSI
- Gigabyte
- ASRock
- Asus
- Ivy Bridge
- ECS
- Z77
Of the nine boards we hope to cover across the Ivy Bridge release, we have a large range of prices and feature sets to consider. Styling seems to be of great importance to these companies, especially when they either all follow a similar color scheme or decide to spray everything with a coat of gold paint!
Today you may see many reviews with Sandy Bridge results being posted. We have decided to wait until we are allowed to publish Ivy Bridge results in order to fully test these boards to the limit, and show how they respond under the latest technology (and perhaps after a BIOS update or two). However, important chipset information is at our hands and we can discuss important changes to motherboard design—the long awaited addition of PCIe 3.0 and native USB 3.0 to the Intel mainstream chipset, but also to new technologies, such as Virtual V-Sync and HyperFormance that comes with Virtu MVP, or just how good ASUS' new memory topology might be.
|
ASRock Z77 Extreme4 |
ASRock Z77 Extreme6 |
ASUS P8Z77-V Pro |
ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe |
|
| Price | $141 | $177 | TBC | TBC |
| Size | ATX | ATX | ATX | ATX |
| Power | 8 + 4 | 8 + 4 | 12 + 4 | 16 + 4 |
| Video |
HDMI 1.4a DVI-D D-Sub |
DisplayPort HDMI 1.4a DVI-D D-Sub |
DisplayPort HDMI DVI-D D-Sub |
DisplayPort HDMI |
| LAN | Broadcom BCM57781 | Broadcom BCM57781 | Intel 82579V |
Intel 82579V Realtek 8111F |
| Audio | Realtek ALC898 | Realtek ALC898 | Realtek ALC892 | Realtek ALC898 |
| Mini PCIe | No | Yes | No | No |
| Wifi | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| SATA 6Gbps | 2 + 2 | 2 + 2 | 2 + 2 | 2 + 2 |
| SATA 3Gbps | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 |
| USB 3.0 | 6 | 6 | 8 | 8 |
| USB 2.0 | 8 | 8 | 10 | 8 |
| Fan Headers | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 |
| SLI/XFire | Two GPUs | Two GPUs | Two GPUs | Two GPUs |
| NA Warranty | 3 Years | 3 Years | 3 Years | 3 Years |
|
Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H Wifi |
Gigabyte GA-Z77MX-D3H |
MSI Z77A-GD65 |
ECS Z77H2-AX |
Biostar TZ77XE4 |
|
| Price | TBC | TBC | $180 | $319 | $169 |
| Size | ATX | mATX | ATX | ATX | ATX |
| Power | 6 + 1 + 2 +1 | TBC | 8 + 2 | 12 + 2 | 10 + 2 |
| Video |
DisplayPort HDMI DVI-D D-Sub |
HDMI DVI-D D-Sub |
HDMI DVI-D D-Sub |
HDMI D-Sub |
DisplayPort HDMI DVI-D D-Sub |
| LAN | Atheros | Atheros | Intel 82579V | Realtek 8111E | Realtek 8111E |
| Audio | Via VT2021 | Via VT2021 | Realtek ALC898 | Realtek ALC892 | Realtek ALC898 |
| Mini PCIe | Yes | No | No |
mSATA + mini PCIe |
No |
| Wifi | PCIe Card | No | No | Yes | No |
| SATA 6Gbps | 2 + 0 | 2 + 0 | 2 + 2 | 2 + 0 | 2 + 2 |
| SATA 3Gbps | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 | 4 + 0 |
| USB 3.0 | 8 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 4 |
| USB 2.0 | 6 | 10 | 10 | 6 | 8 |
| Fan Headers | 5 | 3 | 5 | 3 | 3 |
| SLI/XFire | Two GPUs | Two GPUs | Two GPUs | Three GPUs | Two GPUs |
| NA Warranty | 3 Years | 3 Years | 3 Years | 3 Years | 3 Years |
There is a lot to digest regarding Z77. If you are planning an Ivy Bridge build, we want to hear what you want out of your boards or which ones you are considering to purchase. A little while after these boards, we should be tackling some rather interesting mini-ITX ones as well, so stay tuned!
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145 Comments
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SalientKing - Friday, April 27, 2012 - link
Any plans on putting up some detailed reviews on these units? I'm especially interested in the gigabyte GA-Z77M-D3H , since it seems to be the cheapest z77 i've found so far.Moogle Stiltzkin - Wednesday, May 2, 2012 - link
Hi Anand, i found your short review of the Asus P8-Z77 Deluxe mobo very interesting especially in the small details which other reviews don't bother to inform laymans such as myself.Anyway what i wanted to know more was regarding what you said concerning the PLX. So because the Deluxe is using an older PLX chip, what exactly does this mean ?
You mentioned that as such it doesn't have the PCI to PCI-Express bridge feature.
http://www.plxtech.com/products/devicedefinitions#...
What does that do exactly ? Does it mean it would be possible to use a PCI card using a PCI-express slot ? Is that what the bridge thing does :d ?
The reason i ask is because i'm stuck between keeping my current Deluxe model, or trading it in for a Premium. I'm a bit stuck deciding what to do at this point, so Anand i could use your sound advise please :{
swindmill - Monday, May 14, 2012 - link
The LogMeIn Mirror driver seems to break Lucidlogix's Virtu software as detailed in this blog post:http://blog.ampx.net/2012/05/lucidlogix-virtu-and-...
Has anyone else experienced this issue?
kcblair - Thursday, June 28, 2012 - link
Does Virtu MVP really help with monitors (Geforce 3D Vision ready) ? I have such a monitor, and it "appears" , not to have much of an effect on increased performance. It, however, I set the refresh rate to 60hrz, I think there is an increase in performance, as my frame rates are above the frame rates of the monitor (70-85fps). But my frames rates remain unchanged, (70-85) when I increase my refresh to 120hrz. This statement really confuses me, at least I should make mention of monitors that are 3D Vision ready "If your setup (screen resolution and graphics settings) perform better than your refresh rate of your monitor (essentially 60 FPS for most people). If you have less than this, then you will probably not see any benefit." Any comments ?MrSpockTech - Thursday, February 28, 2013 - link
I read this article in French there:http://www.hardware.fr/articles/858-1/lucidlogix-v...
And what I can say is LucidLogix CHEAT and think people are like monkeys.
Ati and Nvidia cheat too in past to boast all benchmark.
It's really a shame that stuff exist again.
And more funny that Intel support LucidLogix!!!
For me now LucidLogix = C**P !!!