Intel Z77 Motherboard Review with Ivy Bridge - ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, and MSI
by Ian Cutress on May 7, 2012 7:40 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- MSI
- Gigabyte
- ASRock
- Asus
- Ivy Bridge
- Z77
Conclusion – Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H
What does a user want from a motherboard? The holy grail of motherboard questions without one distinct, definitive answer. If one user wants a certain feature, another user will not want it nor will they want it on the product as it could introduce cost. So when a motherboard manufacturer draws up a list of future products, what determines which products they sell? Cost? Market research? Previous experience?
From my perspective, we need a motherboard that works out of the box. Suffice to say, the Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H does work out of the box, as long as you are not using G.Skill memory on the F2 BIOS. Upgrade to the F7 BIOS, and we have a board that hits the price bracket at around $160. For $160, we get a full set of video outputs, an mSATA port, a TPM header, power/reset buttons (with debug LED), dual graphics card support, and a rather different combination of audio/NIC compared to other products.
Nevertheless, the board performs well in our testing suite, and is especially the best in terms of minimal voltage ripple to our CPU.
Conclusion – MSI Z77A-GD65
The MSI Z77A-GD65 will be MSI's number two board, behind the supposedly Thunderbolt equipped Z77A-GD80 released later this year, and the GD65 is currently retailing for $190, between the Gigabyte and the ASUS. For the price we lose PCI and mSATA over the Gigabyte, but gain SATA, an Intel NIC, a clear CMOS button on the IO panel, and arguably easier to use software and BIOS implementations (from this reviewers standpoint).
From a performance perspective, to get into the upper ranges of the other motherboards in this review, it is advised that users enable OC Genie to get a 200 MHz frequency bump when all cores are fully loaded. This would help with strenuous multithreaded workloads. In comparison, for rigorous overclocks, manual adjustment is required.
The MSI Z77A-GD65 is an easy to use product that has all the video outputs. As a kicker, it uses the lowest voltage at load than any other motherboard.
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SnowKing - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
I think you are confusing bits per second vs. bytes per second. Do not be alarmed, that is the gimmick of Ethernet.10 mbps (megabits per second) = 1.25 MBps (megabytes per second)
100 mbps (megabits per second) = 12.5 MBps (megabytes per second)
1 gbps (gigabits per second) = 125 MBps (megabytes per second)
If you want 1 GBps, you will need an 8 gbps connector i.e. (10gbps nic)...and good luck with that.
Unit Converter
http://www.numion.com/calculators/units.html
repoman27 - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
theSeb's (and originally adrien's) point here is that the chart for LAN speeds erroneously list MBps instead of Mbps.HollyDOL - Wednesday, May 9, 2012 - link
Transfer speed is always measured in bps (bits per second).Latin prefixes for kilo-Mega-Giga etc. signify 10^3,10^6 etc. bits
Capacity volume is always measured in B (bytes).
Latin prefixes for kilo-Mega-Giga etc. signify 2^10, 2^20 etc. Bytes (ie. 1kB = 1024 Bytes) according to old school rules.
According to new customs kilo-Mega-Giga signify 10^3,10^6 etc. Bytes, prefixes kB, MB, GB, while alternate prefixes kiB,MiB,GiB signify 2^10,2^20... Bytes. Data storage capacity uses new style kB,MB,GB,TB for long years since it makes their drives look bigger, while on hardware and OS level you are much more likely to see units based on power of two since it is much more natural for binary computer.
Basically 10Mbps = 1.25MB/s is completely wrong... 10Mbps = 10,000,000bps = 1,250,000 B/s = 1.192 MB/s
1TB (new style or storage device manufacturers) = 931,32GiB
Schafdog - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
What is draw of power from GPUs?IanCutress - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
The 7970s should Idle at approx 3W or less each.gorg_graggel - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
the current asus lineup seems to have problems with memory configs that consist of 8GB dimms...their list of supported memory modules seems to be made for multiple boards...it contains configurations for e.g. 6x4gb for boards that have only 4 slots...so i guess it`s not only a problem with my board...
i got myself a sabertooth z77 and a pair of corsair 1600mhz 8gb dimms. no matter how conservative i set the timings the board won`t boot at 1600mhz and freeze after some time at 1333mhz (spd or xmp don`t work either). i can only get them stable at 1066mhz. a single dimm runs fine at the specified clocks and timings.
could you spare some time and test the boards with a 1600mhz config with 2 8gb dimms? or even with 4 of those? no underclocking of higher specced dimms, as there is a 2x8gb@1866mhz config in the list...
would be interesting to know if all those boards had problems with ivy brigde`s max specified dram clocks...
i guess it will be fixed in a future bios update, but maybe beeing pointed out by a respected site, they are gonna hurry it up a bit...i mean c`mon 1600mhz rams at 1066mhz? seriously...
gorg_graggel - Monday, May 14, 2012 - link
so, i got myself another pair of 8gb dimms...g.skill ripjaws 1600mhz, cl10...
those worked from the get go...also not on ovl list...
the latest bios (1015) made the corsair dimms work better @1333mhz (no more freezing), but still no 1600 (for which they are specified)...
so if you plan to get 8gb 1600mhz dimms for your asus board, steer clear from corsair vengeance low profile dimms...at least until the bios has matured some more...
Luay - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
The $225 Asus V Pro has the Realtek ALC892 audio chipset while the $148 Asrock Extreme4 has the 898! Not everyone wants or can install a sound card so what are they thinking?GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD5H-WB Has wireless, 898 audio chip and a third PCI-E 3.0 slot for $219. That's a good reason to pay an extra $70 over the Asrock Extreme4 as I don't really care about auto-over-clocking.
Only Asrock at budget and Gigabyte at mid-end are in it to win it. Not enough high-end boards to tell who won there.
I am shocked by what Asus put on the table but I might be missing something here.
blacksun1234 - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
Gigabyte's third PCI-E 3.0 slot cannot work if CPU BCLK OC only 1MHz to 101MHz. It is buggy M/B. Don't buy it.blacksun1234 - Tuesday, May 8, 2012 - link
I mean GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD5H-WB . GA-Z77X-UD3H is Ok for 3rd PCI-E 2.0.