Z77 mITX Round-Up: Five of the Best – MSI, Zotac, ASRock, EVGA and ASUS
by Ian Cutress on December 31, 2012 7:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- MSI
- ASRock
- EVGA
- ZOTAC
- Asus
- Ivy Bridge
- Z77
- mITX
ASRock Z77E-ITX BIOS
As already mentioned in the overview to the Z77E-ITX, its BIOS is a step back from the most recent implementations of the BIOS we have seen on the X79 Extreme11 and FM2A85X Extreme6 – instead of that starry background we get the older blue on white indicative of the earlier Z77 products. This is mostly likely due to the mid-2012 release of this motherboard, but going through the history of the ASRock BIOS, there is an evolution taking place:
ASRock H67M-GE/HT
ASRock Z77E-ITX
ASRock X79 Extreme11
Despite the evolution, ASRock have kept the general design constant. This means information like the motherboard model, BIOS version, processor installed, processor speed, memory installed and memory speed are right there on the front menu – useful for anyone wanting this information without loading an OS or opening up the case. All that is missing is perhaps the CPU temperature and CPU fan speeds. If this was all wrapped up in an aesthetic and interactive scenario we would be on to a winner.
With the Z77E-ITX BIOS, the Main screen has access to two functions – the System Browser and the Online Management Guard.
The System Browser shows the motherboard with all the changeable ports highlighted. By rolling the mouse over each of them, it will tell the user what it detects in that port. Thus if a SATA device suddenly stops working, users can check this to make sure the BIOS still recognizes it.
The Online Management Guard is an interesting way to get around the ‘how to keep the kids off the internet when they should be doing schoolwork’ issue – users can select hours of the day at which the network controller will be disabled. Unfortunately the system is easily disabled by going back into the BIOS and either changing the BIOS clock or changing the OMG setup itself. Yes, OMG is an odd name for this feature – “OMG, it’s so easy to disable!”
The main bulk of the options are found in the OC Tweaker menu:
The OC Tweaker menu is arranged into lists of features relating to separate parts of the system. First is the CPU configuration, relating to CPU ratio, BCLK and power limitations. We also have overclocking support for the integrated graphics. Underneath this is the DRAM timing options, which give XMP support or a manual adjustment of the timing ratios. The voltages are further down, and we are given Load Line Calibration options as well with diagrams to show how LLC varies with ‘Level’. Finally there are options to save the current settings for future usage.
The Advanced menu deals with the non-overclocking options: we have access to our SATA/USB configurations, as well as the extra controllers on board and the NB/SB options. In order to flash the BIOS via USB or the Internet, the options are in this menu.
The fan settings are found in the H/W Monitor option along the top, and in keeping with previous ASRock motherboards, the fans are set to 100% by default. This is by no means the best way of presenting the motherboard out of the box, resulting in high noise levels unless the options are changed. The fan options on the Z77E-ITX allow for both fans to have a ‘maximum’ temperature after which the fans are on full, and a target fan speed which sets the fans to that speed below the target temperature.
Elsewhere in the BIOS are boot options and security options. Annoyingly missing is a boot override function, useful for those one-off USB installation scenarios.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
54 Comments
View All Comments
Bullwinkle J Moose - Monday, December 31, 2012 - link
Hey yeah, Ian haz a good pointThat Crappy Gigabyte H61n-USB3 doesn't have Chipset USB3
But it does however boot just fine to a USB3 Windows to go drive at USB3 speeds
It also boots to Linux and XP due to the Non-Locked down Bios so we wouldn't want that either would we
and it takes a full 9 seconds to boot XP compared to the super de duper fast 7 second Windows 8
So we should spend more money and get locked into a closed system
After all, that is the future!
Limitations are fun so be happy as we lock down the Internet as well
After all, there are scarey Monsters out there
A man has to know his limitations
Clint Eastwood
Bullwinkle J Moose - Monday, December 31, 2012 - link
Ian haz a good point about the memory tooThat Gigabyte H61 board only takes up to 16GB of RAM
How much do these Z77 boards take by the way?
Was it this site or Maximum PC where the reviewers stated that in everyday use, you will notice no difference in speed between Sata 2 & 3 when you are using the latest and greatest SSD so I probably don't need the RAID capability on my H61 either
Keep up the good work Ian
Death666Angel - Wednesday, January 2, 2013 - link
It seems that someone just discovered sarcasm. Good for you!mczak - Monday, December 31, 2012 - link
H61 is not limited to one single sided DIMM per channel, double sided are just fine. It only accepts one per channel (at least it's specced that way) but since none of these mini-ITX boards have more than two memory slots this wouldn't matter at all here (max memory is still 2x8GB regardless).Frankly I'm not sure losing PCIe 3.0 is a big deal with mini-itx boards in any case but either way it isn't exactly true there are h61 boards supposedly supporting this (as it's got nothing to do with the chipset anyway all the pcie 3.0 signals coming directly from the cpu, though it would require bios support).
This leaves us with losing SATA 6 Gbps - this might indeed make some minimal difference in real world, provided you use a SSD and not a HD.
The major point imho (aside from overclocking) would be missing USB 3.0, which obviously makes a big difference when using external harddisks etc. Granted that could be done with separate usb controller but probably not a good idea since space is limited.
H61 IIRC also will lose the possibility of using 3 display outputs simultaneously. Maybe something like H77 would make more sense for mini-ITX as it pretty much only loses overclocking (plus the ability to split the 16 x pcie 3.0 lanes into 2x8 though I guess this has nothing to do with the chipset itself really, but in any case it won't be missed on mini-itx). So if you don't want to overclock, you wouldn't miss anything at all with H77 on a mini-itx board.
Etern205 - Saturday, January 5, 2013 - link
I also notice that as well, most sites will only review Z77 mITX boards instead of H61 or H77. Not all will need a Z77, Z77 is mostly for enthusiast or for those who are into the technical stuffs. For the average Joe or Jane any mITX board will do. If you tell them it's H61 or Z77, they probably won't care too much on the difference.piroroadkill - Wednesday, January 2, 2013 - link
You can't easily upgrade the chipset later. With a small up-front investment, you get the full feature set, and why not?Bullwinkle J Moose - Sunday, January 6, 2013 - link
Oh Boo Hoo, I can't easily upgrade to an overclocking chipset or void the warranties of my hardware componentsI am just stuck with a totally stable system
Boo Hoo
How can I possibly break this ?
What has the World become ?
Poor me
Boo Hoo
Bullwinkle J Moose - Sunday, January 6, 2013 - link
Why not?Because the H61 is exactly what I wanted
and anything else is NOT !
can you hear me now?
EVGA KINGPIN - Friday, November 19, 2021 - link
I still use my Z77 FTW board , have had it running without turning it off since 2015. evga is the best ,also my EVGA GTX 980 KINGPIN is still running strong,,,thanks EVGA for quality products, JRTsherlockwing - Monday, December 31, 2012 - link
Where is the Gigabyte?