Intel Skylake Z170 Motherboards: A Quick Look at 55+ New Products
by Ian Cutress on August 5, 2015 7:59 AM ESTASRock Z170: Mini-ATX and Micro-ITX
ASRock Z170 Gaming-ITX/ac
Everyone loves a mini-ITX gaming motherboard, right? Even if it says Fatal1ty?
Mini-ITX boards are notorious for getting things right, but ASRock has had a go with this one to implement a number of features. Top of the list is probably USB 3.1, where we have both Type-C and Type-A ports on the rear panel. The rear panel also shows an 802.11ac 2T2R dual band WiFi connection, dual HDMI ports and a single DisplayPort. Other networking is from the Intel I219V, while the half-width audio block comes from the higher end ALC1150 codec. My specifications sheet says there is a PCIe 3.0 x4 slot on board, and by the looks of it we would probably find it on the rear as the half-sized mini-PCIe slot is occupied by the WiFi card. There is a total of six SATA 6 Gbps ports on board with a SATA Express as well, and we’re still in the realm of DDR4.
ASRock Z170M Pro4S ($100)
The Pro4S is designed to be the best cost/performance Z170 motherboard on the market, and the successor to the Z97M Anniversary – it does this by shedding a number of features. We are down to six-phase power with half-height heatsinks, a single PCIe 3.0 x16 from the chipset and no USB 3.1. We still get a PCIe 3.0 x4 based M.2 slot due to the number of free lanes from the chipset, but there are no SATA Express here and only six SATA 6 Gbps slots. Networking comes from the Intel I219-V codec while audio is still the ALC892 design. This board still aims for DDR4 it should be noted.
ASRock Z170M-ITX/ac
The solitary mini-ITX board from ASRock being announced publicly is the Z170M-ITX/AC. Not quite sure why they need an M in the name with the ITX being there, but it must be said the board isn’t necessarily built for style:
I’m sure that this board is more aligned with the Pro motherboards than the Extreme motherboards, namely due to the lack of USB 3.1, but it does oddly enough have dual network ports in the form of an Intel I219-V and the Realtek RTL8111E as well as an 802.11ac 2T2R dual band solution included, sitting upright in the mini-PCIe slot. Audio is provided by the ALC892 codec and a total of four SATA 6 Gbps ports are found just past the DDR4 memory slots. These ports are somewhat annoying, meaning that locking cables will easily block out the last cable from being removed without removing all others first. There is an mSATA slot on board as well, and it would seem to be on the rear similar to previous ASRock mini-ITX designs.
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AndyTri - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
In the specifications it states: M.2, SATA and SATAe ports maximum support 1x M.2_PCIe + 6x SATAs or 1x M.2_SATA + 1x M.2_PCIe + 4x SATAs. Please refer to page 19 forM.2 slots with examples of various combination possibilities. On page 19 however it gives a lot more configuration options including 2x M.2_PCIe + 4x SATAs
althaz - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
I'm tempted by the Skylake i7 and the Asus Z170-Deluxe, but I need to see some real motherboard reviews first. Obviously that's not exactly feasible for this sort of thing where many motherboards are released all at once - but hopefully those reviews are coming :).Especially those POST tests, it's silly, but they make a huge impact on my purchasing decisions.
Ian Cutress - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
Hopefully I'll squeeze one or two out before IDF. Pretty sure five or six samples arrived in the run up to launch, I need to open a few boxes.meacupla - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
I guess we're going to be waiting a while for MSI mITX and mATX boards to show up?Currently, there's only one mATX board that supports SLI, and it's a super expensive one from Asus.
sweeper765 - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
Do you still lose sata ports when using m.2?Mikemk - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
What is SSIC?mrlithium - Friday, August 7, 2015 - link
"Super Speed Inter Chip", A standard concerned with low power, and signaling between chips on the motherboard, while still using USB 3.0 drivers. Something for motherboard makers to be concerned with.http://www.design-reuse.com/articles/34710/low-pow...
trsqd - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
Am I the only one here dreaming of a Mini-ATX board with a Xeon ( I know there's none yet for 1151, but think of Xeon-D ) or i5/7 with Iris Pro graphics ( not everyone is a hardcore gamer ) , with at least 2x M.2 (x4) slots ( imagine SM951 in Raid 0 ) and which can take at least 64GB RAM ? It would be my dream machine...what an amazing host that would be. Or even an Intel NUC with 2xM.2...maofthnun - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
Does anyone know if any of these boards support vt-d? Or is it only gonna be Q170?sweeper765 - Thursday, August 6, 2015 - link
Asus Z170-A question:If i populate the M.2 slot with pcie ssd would that consume any of the regular sata ports?
Manual says m.2 is shared with sata express but what about the 2 sata ports? Can they be used with m.2 at the same time?