ASRock, ECS, Gigabyte, Intel, Sapphire Z77 Motherboard Roundup - PAGE 18

Motherboards utilizing the LGA 1155 socket interface are versatile and this roundup showed that when running the boards with the default settings, they are all capable of squeezing every last ounce of performance out of the Ivy Bridge micro-architecture. However, each board has its own flavor, giving them each their own unique appeal. All of the motherboards also leverage the new features of the Panther Point design such as native support for SATA 6Gbps and USB 3.0, and come with support for Lucid GPU virtualization for improved gaming performance and Intel Quick Sync, improving both encoding and decoding performance.

ASRock Fatal1ty Z77 Professional:

The Z77 Pro was an interesting motherboard to review. Starting with the good aspects, it had excellent performance and could leverage blistering fast memory speeds. The ASRock motherboard also has ample expansion support including 10 SATA connectors as well as support for 3-way SLI and CrossFireX. However, some of the features of the board seemed strange when considering its target audience. Its Legacy connections were out of place on a high-end motherboard. Additionally, it lacked features that some of the other boards had such as integrated Bluetooth and WiFi support, as well as an on-board PLX chip that would have increased the lanes available to multiple graphics cards.

So, while this board has excellent features, solid performance and can push an Intel 3770k to its overclocking limits, we felt it was missing some features that would have really made it stand out. Still, it is an excellent motherboard especially for gamers and fans of Fatal1ty. Currently the ASRock Fatal1ty has an MSRP of $229, which is good for a board of this caliber.

ECS Z77H2-AX:

The ECS Golden Z77H2-AX really was the stand out model for us. At first I thought the golden design was going to be gimmicky, but seeing as it was spread nicely thoughout the motherboard's vital components and thermal solution, it added a nice touch to the board both in terms of quality and aesthetics. This model also came with more features than virtually any motherboard we have examined in the Z77 family, like an on-board m-SATA connector, 3-way graphics card support backup with a PLX chip for x16/x8/x8 support, built-in WiFi and Bluetooth. Of course the golden design isn't going to appeal to all users, but in our opinion ECS has created their best motherboard to date.

ECS' new UEFI BIOS has come a long way. It is still a far cry from what companies such as Intel, Gigabyte and ASUS offer though, so it still needs some work. The general layout of the BIOS could be improved to make it more streamlined for users, and we feel that there should be more options for tweaking the voltage to all areas of the VRM. There also should have been an option to increase the base clock frequency.

This model is also more expensive than the others in the roundup, but even at $299 it will not disappoint. However, since the BIOS is still not up to par with other companies in terms of options available, we are going to give it a Recommended award as opposed to Editors Choice.

Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H & Z77X-UD5H-WB WiFi:

One thing Gigabyte does well is offer their consumers plenty of options in terms of features and pricing. This is clearly evident when it comes to the two boards they sent us as both have a similar design, perform roughly at the same level and even have many similar features including the 3D UEFI BIOS, Digital power design and muti-GPU support. However, for an additional $50 the UD5H offers a more robust set of features like support for Bluetooth and WiFi, as well as having more expansion options and a more capable VRM design.

When it came to performance though there is going to be no real-world difference between the two, so even while one is more expensive they both offer top notch performance. Both boards also overclocked our 3770K to roughly the same level. Of course this is actually a limitation of our processor, as it will simply not go any higher no matter how much voltage we push into it. Essentially, the Gigabyte boards were able to push the chip to its threshold easily, so this is an instance where the processor is holding back the overclocking of the motherboard (and not the other way around). There would be a difference though if the boards were being tested using a binned processor with higher overclocking potential. In this scenario, the UD5H would have the upper hand because it sports more robust power circuitry..

The street price of the Gigabyte UD3H is $159 while the UD5H WiFi is $209. Both are worth the price tag, but to us the UD5H WiFi is the better value considering it comes with both Bluetooth and WiFi support out of the box.

Intel DZ77GA-70K:

The Intel motherboard we examined is yet another great motherboard, and while it is not as visually stunning as the motherboards it still comes packed with features.  The board comes equipped with SLI/CrossFireX support. eight on-board SATA ports, up to 10 USB 3.0 ports and dual Gigabit LAN connectors, just to name a few. Another aspect we really liked was the bundled Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6205 Wi-Fi card. The Centrino 6205 is a Dual-stream (2x2), dual-band (2.4 GHz and 5.0 GHz), 802.11a/g/n Wi-Fi adapter that delivers speeds of up to 300 Mbps and has support for a host of Intel innovative features and business solutions, including Intel Wireless Display and Intel vPro Technology. The feature alone really makes this board standout.

The new UEFI visual BIOS was also a huge improvement over previous generation Intel motherboards. Out of all the boards tested, Intel's had the easiest BIOS to navigate, and virtually every option was available, though more voltage control would have been great. Additionally, the BIOS didn't work well with laser mice, so in order for us to navigate the BIOS without a keyboard we had to use an old-school mouse with a tracking ball.

The Intel DZ77GA-70K takes a less over the top approach to the Z77 design, but it comes with everything that makes the chipset successful and adds features such as a WiFi card and up to eight SATA ports. The price for this model is set a $229, which is good, but unfortunately there are other boards available that offer more for less.

Sapphire Pure Platinum Z77:

Sapphire is newer to the motherboard game than the other manufactures we looked at in this review, but they haven't suffered from any teething problems so far. This is due to the excellent design of their motherboards, which include robust features like a Killer E2200 PCIe Gigabit LAN port to reduce online game lag, support for 4-way CrossFireX and dual BIOS. All of these features really make the Pure Platinum Z77 a great Panther Point product. The Pure Platinum Z77 also sports a nice UEFI BIOS interface that is easy to use and, unlike the Intel board, had no issues with high speed laser mice.

The only issue we really have with Sapphire's motherboard lineup is that they are sort of a ghost product. Currently there are very few retailers or e-tailers that sell their motherboards so even while Sapphire is creating a good product, finding them at the retail level is difficult, and in the case of some of their motherboards almost impossible. Additionally, we would love to see Sapphire break the fetters of AMD. The issue here is that as the largest AMD graphics card manufacturer, Sapphire only supports CrossFireX and not SLI. Adding SLI support would increase the demand for their boards, but we know this is a tricky subject for Sapphire.

Overall, the Sapphire Pure Platinum Z77 is a great board, but we would still like to see Sapphire push the envelope by adding higher-end features such as SLI support, integrated Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and a better on-board audio processor.