Intel Z77 Panther Point Chipset and Motherboard Preview – ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI, ECS and Biostar

Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H WiFi—Visual Inspection

Black and blue seems to be the order of the day when it comes to mainstream boards, as indicated by some of the previous boards but also with the Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H WiFi. Perhaps there is a sale on black PCBs and blue heatsinks?

Joking aside, Gigabyte intends to release two high- end boards initially—the Z77X-UD5H and the Z77X-UD3H, both in regular and WiFi variants. The WiFi variant comes with a PCIe x1 WiFi card to be used in the first PCIe slot on the board, and aerials for the outside of the case.

We have the Z77X-UD3H WiFi in to review for the launch of Ivy Bridge, which should retail for around $160 MSRP. Gigabyte has chosen a few different directions regarding which controllers are on the motherboard. This should provide interesting results when it comes to performance.

The VRM power delivery weighs in at 6 + 4 phase, which is by no means substantial (remember the ASRock Z77 Extreme4 was 8 + 4 and less expensive), and comes paired with a relatively small blue heatsink next to the socket. I’ve noticed that Gigabyte tend to have their memory closer to the socket than most other manufacturers, presumably in the name of performance due to shorter interconnects, but the downside is that it can restrict big air coolers. Nonetheless, it all still conforms to Intel specifications, and there is actually a large gap to the south of the socket.

In terms of fan headers, there are only two within reach of the socket. We have a 4-pin CPU header at the top near the memory slots, and another near the power/reset/ClearCMOS buttons at the top right of the board. The other three headers on board are found at the bottom—one 4-pin beside the SATA ports, one 4-pin next to the USB headers and another 4-pin beside the TPM.

Along the right hand side of the motherboard, Gigabyte has given us a different style of power/reset/clear CMOS button that I have not seen before. The power button is big and red, whereas the other two are relatively small. These will be of use to reviewers and overclockers, however having the ClearCMOS the same size and shape as the reset button may lead to several bad fumblings for the right button followed by several four-letter expletives.

Further down is another style choice—an additional power connector for the PCIe and system, but this case it is a SATA power connector. I prefer this to the awkward molex connectors we see on other products. Below this are the standard six SATA ports from the PCH—two SATA 6 Gbps and four SATA 3 Gbps. Below this is the handy two-digit debug display.

Along the bottom of the board, from left to right, we have the front panel audio, SPDIF header, a 4-pin fan header, the TPM header, three USB 2.0 headers, and another fan header. At the top of the PCIe is our mSATA connection, useful for mSATA SSDs and boot drives to save case space. In terms of PCIe, Gigabyte has installed a little nugget of common sense, giving enough space between the first two full-length PCIe for GPUs. However, in the x1, x16 (x8 in multi-GPU), x1, x1, x8, PCI, x4 setup, only the first two full length PCIe are for graphics output—the final one is a PCIe 2.0 x4 connector. This would be better served if it were a slightly different color to the other PCIe x16/x8 connectors. Also with two full length GPUs on board, the user will have access to two PCIe x1 connectors but the PCI connector is blocked.

I know Gigabyte will make a few people jump with joy in relation to the back panel layout—no USB 2.0! From left to right, we have a PS/2 combination port, two USB 3.0, D-Sub, DVI-D, an Optical SPDIF output, HDMI, DisplayPort, two more USB 3.0, two eSATA, gigabit Ethernet, a final two USB 3.0, and audio outputs.

Board Features

One of the odd choices of Gigabyte is their network and audio controllers. On near every board I have reviewed, we get either a Realtek, an Intel or a Broadcom for the network, and a Realtek or Creative audio solution. Gigabyte has decided to jump in with an Atheros network controller, and a Via VT2021 audio. It will be interesting to see if this has an effect on our test capabilities.