Six $220-280 Z77 Express-Based Motherboards, Reviewed

Features
By Thomas Soderstrom
published

Expanded graphics card support, enhanced on-board features that include Thunderbolt on some models, and more-robust voltage control are all good reasons to consider paying a little extra for a higher-end motherboard. Today we examine five top choices.

ASRock Z77 OC Formula

ASRock brightens the look of its Z77 OC Formula with gold-colored caps and highlights on a black PCB and matching heat sinks. An included 40 mm active cooling fan is superfluous for most applications. But at least it's thermally controlled, operating almost silently unless its automatic fan control is disabled.

Four of the six back panel-based USB 3.0 ports are fed by a third-party single-lane controller, while the other two are connected directly to the chipset. ASRock fits in four more USB ports (of the 2.0 variety) by limiting graphics output to a single HDMI connector. An I/O panel CLR_CMOS button helps overclockers get themselves out of a bind, while also giving troublemakers an opportunity to mess with you.

A pair of Marvell SATA 6Gb/s controllers add four high-speed ports to the two provided by the chipset, bringing the total number of internal drive connectors to ten (including 3 Gb/s connectivity). Port placement is simplified a bit by a front edge that extends down about an inch beyond the ATX specification, though the added width is rarely an issue for enthusiast-class cases.

Features that favor overclocking enthusiasts include an extra four-pin CPU power connector (probably superfluous), a heat pipe that runs the length of the Z77 OC Formula’s voltage regulator cooler, a Port 80-style diagnostics display, two rows of line voltage detection points, and on-board power/reset buttons. Those last three features are really only useful on an open bench.

The Z77 OC Formula’s layout is fairly convenient, with the difficult-to-place USB 3.0 header located above the board’s centerline. ASRock also put three slot spaces between it primary and secondary graphics card slots. A third double-slot graphics card would require you to mount the board in an eight-slot case. But the third slot's second-gen PCIe x4 connection makes it less than ideal in a CrossFire configuration. SLI isn't even an option, since the third slot's lanes come from the Z77 PCH, and Nvidia doesn’t allow SLI through secondary PCIe controllers.

If you own an older case, the front-panel audio connector might be a little less convenient, since its extreme bottom-rear-corner location falls around an inch beyond the reach of some front-panel cables. We haven't had this issue in the lab for a couple of years, though.

The Z77 OC Formula includes six SATA cables, ASRock’s exceptional 3.5” USB 3.0 bay adapter (able to hold an SSD), a tube of thermal paste, and an SLI bridge.

Thomas Soderstrom
Thomas Soderstrom
Thomas Soderstrom is a Senior Staff Editor at Tom's Hardware US. He tests and reviews cases, cooling, memory and motherboards.
35 Comments Comment from the forums
  • roberta
    As u have reviewed SIX (6) motherboards, the article's title should be:
    "Six $220-280 Z77 Express-Based Motherboards, Reviewed"
    Reply
  • mayankleoboy1
    No SATA and USB tests ? data transfer speed differences will typically be noticable in everyday usage.
    Also, the time taken to show the windows loading screen/ BIOS page..
    Reply
  • admit it.
    you really liked the black/grey dimms and PCI slots of the gigabyte better than the blue/black of the MSI!
    Reply
  • Crashman
    robertaAs u have reviewed SIX (6) motherboards, the article's title should be:"Six $220-280 Z77 Express-Based Motherboards, Reviewed"Let's see what the article says:
    The one motherboard in today’s line-up with a 48-lane PCIe 3.0 bridge is ECS’ Golden Z77H2-AX. Unfortunately, this platform climbed $40 beyond the budget limit of today’s round-up in the time we've been reviewing it. We're tired of seeing board vendors playing pricing games based on our review schedule (this isn't the first time we're seeing a curiously-timed price move). So, since we put the work in to review ECS' submission, we're including our already-gathered data and simply withholding the board from any award candidacy.
    mayankleoboy1No SATA and USB tests ? data transfer speed differences will typically be noticable in everyday usage.Also, the time taken to show the windows loading screen/ BIOS page..Would have covered windows load time except that it wasn't markedly different. That is, after disabling empty SATA controllers. If you count the time that it takes to get the "No Device Found" error on boards that have extra SATA controllers, you're penalizing a board for having more features.

    Andrew Ku tests drive controllers. I'm trying to get him to "write the book" on controller performance, since dozens of boards use only a few different controllers. As for testing things like Z77 controller performance on board A vs Z77 controller performance on board B, it's a waste of time unless something is broken. So the article looked for "broken stuff". See the red bar on the first chart:
    http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/z77x-up5-th-z77a-gd80-z77-oc-formula,3305-22.html
    With nothing broken, there's no excuse to test the Z77 controller six times. Back to me begging Andrew Ku for a comprehensive comparison of every SATA controller currently available on mainstream-brand enthusiast boards.
    Reply
  • JeanLuc
    Arghh! Why the hell are you overclocking the base clock on Z77!! That will most likely cause permanent damage to your CPU.
    Reply
  • You left out a key aspect for overclockers which is vcore offset.
    This allows ocer's to achieve higher overclocks while still retaining the power saving functions, instead of being forced to either reduce the overclock, or be forced to run high voltage 24/7.
    MSI doesn't have this key feature.
    Reply
  • Onus
    I would think that the Sabertooth's five year warranty merits at least a mention in any value conclusion.
    Reply
  • ttg_Avenged
    I'll just stick with sandy bridge. Doesn't seem like I'm losing much at all.
    Reply
  • luciferano
    JeanLucArghh! Why the hell are you overclocking the base clock on Z77!! That will most likely cause permanent damage to your CPU.
    Overclocking the BLCK is very unlikely to cause any damage, it's just likely to not give much of a stable overclock.
    Reply
  • Crashman
    jtt283I would think that the Sabertooth's five year warranty merits at least a mention in any value conclusion.I actually missed that, having checked the lesser brands just to make sure those still had their three year warranty. Will add it.
    Reply