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This is a screwdriver-impenetrable, fail-safe LGA1155 mainboard with an excellent feature set and a 5-year warranty. Beneath Asus’ “TUF Thermal Armor” there is a very sensitive soul – a set of additional thermal diodes called “TUF Thermal Radar”.
This board from ASUS is a great all-round performer, compared to the P67 boards we have reviewed—space for tri-GPU setups, six fan headers with good OS fan controls, eight SATA ports, six with RAID 0/1/5/10, Intel gigabit Ethernet and it performs well in our benchmark suite. The goods bundled in the box aren't the best we've seen, especially for an expected retail price of $210. But this is a Z68 board—the seemingly logical progression Intel have taken to combine the best bits of P67 and H67, in terms of overclocking. It's thanks to software solutions such as LUCIDLOGIX's Virtu that we can harness both the integrated GPU and discrete GPUs for different work loads—I detail my experiences with Virtu in this review.
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> <strong>P67 $190 Part 2: MSI, ASRock and ECS</strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> Our first look at $190 P67 boards started with ASUS and Gigabyte. Within hours of posting the review, I was commandeered by several other companies to look at their $190 motherboards. This is still one of the best selling P67 price points, even with Z68 around the corner. Here, we look at the MSI P67A-GD65, the ASRock P67 Extreme6 and the ECS P67H2-A2, and come up with some interesting results.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> <strong>Does P67 Have A Future?</strong></span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> P67 has received a lot of criticism since its inception. With all the Sandy Bridge CPUs containing an integrated GPU in the form of Intel’s HD graphics, we’d expect each chipset to have some form of graphical output. But for some reason, it wasn’t included in P67 – this may be part of Intel’s divine strategy of separating different features in different chipsets, or that Z68, the successor to P67 which will include video outputs, just wasn’t ready. With the lack of access to the iGPU, we also lose access to QuickSync, and end up with silicon real-estate we can’t use. One other sticking point was that Cougar Point does not natively support USB 3.0, whereas it seems that AMD will for their next generation of chipsets.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> We expect Z68 to command a premium, this much is certain. With the recent news regarding NVIDIA bringing Optimus to desktops, and we’ve known Virtu will also be available for a little while now, we can expect lower 2D power usage, as well as use of QuickSync. Both the CPU and iGPU can be overclocked, which will also mean that manufacturers will have to put more testing into CPU power delivery, leading to higher board cost. So where does this leave P67, exactly? A lower priced alternative to overclocker the CPU while using discrete GPUs? </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> Let’s not forget the Intel recall of all Cougar Point chipsets with the mild manufacturing issue. P67 is painted with the stigma of this issue, and the only way to ensure a B3 stepping of the PCH is to buy a board with B3 in the name, or from a reputable retailer that would have replaced all their stock. Z68 isn’t scarred with this issue, adding more credence to P67 potentially disappearing.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> So here I am, ranting about P67 and Z68. Why should we review these P67 boards if they might disappear? The importance of future sales of P67 will depend exactly on the price premium over Z68. It could be argued that P67 is to be squeezed out of the market, and the rest of the P67 product will be sold with discounts, but it’s currently here, and people are still buying, wanting the best deal, and it may still stay with us for a long while yet. </span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"> With that in mind, today we’re looking at three P67 boards, all initially released around the $190 price point (though some have changed since). First is the MSI P67A-GD65 ($180) offering more bells and whistles than a county fair. Then the ASRock P67 Extreme6 ($210), which is the model above the P67 Extreme4, which we liked very much in terms of price/performance/add-ons – it will be interesting to see what has changed between the two models. Finally we test the ECS P67H2-A2 ($195), offering simplicity and functionality. Let the games begin!</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"><a target="_blank" href="http://www.anandtech.com/show/4323/p67-190-part-2-msi-asrock-and-ecs">Read more...</a><br />
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This is the only LGA1155 mainboard from the Extreme series, which means that it has all the latest features and functionality that Intel can possibly get onboard: USB 3.0, Power On and Reset buttons, Diagnostic LEDs, POST-code indicator, discrete WiFi/Bluetooth module and a skull with blinking eyes.
<p><span style="font-size: small;">This mainboard sports very convenient layout, great functionality expanded with a number of additional onboard controllers. Everything necessary is there, there is nothing excessive. The price is quite moderate, so this mainboard will undoubtedly be of interest to potential users.</span></p>
<p><span style="font-size: small;"><a target="_blank" href="http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/mainboards/display/ga-p67a-ud4-b3.html">Read more...</a><br />
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The board is based on Intel X58 Express chipset and is designed for LGA1366 processors. It boasts convenient design, extensive settings for system configuring and overclocking and is incredibly energy-efficient.
This mainboard is based on Intel P67 Express chipset and supports LGA1155 processors. What new features does this model boast? How did they manage to offer extensive functionality at a low price? The answers to all these questions are in our today’s review!
Asus provided their mainboards with all sorts of new features and functionality and we are very excited to tell you about them. As always they rolled out the entire new lineup of products, so a lot of things we will discuss today are also true for a number of other models in the series.
<p><span style="font-size: small;"><span class="article-name">The most remarkable peculiarity of MSI XPower mainboard is the presence of six graphics cards slots. However, it is not only this feature that makes it interesting. It also boasts a lot of various features and supports a number of interesting technologies, which we are going to discuss in detail in our today’s review.<br />
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<p><span style="font-size: small;"><a target="_blank" href="http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/mainboards/display/msi-xpower.html"><span class="article-name">Read more...</span></a><br />
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It makes perfect sense to choose lower-end mainboards for the first benchmarks: these products will be very popular. Moreover, each mainboard is unique in its own way and differs from the regular Intel P67 Express and H67 Express based products, which makes them especially interesting.