ASUS P8Z68-V PRO Review: Our First Z68 Motherboard
by Ian Cutress on May 11, 2011 3:13 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Asus
- Z68
Test Setup | |
Processor |
Intel i5-2500K ES—3.3 GHz (3.7 GHz Turbo) 4 Cores, 4 Threads, 6MB L3 |
Motherboards | ASUS P8Z68-V PRO ($210) |
Cooling | Corsair H50-1 Water Cooler |
Power Supply | Silverstone 1000W 80 PLUS Silver |
Memory |
Patriot Viper Extreme DDR3-2000 9-10-9-27 2x4GB Kit, 1.65V Corsair Vengeance DDR3-1600 9-9-9-24 2x4GB Kit, 1.50V G.Skill RipjawsX DDR3-2133 9-11-9-28 4x4GB Kit, 1.65V |
Memory Settings | DDR3-1333 9-9-9-24 1T 2x4GB |
Video Cards |
XFX HD 5850 1GB Sapphire HD 5850 1GB |
Video Drivers | Catalyst 10.12 |
Hard Drive | Micron RealSSD C300 256GB |
Optical Drive | LG GH22NS50 |
Case | Open Test Bed—CoolerMaster Lab V1.0 |
Operating System | Windows 7 64-bit |
SATA Testing | Micron RealSSD C300 256GB |
USB 2/3 Testing | Patriot 64GB SuperSonic USB 3.0 |
Power Consumption
CPU Temperatures
The ASUS P8Z68-V PRO doesn't do too badly in the temperature tests, but it is towards the bad end on our power consumption tests.
95 Comments
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L. - Thursday, May 12, 2011 - link
IGP Intel = Ouch.I believe that if you need multiple displays you'll be far better off waiting for amd llano or the next gen of intel fail-gpu.
sylar365 - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
Right now I am using an Asrock P67 Extreme 4, i5-2500k, OCZ Vertex 2 64GB with Windows and a couple frequently used apps and a WD 640GB Black SATA 2 for bulk storage. I only use one graphics card in the form of a GTX 560 ti and I appreciate it's performance but am in love with it's power usage. As far as I can tell it seems like upgrading to the Z68 platform would not provide much gain in gaming FPS, SSD longevity or overclocking ability. Those issues aside would I see ANY decrease in my monthly electric bill after partially using my CPU's on chip GPU? Even while assuming that I have some disposable income it still seems that jumping from P67 to Z68 would be like throwing money into the wind unless I plan on ... nope, nevermind ... even adding a second 560 ti would be faster on my current board. As far as investments go (for me anyway) making it rain at the local strip club is looking to be a more responsible path than upgrading to Z68.AnnihilatorX - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
Or if you are like me who hold out onto my B2 P67 until it died 2 weeks ago and get a refund and buy Z68 :PSunsmasher - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
Upgrade doesn't make sense for you because you apparently don't do much transcoding....L. - Thursday, May 12, 2011 - link
Like most people ;)Otherwise, this motherboard looks like a piece of trash for 210 bucks, very limited pciE, etc.. who would want it.
There is a fair chance you will see Z68 boards that are much more convincing.
Tylanner - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
Man would I be upset if I held out for Z68 all these months.I was expecting an improvement in Multi-GPU Scaling(2-way Sli)
AnnihilatorX - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
No. Z68 is still limited by number of PCI-E. The main reason is CPU really. You'd have to go for Z79 and Sandybridge-E for higher PCI-e lanes count.AnnihilatorX - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
Actually disregard me, bandwidth should be sufficient for 2-way SLIrbusch - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
On page two if the review it says...."here are a couple of negative points however - the iGPU frequency requires a reboot after every selection, and the changes you do make to the CPU frequency aren't written to BIOS (and thus aren't permanent) nor are they initialised on reboot, requiring a manual adjust on every boot."
Does this (the CPU bit) differ from the P8P67 PRO board? Am I understanding correctly that any CPU overclock done in windows (as opposed to UEFI) disappears every single time the machine is rebooted?
rbusch - Wednesday, May 11, 2011 - link
And forgive me if this is a obvious and stupid question but at (nearly) the same price point, would there be any advantages of choosing the P8P67 Pro over the P8Z68-V PRO?Thanks