Overclocking and Conclusion
Overclocking
To give a feel for the overclocking performance potential of the Z97-Machine board, we attempted to push it to known CPU-supported performance parameters with minimal tweaking. We were easily able to get the board running stable for over 4hrs at a 4.7GHz CPU speed, a 2400MHz memory speed, and a 4.0GHz ring bus speed with a 100MHz base clock. The system would not stabilize with a base clock any higher than 100MHz however. System stability was tested running the AIDA64 stability test in conjunction with EVGA's OC Scanner X graphical benchmark running at 1280×1024 resolution and 8x MSAA in stress test mode. Note that 16GB (2 x 8GB) of Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3-2400 memory modules were used for the overclocking tests.
Note that this is is meant only as a quick preview of the board's performance potential. With more time to tweak the settings to a greater extent, pushing to a higher base clock and ring bus speed may have been achievable, in addition to an overnight stability run without issue.
Performance
ECS has really upped their game with the Z97-Machine motherboard. The board performs as well as its pricier competitors. The real test of the board was in its overclocking ability because of the stress that it puts on the board's components.
Pricing
As of January 01, the ECS Z97-Machine motherboard was available at Amazon.com for $111.99 after $28 instant rebate with Prime shipping. The board was also available from Newegg.com for $139.99.
Conclusion
ECS has a real powerhouse on their hands with the Z97-Machine. The board is well designed and would look good in any windowed case. ECS worked hard to endear themselves to the enthusiast and gaming community, focusing efforts on competitively prices, high performance solutions, aka the Z97-Machine. The board does not have all the bells and whistles that you find on the high-end Z97-based boards with a focus on minimal needs for an enthusiast board while maintaining performance and component quality. ECS bundled in a top-notch six phase digital power deliver system, more than enough to handle even the more strenuous CPU activities. The stock and overclocking performance more than adequately prove out this board's metal. While there are no SATA-Express ports bundled, ECS did include an M.2 slot in-lieu of two additional SATA III ports on the Intel Z97 controller.
Strengths
- Stock performance
- Overclocking potential
- Board layout and design
- Price
- Motherboard manual details and quality
- UEFI BIOS design and usability
- Quality of included power circuitry
- PCIe-based M.2 10Gbps device port
- Intel GigE network controller performance
Weaknesses
- CMOS battery inaccessible with PCIe video card installed
- Limit of four SATA III ports
- Lack of integrated SATA-Express ports
- Inability to push board to higher than 100MHz base clock
So if the board had a better
So if the board had a better location of the CMOS battery it would received a gold award? lol.
Anyway, I see the lack of SATA express and having only 4 sata ports very fitting for most value-minded buyers like me. Having an M.2 SSD is like a luxury compared to the cheaper 2.5″ SSDs
That baseclock issue may be remedied by a simple BIOS fix if the VRM hardware is up to par to similar performance boards.
Anyway, good write-up!
did you get m.2 ssd to boot? how?
One of the questions I always
One of the questions I always wait to see an answer for, is that you and the Manufactures, all talk about USB Ports on the Main Boards, But unless I miss it, it would great to know if the area single Chip per bank or a Chip per port, meaning if like this one, it has 4 USB 3.0 ports on the back, If I connect 4 USB 3.0 Drives, will I be getting the theoretical 5Gb/s on each port? I always made you when I buy 3.0 expansion card, the if it had 4 ports the total bandwidth was 20Gb/s. (there are very few out there)
Or I’m I to assume there best scenario for every board?, that “word” should I be looking for? Channels? Or should Still should be buying add-on cards?
If not, is there a Board out there that each port is a separate “channel”?
On the board, all USB 3.0
On the board, all USB 3.0 ports are controlled by the Z97 chipset and feed into a single root hub. According to the Intel spec, the Z97 USB 3.0 controller sits on the PCIe bus with a maximum bandwidth of 5 Gbps (which is equivalent to a single PCIe lane – x1). Since all ports go through a single hub, all connected devices share the 5 Gbps available bandwidth.
In my experience, the integrated Intel chipset control USB 3.0 ports always have better performance than those controlled via a 3rd party controller embedded in the board. This is most likely because the 3rd part controller has to share the PCIe bus and bandwidth with other devices/ports in the system.
If you went with a PCIe card for USB 3.0, the card would be limited by the bandwidth it is granted by the PCIe slot, which would most like also be x1 or 5Gbps. So if you added a USB 3.0 PCIe controller card, you would get another 5Gbps, shared between the ports on the card.
Hope that helps…
[quote]Hope that
[quote]Hope that helps…[/quote]
It helps me anyway! Thanks. Also appreciate all the photos; very useful.
Thanks for your response, I
Thanks for your response, I like to hear back from you after you view this link from the USB 3.0 Card I usually get and refer to on my comments. This are 4 dedicated and claim a total of 20 Gbps (4 x 5)
http://www.highpoint-tech.com/USA_new/series_RocketU1144C.htm
I’m disappointed to find out the USB ports on most Motherboards are shared (I seen some with 2 Controllers, that may give me 2 channels, guess). I happy to report, that with the Highpoint above card, I get close to 80% of the USB 3.0 speed when using 3 USB drives at the same time (comparing it so a single drive in use on the same card), sadly I don’t have an new Motherboards with 3.0 ports yet to compare.
One of the biggest problem that this card solves for me, is that I often copy data between external drives and with this card I get much better performance in that scenario (I compared it to copying the date from one drive to the computer and then back out to the other drive, never mind the time to takes to do that).
Thanks again, please let me know your thoughts on the Highpoint cards.
Thanks
Thanks