Testing Configuration and Benchmarks Used

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To verify that the motherboard works as advertised, the board was run through our standard benchmark suite. In most cases, the results are presented for the motherboard under review as well as a different similar-class motherboards for performance comparison purposes. The benchmark tests used should give you a good understanding of the board’s capabilities for both office and gaming use so that you, the reader, can make a more informed purchasing decision.

Test System Setup
Motherboards Intel X99-based systems
ASUS X99-E WS
ASUS X99-A

Intel Z170-based systems
ASUS Z170-A

Intel Z97-based system
ASUS Z97-Pro
CPU Intel X99-based systems
Intel Core i7-5960X
(3.0GHz CPU and Ring Bus, 30 x 100MHz Base Clock)

Intel Z170-based system
Intel Core i7-6700K
(4.0GHz CPU and Ring Bus, 40 x 100MHz Base Clock)

Intel Z97-based system
Intel Core i7-4770K
(3.5GHz CPU and Ring Bus, 35 x 100MHz Base Clock)
Memory Intel X99-based systems
Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-2666 modules
(2133MHz, 15-17-17-35-1T, 1.225V)

Intel Z170-based system
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2666 modules
(1600MHz, 16-18-18-35-1T, 1.225V)

Intel Z97-based system
Corsair Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 modules
(1600MHz, 9-10-9-27-1T, 1.525V)
Hard Drive Intel 730 240GB SSD
Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA III HD
Sound Card On-board sound
Video Card ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB
NVIDIA GTX 570 1.25GB
CPU Cooling XSPC Raystorm D5 Photon RX480 V3 WaterCooling Kit
Corsair Hydro Series™ H100i Extreme Performance CPU Cooler
Video Drivers NVIDIA 353.62
Power Supply Corsair HX750
Operating System Windows 10 Pro x64

Test Setup Explanation

The 64-bit Windows 10 based test bench used for Intel X99 LGA2011-V3 board testing includes an Intel Core i7-5960X CPU, 32GB of DDR4-2666 memory, an ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB video card or an NVIDIA GTX 570 1.25GB video card, and an Intel 730 240GB SSD drive. For Intel Z170 LGA1151 board testing, an Intel Core i7-6700K processor, 16GB of DDR4-2666 memory, an ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB video card, and an Intel 730 240GB SSD drive were used in the test system. For the Z97-based board testing, an Intel Core i7-4770K CPU, 16GB of DDR3-2400 memory, an ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB video card, and an Intel 730 240GB SSD drive were used in the test system. Using the selected components gives us the ability to demonstrate the motherboard’s capabilities rather than that of the components themselves.

NOTE: For ASUS X99-E WS motherboard testing, a Corsair Hydro Series™ H100i Extreme Performance CPU Cooler and an NVIDIA GTX 570 video card were used for most board testing. However, the ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 video card was used for the PCMark 8 benchmark tests only to ensure equivalent results with the other test systems because of the impact of the system GPU on these specific benchmark test results.

Benchmark Tests used for evaluation:

  • SoftPerfect Research NetWorx Speed Test v5.41
  • LanBench v1.1.0
  • ATTO Disk Benchmark v3.05
  • SiSoft Sandra 2015 SP2b (v2015.07.21.42)
  • Intel Linpack Benchmark v11.3.0.004
  • Maxon Cinebench R15
  • PCMark 8 v2.4.304
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