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Intel DZ77GA-70K Motherboard Benchmark Performance Tests
Manufacturer: Intel Corporation
Model Number: DZ77GA-70K
Product Name: Intel Z77 Express motherboard
Price: $224.00-$240.00 MSRP
Full Disclosure: Intel Corporation provided the product sample used in this article.
Does Intel really want to cater to enthusiasts? Personally, I've never known anyone who used an Intel motherboard in their rig, although I'm sure some people do. And it's hard to blame them: historically, third party vendors have offered superior performance and features. Intel seemed to be more concerned with stuff like skull logos whose eyes blinked as drive activity indicators rather than creating motherboards enthusiasts would actually want to use.
Here's a preview: while Intel still has a way to go to before the likes of ASUS, MSI, and EVGA need to start worrying, their latest Extreme series motherboard is the first one I've tested that's actually competitive in features and performance. In one specific area it's better than anything I've seen before.
Testing Methodology and Specifications
I was fortunate enough to have three new Intel Z77 Express motherboards available: the MSI Z77A-GD65 that I've previously reviewed, an ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe, and the subject of this performance comparison, the Intel DZ77GA-70K.
I compared the performance of the motherboards at stock speeds using the benchmark programs listed below, with a spiffy new Ivy Bridge Core i7-3770K CPU. Since the Core i7-3770K's "HD 4000" integrated graphics shares L3 cache and memory bandwidth with the CPU cores, I disabled it and use and AMD Radeon HD5770 video card for all benchmarks. I used the same processor, hard disk, and memory on each motherboard, so that the motherboards were the only thing that changed between tests. Any performance differences at stock clock speeds are thus due to the motherboards.
On the Intel motherboard, I also ran the benchmarks at the highest overclock I could achieve.
Intel Z77 Express Test Platform
- Motherboard: MSI Z77A-GD65 (BIOS 10.3B6)
- Motherboard: Intel DZ77GA-70K (BIOS GA7710H.86A.3000.R09.1203090931)
- Motherboard: ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe (BIOS 0906)
- Processor: 3.5GHz Intel Core i7-3770K
- System Memory: 8GB (2 4GB DIMMs) DDR3-1600 (9-9-9-27)
- Primary Drive: Seagate Barracuda ST3500418AS 500GB
- Graphics Adapter: AMD Radeon 5770
- CPU cooler: Thermalright Silver Arrow
Benchmark Applications
- Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit
- AIDA64 Extreme Edition v2.20.1800
- Futuremark PCMark 7 v1.04
- Productivity
- Creativity
- Computation
- Maxon CINEBENCH R11.5 64-Bit
- Street Fighter IV benchmark
- x264Bench HD 3.0
- SPECviewperf-11:
- Lightwave 9.6
- Autodesk Maya 2009
- Siemens Teamcenter Visualization Mockup
- SPECapc LightWave 3D v9.6
- Handbrake 0.96 video transcoding
- Blender 3D rendering
- POV-Ray 3D rendering
Intel DZ77GA-70K Specifications
Specifications supplied by Intel.
| CPU |
Intel® Socket 1155 for 3rd/2nd Generation Processors
Supports Intel® 22 nm CPU
Supports Intel® 32 nm CPU
Supports Intel® Turbo Boost Technology 2.0 |
| Chipset |
Intel Z77 |
| Memory |
Four 240-pin DIMM connectors supporting dual-channel memory. Two double-sided DIMMs per channel
Maximum system memory up to 32 GB10 using 8 GB double-sided DIMMs
DDR3-1600+ O.C. SDRAM memory support |
| Expansion Slots |
Two PCI Express 3.0 ×16 connectors (configured as ×8/×8 in dual graphics mode)
Two PCI Express 2.0 ×1 slots
One PCI Express 2.0 x4 slot
Two PCI slots |
| LAN |
Intel 82579V, 1 x Gigabit LAN Controller(s)
Intel 82574V, 1 x Gigabit LAN Controller(s)
Dual Intel LAN on the back panel
New low-power design can meet Energy Star 5.0 specifications |
| Wireless data network |
Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n |
| Bluetooth |
Bluetooth V2.0 |
| Audio |
10-channel Intel® High Definition Audio8 codec
8-channel via the back panel
2-channel via the front panel
Back panel support for output via optical cable
One internal header for S/PDIF output for HDMI support |
| IEEE 1394 |
1 x IEEE 1394a port(s) |
| USB Ports |
Four Hi-Speed USB 2.0 ports via back panel, including two fast charging high current ports (yellow)
Six additional Hi-Speed USB 2.0 ports via four internal headers
Four Super-Speed USB 3.0 ports (blue) and four Super-Speed USB 3.0 via internal headers |
| Back I/O Ports |
PS/2 mouse/keyboard port
2x hi-current USB 2.0 ports
2x standard USB 2.0 ports
4x USB 3.0 ports
1x ESATA port
1x IEEE 1394 port
1x HDMI port
1x audio panel |
Let's get to the benchmarks!
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Comments
1. Most people only boot their systems once a day, if that, and the time spent to get to the Windows desktop is insignificant compared to the time the computer's being used.
2. The time will vary greatly depending on the boot device (regular hard disk, Velociraptor, SSD); the version of Windows being booted, drivers, etc.
Granted, you could use a standard hardware configuration and Windows installation to reduce the number of variables in #2, but I don't think that many people would find it useful. FWIW I didn't notice the board being particularly speedy or slow.
For reference try googling it and see dozens and dozens (hundreds even?) of people on tech forums around the world trying to find this information out :).
Or head over to anandtech and see how almost all of the positive comments mention POST time benchmarking as a great review feature.
As to hardware variability, I would assume by now that any enthusiast knows that overall boot time is greatly effected by hardware, most notably HDD/SSD. However POST time can still make 20 seconds of difference in startup time, considering most machines with SSDs start up in well under a minute, you can see how a lot of everyday users would like to see how they could shave most of this time off.
Once again, thank-you for the great review and for the reply :).
If you want a fast bootup: you should disable all of the motherboard features you don't use, use a small and fast boot device like a SSD without RAID, and don't install drivers and services unless you absolutely need it.