Differences between Asus P8Z68-v and the pro model

[mardig88]

What are the differences between the Asus P8Z68-v and the pro model?
and how does it compare to the sabretooth p67?

Thanks

[keto]

Dunno if I'll get in trouble for this, but there's an EXCELLENT 67/68 motherboard comparison chart at the top of this thread, ordered by brand with ASUS up top Official Intel P67/Z68 Motherboard Comparison List & OC Results

[Ed103194]

I think the main difference that matters most is the # of power phases, more=better, and there may be front/back usb3 support, integrated bluetooth etc. From my understanding the pro has 12+1 phases and the sabretooth only has 8

[Dragonstongue]

As far as phases, this can matter, but it depends more on the "quality" of the phases provided, Gigabyte, asus, msi etc all generally try to trump "our mothebroard or gpu uses X phases therefore it will last longer, or overclock higher etc" more often then not, the lower boards with quality caps/phases tend to overclock, last, stay just as cool, and more often then not, outdo the boards that try to justify slapping the best of the best on thier respective boards and charging that much more for them.

Giga has been notorius for doing this, at a time when most were using 8 phase total they would up it and say "we got 18 total therefore ours will do better" this was often proven false, mostly cause they had very poor control on voltage, and it frequently fluctuated greatly or, simply provided to much Vdroop/Vdrop and would cause instability

Most quality motherboards use 6+2,8, 12+4 etc phases, 6 or more for cpu and at least 2 if not 4 phases for everything else(the ones with IGP usually have more dedicated to cpu) more power doesnt always equal more capabilities, though it usually does yeild tighter control, which may be able to reduce overvolting and in theory, require less of a voltage overhead for a given clock speed, which is always good.

Sabertooth are excellent boards, and OC very well, a couple of my buddies have them, they have more sensors on those bad boys then any board I have ever seen :P I myself am using M5A99X EVO which I believe is 10+2 phase or 8+2 and requires very low voltage for any given clock, becuase the phases are :intelligent: if you will.

not much difference, I believe the Pro just has better cooling, more sata 6 ports, firewire, as well as better bluetooth connectivity, as well as igp up for better IGP overclocking, same power phases 12+4 12 cpu/mem 4 for IGP from my understanding, also just to add some fuel into this, there is also the ASUS Z68 Deluxe, which has a couple more features, and lacks the igp ability, which may actually allow slightly better control on voltage/overclocking?