ASUS Z87 Deluxe Motherboard Review

[Eldonko]

BIOS Rundown p.2

BIOS Rundown

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Moving over to the Advanced section, we see there are a number of configuration subscreens for CPU, PCH, SATA, System Agent, USB, Platform Misc., Onboard Devices, APM, and Network Stack.

The CPU Configuration page contains detailed information about the CPU installed as well as settings for hyper-threading and active cores. At the bottom of CPU Configuration, there is a subpage titled CPU Power Management Configuration. Here, Speedstep, Turbo, and C-State settings are found.

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The next two subpages are PCH Configuration and SATA Configuration. These pages are fairly straightforward and contain settings for the chipset and SATA drives. However, it is worth mentioning that Intel Rapid Start Technology (RST) and Smart Connect Technology (SCT) can be enabled under the PCH menu. A new feature in the Z87 series BIOS is the ability to rename hard drives under the SATA Configuration page. This is a handy way to keep your drives properly labeled when you have several storage areas and partitions in your system.

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The last notable subsection of the Advanced tab is the System Agent Configuration page. It is rather buried in subpages but there is a Graphics Configuration page as well on which settings for the iGPU are found. The iGPU will be disabled by default so to use it iGPU Multi Monitor must be enabled. Under NB PCI-E Configuration, link speeds are selectable, up to Gen 3.

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The Monitor section contains the system temperature/power status, and adjustable fan settings with profiles. Fan speeds are customizable based on a number of settings, bringing a whole new level of control with Fan Xpert 2.

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The Boot section contains boot priority options and POST options. Here you can also enable Hardware Fast Boot, Boot Logo Display, and DirectKey which will boot the system to BIOS when the DirectKey button is pressed.

Under the Tools menu are three subsections: DRAM SPD Information, EZ Flash 2, and OC Profiles.

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DRAM SPD Information shows all installed memory with subsections showing SPD and ASUS OC Profiles allow for saving eight customized OC Profiles suited for different situations. This is a very handy overclocking tool that will save a ton of time. EZ Flash 2 is used for flashing the board’s BIOS from a in a safe and easy manner from a USB stick.

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Next we have some brand new UEFI features that ASUS has come up with for the Z87 generation of motherboards. The My Favorites page allows you to add customized BIOS items to a start page and will save navigation time. We set up some of our favorite most-used settings and they worked perfectly.

On the right hand side of each BIOS page are two buttons marked Quick Note and Last Modified. Quick Note allows you to enter notes on settings you have tried instead of using the classic paper and pen method.

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The Last Modified feature shows the last saved BIOS settings in case you would like to revert back to a previous setting. An export of these prior settings can also be saved to USB for future use. Similar to Last Modified, when you save the BIOS and exit, a BIOS Settings Change screen pops up to remind you of changes made so you can have one last scan of the changes before exiting the BIOS.

All in all we loved the new BIOS features ASUS included with the Z87 Deluxe and although the board was brand new the BIOS was relatively bug free and easily recoverable when instable settings were used.

 

[Eldonko]

Test Setup and Testing Methodology

Test Setup and Testing Methodology

Our test setup consists of an Intel Haswell 4770K, a 4670K, ASUS Z87 Deluxe motherboard, a Gigabyte GTX 670s, 8GB of G.Skill TridentX DDR3-2800 12-14-14-35 memory, a SanDisk Extreme 120GB SSD, and a WD Black 1TB. All this is powered by an Antec Signature Series 850W PSU. Here are a few shots of the setup and hardware:

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As you can see above we used watercooling (Apogee XT) for the CPU along with two heatercores in a Dimastech test bench.

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We were also lucky enough to get our hands on a brand new kit of G.Skill TridentX DDR3-2800 12-14-14-35 memory designed specifically for Haswell.

Overclocking Methodology

The Z87 Deluxe has a lot of hype around its auto overclocking options (TPU, OC Tuner, and 4-Way Optimization) so we thought the best course of action for testing this mainstream board is to test each auto OC option separately and then see what it can do with a manual OC.

We chose a benchmark suite that included 2D benchmarks, 3D benchmarks, and games; and then tested each overclocking method individually to see how the performance would compare. The different configurations we ran are as follows:

• Turbo Boost - To represent a Z87 at stock with turbo enabled.
• TPU Level 1 TPU / OC Tuner Ratio – To represent a Z87 at level 1 of auto overclocking.
• TPU Level 2 TPU / OC Tuner BCLK – To represent a Z87 at level 2 of auto overclocking.
• 4-Way Optimization – To represent a Z87 at the maximum auto overclock available.
• Manual OC –To represent an experienced overclocker that is looking for the optimal 24/7 overclock to maximize system performance while keeping voltage and temperatures in check.

We did stability testing a little differently for the Haswell platform than we have in the past. Both Intel and ASUS told us AIDA64 was optimized for the platform so instead of LinX or P95, the main stability test used was the AIDA64 stability. AIDA64 has an advantage as it has been updated for the Haswell architecture and tests specific functions like AES, AVX, and other instruction sets that some other stress tests do not touch. After the AIDA64 stability test was stable, we ran 2 runs of HyperPI and 2 runs of 3DMark to test memory and 3D stability. Once an overclock passed these tests, we ran the full benchmark suite and then this is the point deemed as “stable” for the purposes of this review.

The CPUs used are Engineering Samples with a C0 stepping which is the same stepping as the initial retail chips. We understand that these may not reflect retail chips but this is all that was available at the time of the review.

Windows 7 Service Pack 1 was installed to take advantage of the Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX) with Haswell. Intel AVX is a 256-bit SIMD floating point vector extension of Intel architecture. The BIOS used for overclocking and benchmarking was version 1007 and the Nvidia drivers used were version 320.18.

 

[Eldonko]

Feature Tests: TPU, OC Tuner, 4-Way Optimization

Feature Tests: TPU, OC Tuner, 4-Way Optimization

When we first had a look at the Z87 Deluxe and the auto overclocking options available we were overwhelmed to say the least. There is a TPU switch that has two levels of increase frequencies, OC Tuner in the BIOS has both BLCK and Ratio modes, and then there is 4-Way Optimization. That is 5 methods of auto overclocking on a single board, all of which can help first timers achieve higher clock speeds with a minimum of input.

Through testing we realized that TPU level 1 and OC Tuner Ratio mode are the same thing, with different methods for implementation (TPU 1 is a switch, OC Tuner Ratio is via BIOS). Same went for TPU Level 2 and OC Tuner BCLK, both gave the same result.

With all of these options on-hand, which is the best? We set off to find out.


TPU Level 1 TPU / OC Tuner Ratio

The first overclocking method tested on our 4770K and Z87 Deluxe is using TPU Level 1. Alternatively, OC Tuner Ratio mode in the BIOS yields the same result. Enabling this is as easy as flicking a switch and our system went from stock to 4107Mhz (41 x 100.17) on the CPU, 2404Mhz at 12-14-14-35 2T on the memory, and 3906Mhz for uncore.

Ratio limits per core varied: 43x for cores 1 and 2, 42x for core 3, and 41x for core 4. This means single threaded applications would run at a higher speed.

Stability tests finished without issue, and we were able to complete every test in the benchmark suite. Voltage set in the BIOS was adaptive at 1.150 + 0.025v and this gave 1.140v idle and 1.252v load with load temps at about 62C. All in all, that's a fairly decent overclock which balances temperatures, voltage and power consumption.


TPU Level 2 TPU / OC Tuner BCLK

TPU Level 2 was the target of our next set of tests. Again, setting OC Tuner BCLK mode in the BIOS yields the same result.

Flicking the TPU switch to Level 2 brought our system to 4250Mhz (34 x 125) on the CPU, 2000Mhz at 12-14-14-35 2T on the memory, and 3875Mhz for uncore. Ratio limits were set to 34 for all cores.

Once again, stability tests finished without issue, and we were able to complete every test in the benchmark suite. Voltage set in the BIOS was manual at 1.175v and this gave 1.175v both idle and load with load temps at about 65C so a bit more aggressive than Level 1 but still within safe operating limits.


4-Way Optimization

A key feature of the Z87 Deluxe is ASUS' fourth generation of Dual Intelligent Processors (DIP4) and 4-Way Optimization. 4-Way Optimization is a complete system tuning utility that offers fully automated overclocking, fan profiling and tuning, power optimization and full VRM power management. There is literally no work to do to activate this feature; simply open AI Suite II, modify the 4-Way Optimization button and the utility does the rest.

While the process is running the system will go through a few reboots and continue to overclock and stress test until a bsod occurs. After that point the board will not attempt overclock any further. Once complete, you get a results screen which is customized depending on your cooling equipment and CPU quality. Truth be told, this is one of the best auto overclocking features we've ever come across.

In our case, the system stopped at 4900Mhz with 2 cores at 49x and 2 cores at 48x and adaptive voltage set at 1.250V + 0.025v. Memory was set at 2400Mhz at 12-14-14-35 2T and uncore remained at 3900Mhz.

Click for full screenshot​

Once we started stability testing however, the system was not stable, quickly posting a BSOD. This was expected to some extent with such an aggressive overclock and a low vCore. The voltage set was adaptive so moving offset voltage up slowly and retesting brought us to an extra 0.035v for stability. In the end this gave 1.25V + 0.06v offset for 1.31v idle and about 1.40v load with load temps at about 82C.

Considering we were using an ES chip, we thought it would be beneficial to test another chip with 4-Way Optimization to see if the same stability issues existed. This wasn't exactly ideal since it was another engineering sample but two chips are better than one so we threw in a 4670K.

4-Way Optimization brought the chip to almost the exact same point as the 4770K: 4800Mhz on CPU with all cores at 48x, 2400Mhz at 12-14-14-35 2T on memory, and 3800 on uncore. Voltage was once again adaptive at 1.250v + 0.025v. However, similar to the 4770K, the AIDA64 stress test gave a quick BSOD. The 4670K actually needed a hair less voltage than the 4770k for 4800Mhz and after some testing we settled on 1.250v + 0.05v for 1.30v idle and 1.395v load with temps at about 80C load.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to conclude if 4-Way Optimization still needs a little work since we were using ES chips but if we were to guess we would say it does need a little tweaking. 4800-4900Mhz is a very aggressive overclock for an automated affair and you really need a high end cooling system to run those kinds of speeds. In addition, it just didn't feel like the ASUS-induced stress tests were enough to ensure full stability with the low voltage being applied. We will retest 4-Way Optimization with a retail CPU and report on the findings soon.

 

[Eldonko]

Manual Overclocking

Manual Overclocking

We saw in our Intel i7-4770K & i5-4670K Review that Haswell brings with it some new overclocking methods and challenges. Overclockers have to find a balance between maximum CPU clocks, memory clocks, and uncore. You can no longer expect to easily max out CPU and memory clocks as you will likely have to sacrifice one or the other for any degree of stability.

Additionally, with the VRM on-die Haswell temperatures exceed even those we saw with Ivy Bridge, so stock Intel coolers no longer cut it. Many users are moving to high end water cooling setup to manage the heat produced by Haswell chips. In this section we will bring you through the process of manually overclocking a 4770K with the Z87 Deluxe and hopefully you can learn a few tips and tricks to help with your own Haswell overclocking.

Before getting into manual overclocking we did want to mention two caveats about the results. First of all, we are using a high end water cooling system with a powerful pump and two double heatercores equipped with four 120mm fans to dissipate heat. Second, our processor is an Engineering Sample so it may or may not be representative of a retail 4770K. The basics are the same however so let’s get to it.

Starting with the CPU overclock and leaving the RAM below spec and uncore at stock we started at the 4.8GHz achieved with 4-Way Optimization and slowly went up from there while keeping a close eye on temperatures. 4.9GHz was hit easily using 1.42v (manual voltage) without issue but at that point temperatures were hitting close to 90C under AIDA64 load so for safety’s sake we chose to stop there.

With a stable overclock of 4.9GHz, the next step was to start bringing memory clocks up to see where they should be. Our G.Skill Trident kit is rated for 2800Mhz so with a first attempt we tried for 2400Mhz on the RAM at stock timings of 12-14-14 2T. This was a no go and the board wouldn’t even boot at 2400 and 4.9MHz. Adding System Agent (VCCSA) and I/O voltage was also getting us nowhere.

After many hours of testing we found that to be stable at 4.9GHz, memory had to drop to all the way down to 2000Mhz. The issue is the L3 cache is tied to the memory controller frequency so when you have your CPU clocks at absolute max, you are running out of headroom for I/O which can lead to a number of stability issues.

The strength of a chip’s IMC has some impact on where memory will max out so we tossed in the 4670K to see if we could get memory above 2000MHz at 4.9GHz. The 4670K’s IMC was a little stronger and we managed 2400MHz on the memory but still could not get to the spec speed of 2800MHz. We took this as a learning experience and started searching for the point that we could sacrifice a bit of CPU speed for those big memory clocks.

SuperPI and Cinebench are very handy for testing exactly which combination of CPU speed, memory speed, memory timings, and uncore frequency will yield the best results. After quite a bit of trial and error, we concluded that by dropping CPU speed to 4.8GHz the memory and uncore could clock with relative freedom. Remember, CPU clocks are king, but only to the point where you don’t have to drastically underclock your memory and uncore to achieve stability.

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After all was said and done, we found the optimal configuration for our setup was 4800MHz (48 x 100) on the CPU, 2800MHz on the memory tightened to 11-13-13 1T, and 4600MHz for the uncore. For voltage we preferred the adaptive mode because CPU VCore fluctuates automatically and only as needed which saves power and reduces heat.

Here are a few tips to help with stability:

• Run uncore at 100-300Mhz below CPU speed to help with stability. Running uncore at 1:1 with CPU is difficult and the performance lost by dropping it a bit is negligible.
• Tweak your System Agent and I/O voltages for memory stability until you find the sweet spot (typically 1.1v to 1.25v for VCCSA, 1.10v to 1.20v for I/O with digital I/O 50mv higher than analog).
• Watch your trfc as it will need to be high at high memory speeds
• If you are having difficulty stabilizing high memory clocks try the 125 strap
• There is only about a 5-10% range possible for the PCI-E/DMI controller when adjusting BCLK so keep BCLK within that 5-10% range of the CPU strap.
• Don’t bother trying the 3000 memory divider, it does not work!

Memory Overclocking

After finding that optimal point for our manual overclock, we wanted to see how far Haswell can push memory and G.Skill’s new Trident provided a perfect opportunity for that.

Click for full screenshot​

While maintaining 4800MHz on the CPU, we were able to push the Trident kit to 2933MHz by loosening the timings to 12-14-14 while keeping 1T and relatively tight secondaries. DRAM voltage was also kept at stock of 1.65v.

Click for full screenshot​

Of course we didn’t stop there as the holy grail of memory speed for Haswell seems to be that 3000MHz point. After wasting some time trying to get a 3000 memory divider to work we realized that Intel disabled it for some reason so we moved back to 2933 and went to 3000MHz with a BCLK adjustment. After tweaking voltages and timings we were able to hit the 3000MHz mark with once again maintaining the 4.8GHz on CPU and 4.6Ghz on uncore. The secondary timings had to be loosened slightly and command rate changed to 2T.


BCLK Overclocking

BCLK overclocking on the Haswell platform is linked to the CPU straps and you can typically scale 3 to 5 BCLK from the strap before running into stability issues. The straps available are 100, 125, 167, and 250 but it is pointless to have the 250 strap in the UEFI because since it isn’t even useable. ASUS also created an “artificial strap” of 200 on their ROG boards which isn’t available on the Deluxe. Without the 200 strap the best bet is to start at 167 and work up from there.

Moving up one base clock at a time, we were able to reach 172 BCLK on the Z87 Deluxe. We have seen some ROG boards hit the 200 mark but that is using the 200 strap that ASUS has developed and made available in their high end boards’ BIOS. Tweaking SB PLL and BCLK Skews help with BCLK but ASUS has done a good job with the auto settings for these so don’t expect too much when tweaking them manually.

 

[Eldonko]

System Benchmarks

System Benchmarks

In the System Benchmarks section we will show a number benchmark comparisons of the 4770K and Z87 Deluxe using the stock speed (turbo enabled), TPU I, TPU II, 4-Way Optimization, and our manual overclock. This will illustrate how much performance can be gained by the various overclocking options the Z87 Deluxe has to offer. For full comparisons of a 4770K vs. a number of different CPUs have a look at the Intel Haswell i7-4770K & i5-4670K Review.

For reference the CPU speeds, memory speeds, memory timings, and uncore speeds used for these tests are as follows:

SuperPI Benchmark

SuperPi calculates the number of digits of PI in a pure 2D benchmark. For the purposes of this review, calculation to 32 million places will be used. RAM speed, RAM timings, CPU speed, L2 cache, and Operating System tweaks all effect the speed of the calculation, and this has been one of the most popular benchmarks among enthusiasts for several years.

SuperPi was originally written by Yasumasa Kanada in 1995 and was updated later by snq to support millisecond timing, cheat protection and checksum. The version used in these benchmarks, 1.5 is the official version supported by hwbot.

A 20% improvement in SuperPI 32M calculation when going from stock speed of 3900Mhz (optimized defaults) to the manual overclock speed of 4800MHz is quite impressive in some respects. However, the gains are modest since the stock speed is with Turbo enabled.


CINEBENCH R11.5

CINEBENCH is a real-world cross platform test suite that evaluates your computer's performance capabilities. CINEBENCH is based on MAXON's award-winning animation software CINEMA 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation.

In this system benchmark section we will use the x64 Main Processor Performance (CPU) test scenario. The Main Processor Performance (CPU) test scenario uses all of the system's processing power to render a photorealistic 3D scene (from the viral "No Keyframes" animation by AixSponza). This scene makes use of various algorithms to stress all available processor cores. The test scene contains approximately 2,000 objects which in turn contain more than 300,000 polygons in total, and uses sharp and blurred reflections, area lights, shadows, procedural shaders, antialiasing, and much more. The result is displayed in points (pts). The higher the number, the faster your processor.

The CINEBENCH R11.5 results show an impressive increase in rendering performance moving from a stock system to an overclocked system. For CPU rendering, a 23% (single thread) and 24% improvement (in points) was achieved when moving to manual OC speeds.



Sandra Processor Arithmetic & Processor Multi-Media Benchmarks

SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. The software suite provides most of the information (including undocumented) users like to know about hardware, software, and other devices whether hardware or software. The name “Sandra” is a (girl) name of Greek origin that means "defender", "helper of mankind".

The software version used for these tests is SiSoftware Sandra 2013 SP3. In the 2013 version of Sandra, SiSoft has updated operating system support, added support for Haswell CPUs, as well as added some new benchmarks to the testing suite. The benchmark used below is the Processor Arithmetic benchmark which shows how the processor handles arithmetic and floating point instructions. This test illustrates an important area of a computer’s speed.

Sandra’s processor arithmetic benchmark also shows some notable improvements on an overclocked system, with 24% to 26% gains in Dhrystone ALU iSSE4.2 (GIPS) and Whetstone FPU iSSE3 (GFLOPS) performance for the manual overclock.



PCMark 8 Benchmark

Developed in partnership with Benchmark Development Program members Acer, AMD, Condusiv Technologies, Dell, HGST, HP, Intel, Microsoft, NVIDIA, Samsung, SanDisk, Seagate and Western Digital, PCMark 8 is the latest version in FutureMark’s popular series of PC benchmarking tools. Improving on previous releases, PCMark 8 includes new tests using popular applications from Adobe and Microsoft.

The test used in below is the PCMark 8 Home benchmark. This testing suite includes workloads that reflect common tasks for a typical home user such as for web browsing, writing, gaming, photo editing, and video chat. The results are combined to give a PCMark 8 Home score for the system.

Since PCMark 8 includes a bit of everything, including 3D, the gains are not as dramatic as some of the pure 2D benchmarks. Moving from stock speed to the manual overclock we have an overall improvement of 12% for PCMark 8.



AIDA64 Benchmark

AIDA64 Extreme Edition is a diagnostic and benchmarking software suite for home users that provides a wide range of features to assist in overclocking, hardware error diagnosis, stress testing, and sensor monitoring. It has unique capabilities to assess the performance of the processor, system memory, and disk drives.

The benchmarks used in this review are the memory bandwidth and latency benchmarks. Memory bandwidth benchmarks (Memory Read, Memory Write, Memory Copy) measure the maximum achievable memory data transfer bandwidth. The code behind these benchmark methods are written in Assembly and they are extremely optimized for every popular AMD, Intel and VIA processor core variants by utilizing the appropriate x86/x64, x87, MMX, MMX+, 3DNow!, SSE, SSE2, SSE4.1, AVX, and AVX2 instruction set extension.

The Memory Latency benchmark measures the typical delay when the CPU reads data from system memory. Memory latency time means the penalty measured from the issuing of the read command until the data arrives to the integer registers of the CPU.

Moving from stock speed to the manual overclock on the Deluxe and from 1600Mhz to 2800Mhz on memory, we see gains up to 20 to 42% in memory read, write, and copy performance. The results are similar when looking at latency; it drops from 56.4ns to 37.0ns, an improvement of 34%.

 

[Eldonko]

3D and Gaming Benchmarks

3D and Gaming Benchmarks

In the 3D and Gaming Benchmarks section we will show benchmark comparisons of the 4770K and Z87 Deluxe using the stock speed (turbo enabled), TPU I, TPU II, 4-Way Optimization, and our manual overclock. The improvement wont be a s dramatic as with 2D benchmarks but it will illustrate how much 3D performance can be gained by the various overclocking options the Z87 Deluxe has to offer. The GPU is kept at stock speed for all tests for consistency. For reference the CPU speeds, memory speeds, memory timings, and uncore speeds used for these tests are as follows:

3DMark Fire Strike Benchmark

The latest version of 3DMark from FutureMark includes everything you need to benchmark everything from smartphones and tablets, to notebooks and home PCs, to the latest high-end, multi-GPU gaming desktops. And it's not just for Windows. With 3DMark you can compare your scores with Android and iOS devices too. It's the most powerful and flexible 3DMark we've ever created.

The test we are using in this review is Fire Strike which is a DirectX 11 benchmark designed for high-performance gaming PCs. Fire Strike features real-time graphics rendered with detail and complexity far beyond what is found in other benchmarks and games today.

As a brand new purely 3D benchmark it is not surprising to see minimal gains from an increase in CPU and memory clocks. Moving from stock to our manual overclock we see gains of 3% in Fire Strike points.



Sleeping Dogs Gaming Benchmark

Sleeping Dogs is an open world action-adventure video game developed by United Front Games in conjunction with Square Enix London Studios and published by Square Enix, released on August 2012. Sleeping Dogs has a benchmark component to it that mimics game play and an average of three runs was taken.

The settings used in the testing below are the Extreme display settings and a resolution of 1920x1080. World density is set to extreme, high-res textures are enabled, and shadow resolution, shadow filtering, screen space ambient occlusion, and quality motion blur are all set to high.

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Results: Similar to 3DMark, moving from stock to our manual overclock we see gains of 3% in average FPS in Sleeping Dogs.



Metro: Last Light Gaming Benchmark

Metro: Last Light is a DX11 first-person shooter video game developed by Ukrainian studio 4A Games and published by Deep Silver released in May 2013. The game is set in a post-apocalyptic world and features action-oriented gameplay. The game has a benchmark component to it that mimics game play. Scene D6 was used and an average of three runs was taken.

The settings used in the testing below are Very High for quality and a resolution of 1920x1080. DirectX 11 is used, texture filtering is set to AF 4X, motion blur is normal, and tessellation is set to high.

Metro: Last Light gives a bit larger improvement moving to an overclocked system than the previous two benchmarks. MetroLL shows an improvement of 8%, not bad at all.

 

[Eldonko]

Conclusion

Conclusion

With a full stable of Z87 motherboards, ASUS has a lot of options to choose from but the Z87 Deluxe is somewhat unique since it targets enthusiast users who want all the bells and whistles but can’t justify spending close to $400 for a Maximus Extreme. Feature-wise ASUS certainly didn’t disappoint since the Deluxe offers a dizzying number of features, most of which work surprisingly well considering it has only been on the market for less than a month.

When a new platform is launched, innovation is key and ASUS seems to have hit all the right buttons in creating this board. For example, Wi-Fi GO is packed full of great options for users that want to make a foray into cloud computing through a mobile device. We didn’t feel that everything Wi-Fi GO has to offer was thrilling but items like Cloud GO, DLNA Media Hub, and Remote Desktop became an integral part of daily computing and worked extremely well. We also liked Bluetooth connectivity, the “future proof” 802.11ac access, and the wireless antenna which can be easily upgraded if desired.

For novice or what we like to call “perspective” overclockers, ASUS offers a number of options, all of which are well thought out and implemented. There are several easy auto overclocking modes like OC Tuner and TPU modes which require a simple switch or BIOS selection. For those with a little more ambition that like to get their hands dirty, 4-Way Optimization and manual overclocking can bring the board to levels that exceed a 25% improvement over stock speeds.

In theory, ASUS’ unique 4-Way Optimization should be nothing short of outstanding since it allows for aggressive overclocks while optimizing power savings and fan speeds. It even does on the fly stress testing to ensure overclocks are stable. We did however determine that it may bring the overclocks a little too far without adequate assurances and some additional manual effort was required for complete system stability. However, this can’t be held against ASUS since ES chips were used rather than retail samples so the Deluxe’s performance here could very well change when using standard stepping processors.

The UEFI BIOS itself is also a key feature since it comes with over 15 new features over previous gen boards and it remains one of the easiest to use. The best new additions are the handy My Favorites page which gives quick access to your most-used commands, Quick Notes, and the ability to name SATA ports. All of these go a long way towards making a once daunting interface more accessible and infinitely easier to use.

Sitting at the very upper echelon of the mainstream price bracket at nearly $300, our only real complaint about the Deluxe is its relative positioning against competing solutions for people who don’t need its full stack of features. ASUS even competes against itself with boards like the Z87 Pro, RoG Hero, and the even the Sabertooth. In the end though the Deluxe is called the Deluxe for a reason: it offers 802.11 ac support, the extra LAN controllers, more SATA ports, additional video outputs, all things that less expensive boards don’t include. The conductive polymer capacitors, and 16 PWM phases also making it one of the most powerful and durable in the sub-$400 segment.

When it comes to a wide ranging, well implemented feature set, excellent overclocking options, a UEFI design to be proud of and a great layout, it’s almost impossible to find a comparable solution. With a huge list of pros and only minor hiccups, we are pleased to award the Z87 Deluxe a well-deserved Dam Good award.


Pros

- Industry leading UEFI BIOS full of new features
- DirectKey is simple but awesome
- AI Suite III has everything you need
- Wi-Fi GO brings could computing and connectivity to the next level
- 802.11 ac support
- Bluetooth connectivity
- Power! Conductive polymer capacitors & 16 phase DIGI+
- Amazing auto overclocking options
- Loads of SATA and USB 3.0 ports
- Fan Xpert II is the most customizable fan solution yet


Cons

- Board is not cheap at $300
- 4-Way Optimization may need refining