Benchmarks

Test System Specs

  • Intel Core i7-6700K (4.0GHz)
  • x4 4GB Kingston Predator DDR4-3000 (CAS fifteen-sixteen-sixteen)
  • EVGA Z170 FTW (Intel Z170)
  • Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming seven (Intel Z170)
  • Asrock Z170 Extreme7+ (Intel Z170)
  • MSI Z170A Gaming M7 (Intel Z170)
  • Supermicro C7Z170-SQ (Intel Z170)
  • Asus ROG Maximus Eight Hero (Intel Z170)
  • Silverstone Strider Series (700w)
  • Crucial MX200 1TB (SATA 6Gb/southward)
  • GeForce GTX 980 (4096MB)
  • Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64-fleck
  • Nvidia GeForce 358.50 WHQL

In that location was just a 1.five% performance variance betwixt the slowest and fastest Z170 motherboards in the SiSoftware Sandra memory bandwidth examination using DDR4-3000 retentivity.

This fourth dimension we run into a 6% performance difference betwixt the Z170 motherboards when testing in Excel 2022. The Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming vii and Asrock Z170 Extreme7+ provided the best results taking simply three.3 seconds, while the EVGA Z170 FTW was the slowest taking 3.5 seconds.

There were no performance margins to be spoken of when testing with Photoshop CC, with just 0.i seconds separating the fastest from the slowest Z170 motherboard.

Like the previous application tests, we discover that all six Z170 motherboards evangelize similar performance when testing with WinRAR.

Deferred procedure telephone call latency or DPC is a function within Windows that allows higher priority tasks such equally device drivers to defer lower priority tasks for execution at later on times. It's an interrupt and reassignment of sorts performed by the operating system.

Users will find that DPC latency varies from make to brand and even board to board, and then while Asrock's Z97 Extreme4 for example might have offered very depression latency, there is no guarantee this will be the case with the Z170 Extreme7+.

DPC problems bear witness up in the form of audio dropouts and streaming video issues, and so those using their arrangement for encoding purposes for example will observe it crucial to have a motherboard capable of maintaining a low interrupt to process latency.

The proficient news is tools such as LatencyMon are freely available and easy to use for checking a systems latency. LatencyMon was run for 20 minutes at which bespeak the maximum result was recorded.

As a reference bespeak my own personal office PC, which features the Z87 Extreme11/ac, Core i7-4790K and uses on-lath audio, had a maximum interrupt to procedure latency of 168µs.

Of the boards tested Supermicro's server form C7Z170-SQ was the most impressive, which was a scrap of a surprise. The Asrock Z170 Extreme7+ was also very practiced, followed past the MSI Z170A Gaming M7.

Annihilation under 200µs is extremely good and fifty-fifty the Asus ROG Maximus 8 Hero which was the least impressive Z170 motherboard nevertheless provided fantabulous performance.

For the RightMark Sound Analyzer tests nosotros connect the line out to the line in using a short half dozen inch 3.5mm to 3.5mm high-quality jack, plow the Os speaker volume to 100%, and run the Rightmark default test suite at 192 kHz, 24-bit. The Bone is tuned to 192 kHz/24-bit input and output, and the Line-In volume is adjusted until nosotros have the best RMAA value in the mini-pretest. Nosotros await specifically at the Dynamic Range of the audio codec used on board, too as the Full Harmonic Distortion + Dissonance.

Equally y'all tin can see the Creative solution found on the Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming vii provided past far the best outcome in the Dynamic Range test. The Realtek ALC1150 motherboards were fairly similar, though the MSI, Asrock and Asus boards did perform improve than the Supermicro and EVGA boards.

When looking at the total harmonic distortion + noise we again notice that the Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 7 is far superior to the other boards tested.

The idle power consumption was around forty-43 watts for the most part, though the MSI Z170A Gaming M7 never dropped beneath 48 watts and the Asus ROG Maximum 8 Hero sat at 56 watts, making it the nigh power hungry lath at idle.

Once again nosotros find that the Asus ROG Maximum 8 Hero is the most power hungry of the Z170 motherboards, though this time it consumed but 4 watts more the MSI Z170A Gaming M7. Unsurprisingly the characterless EVGA Z170 FTW consumed the least amount of ability underload with an entire system consumption of merely 98 watts. The Asrock Z170 Extreme7+ was surprisingly efficient using the 2d least corporeality of power.