ECS Z97 Machine Motherboard Review

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Introduction

The 89 USD ECS Z97 Machine L33t Gaming Motherboard

Tagged in their L337 Gaming series, ECS recently released a Z97 motherboard with a tasty design, good features and a very good price. ECS took the Z97 chipset and made a nice dark looking motherboard that has SLI/Crossfire support and tweaking features. It also comes with a custom audio solution. Join us in a the Z97 Machine, a product that will please the budget PC gamer with the hunger for a high-end PC.

Intel released their series 9 chipsets, among them will be low-end and high-end desktop solutions. For the consumers and readers of Guru3D, H97 and Z97 should be the two most interesting ones. For the HTPC end of things H97 is the most appealing as tweaking options are stripped away with a lower price-tag. For the more hardcore gamers and PC aficionados, the Z97 is the most interesting. Z97 by itself as a chipset is nothing special. HOWEVER, we have plenty to look at as the motherboard manufacturers went totally nuts and started redesigning their motherboards, added new features and made them extraordinarily cool. You'll spot new redesigns build on the DNA of Z87 yet improved massively. Cool looks, features like AC WIFI, M2 SSDs and Sata Express will bring some very interesting features onto the market. So if (at the time) you didn't upgrade to Z87, now might be a good time. 

Now back to ECS, the machine series really is supposed to be the mainstream model but I'd tag this in the somewhat high-end class alright, you can fit even Devils Canyon processor on it (Core i7 4970K). This Intel Z97 based motherboard will come with nice PC options like 8-pin EPS connectors, a 6-phase VRM design for the processor, two PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slots (x8/x8 when two cards and x16 with one card).

The board comes with an Intel I218-V Gigabit Fast Ethernet Controller. Storage wise you will get four SATA 6 Gb/s and of that all new M.2 slot. Overclocking features are includes in the BIOS and you will spot a POST LED display as well as on-board reset and power buttons.

All-in-all this motherboard offers a decent feature set for not a lot of money, so join me in a review and overview of what ECS has to offer with the ECS Z97 Machine motherboard, next page please.
 


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