EVGA Z68 FTW review

A lot of manufacturers have jumped on the Intel Z68 chipset bandwagon as it's really the hottest chipset in town at the moment when it comes to sheer features versus performance. We stated it many times already, Z68 is what H67 and P67 really should have been combined.

Combine a nice K model Sandy Bridge processor with a P67 or Z68 motherboard and the sky is the limit. Nearing 5 GHz overclocks on just air is something more likely then it is a possibility. But it remains weird though, as the Z68 was never intended to be launched as an enthusiast platform. However due to delays on new chipsets and processors by Intel the mobo goblins figured, hmms, why not take that Z68 chipset with all the new features, add some more controllers and make it the hottest chipset currently available on the market?

Over the past few weeks as a result you have been able to read many Z68 motherboard reviews here at Guru3D.com, priced from 200 EUR towards 400 EUR, the sky is the limit. And today that brings us at the premises of eVGA. After a rocky year with lots of changes in their motherboard engineering team, they are getting back on their feet. Recently they launched several Z68 chipset based motherboards, one of them is the FTW edition (for teh Win). The motherboard follows eVGAs traditional design and layout, comes with enthusiast overclock features and sells at roughly 250 USD / 225 EUR.

The Z68 FTW is the flagship product in the Z68 range. It is beefy in features and physical size as this motherboard follows the EATX Form Factor at 30cm by 26 cm wide. That means you'll need a chassis that supports that specific format. The motherboard has a delicious six PCI Express x16 slots, along with a number of jumpers that can disable one or more of them (handy in extreme overclock sessions).

The Z68 FTW is board that has a 12-phase PWM circuitry and dual 8-pin CPU power connectors to keep current flowing stable at even the highest overclocks. Funky to see is the 90 degrees angled 24-pin power plug and features like triple BIOS.

It doesn't stop there though, no Sir. You may pop in DDR3-2133 memory, it has two SATA 6.0 Gbps ports, four SATA 3.0 Gbps connectors, dual Gigabit Ethernet, USB 3.0, 7.1 channel audio and eSATA, plus a debug LED and Power, Reset and Clear CMOS buttons.

All in enough stuff to write about, let's have a peek and then head onwards into the review.