ECS Z77H2-AX Golden motherboard preview - Page 4

SATA ports then -- ECS is equipping the board with six SATA ports plus two eSATA. The SATA ports to the right are SATA III 6Gbps which are native to the Intel Z77 chipset. In the middle you'll see four black SATA II 3Gbps ports. The additional eSATA ports are SATA III 6Gbps based on an ASM1061 (Asmedia) chip. There's also a mSATA port below the PCH cooler. We spotted an extra Texas Instruments TUSB7320 USB 3.0 controller which provides connectivity for the front panel USB 3.0 header.

At the left edge of the Z77H2-AX we see the a internal IEEE1394a (Firewire) header, front panel headers, etc. There also is a diagnostic POST LED /  status indicator to be found there. Unfortunately (as happen s a lot with ECS) they again forgot to mention the display codes in the manual. So if your board is not posting and showing code 26 or something ... you'll have no idea what it means (well code 26 is always graphics but still).

3-way AMD CrossFireX and Nvidia SLI arrays are supported by the PCIe 3.0 connectors, you'll find additionally a PLX chip. Interesting is that all three slots are PCie gen 3.0 compatible but these are physical PCIe 3.0 x16 links, mechanically the lower one has a PCIe 3.0 x8 link and that's still double of what the normal Intel Z77 Express products offer.

Mind you that while HDMI 1900 x 1200 output comes in as a stock feature. Users can enjoy fast data transfers using the dual SATA3 6Gb/s connectors and the maximum of 6 USB 3.0.2.0 ports available.

That's it for this tiny little preview. Obviously once Ivy bridge is out we'll conduct a full review. And to ECS, what a beautiful looking motherboard .. very nice. Drop a note in our forums and tell us what you think of this product.

H.