Asus Sabertooth Z77 Motherboard Review (with OC GTX680)

1. Introduction2. Asus Sabretooth Z77 Motherboard3. Asus Sabretooth Z77 Motherboard (Super High Res Gallery)4. Bios and Overclocking5. Testing Methodology6. Synthetic: PCMark 77. Synthetic: 3DMark Vantage8. Synthetic: 3DMark 119. Synthetic: Unigine Heaven Benchmark10. Synthetic: HQV Benchmark 2.011. Synthetic: SiSoft Sandra 201112. Synthetic: Cinebench R11.5 64 bit13. Synthetic: SSD Performance14. Real World: 3D Rendering15. Real World: Media Encoding16. Real World: HandBrake 9.517. Gaming: F1 201118. Gaming: Far Cry 219. Gaming: Alan Wake20. Gaming: Battlefield 321. Gaming: Total War Shogun 222. Closing Thoughts23. View All Pages

The Asus Sabertooth is the first Z77 motherboard we have reviewed and it has certainly set the bar high already. It stands out on the market, thanks to the Thermal Armor which covers the board from head to foot.

First impressions were positive, as the bundle is extensive and adds to the value of the product. I am not really sure that the Thermal Armor is really necessary, especially without the supplied, tiny fans installed. Surely it would trap a higher percentage of warm air closer to the capacitors?

I unsuccessfully tried to measure stability variables at the highest possible speeds, overclocking the 2600k to 5ghz with the help of a Corsair H100. Would the board crash without the active cooling? Would it operate better with the Thermal cover removed and no fans in place?

In a nutshell, the Sabertooth Z77 never crashed, regardless of whether I had the active fans installed or the Thermal Armor removed. Temperatures of the VRM's reduced by around 8c with both fans operating, but temperatures weren't dangerously high in the first place so it made little difference in real world terms. I didn't appreciate the added noise, so therefore didn't use them for the review. It may be possible in a very warm climate that they will help improve stability when overclocked, but I can't imagine many people would need them installed.

Overclocking the Sabertooth Z77 was exceptionally straightforward and by simply pressing the ‘OC Tuner' option, the board overclocked the 2600k to just past 4.4ghz without increasing the core voltage. We manually pushed it to 4.8ghz with a £20 cooler, minor voltage bump and a few other tweaks. Throughout the last week it has maintained stability even when placed under extreme synthetic load.

The Asus Sabertooth Z77 is an expensive product, but we feel it is worth the money, especially if you are buying a new motherboard to overclock a processor to the limits. We are confident with high end cooling and a good stepping, that a 2600k or 2700k will be stable at 5ghz+. You can't ask for much more than that.

We can't comment on next generation CPU performance just yet, but when NDA breaks we will have all the results here.

You can buy the board from Overclockers in the UK for £182.99 inc vat.

Pros:

• Overclocks like a dream.
• Looks great.
• Very difficult to crash.

Cons:

• We aren't sold 100% on the ‘Thermal Armor' concept.
• Expensive.

Kitguru says: A quality board that comes fully loaded.

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