Gigabyte Z270X-Ultra Gaming Motherboard Review

1. Introduction2. Gigabyte Z270X-Ultra Gaming: Packaging and Bundle3. Gigabyte Z270X-Ultra Gaming: Board Layout and Features4. Gigabyte Z270X-Ultra Gaming: UEFI5. Gigabyte Z270X-Ultra Gaming: Software6. Testing Methodology7. Tests: CPU Related8. Tests: Memory Related9. Tests: Gaming Related10. Overclocking & Power Consumption11. Tests: Motherboard Features Performance12. Closing Thoughts13. View All Pages

ATTO Disk Benchmark

The ATTO disk benchmark is a Windows-based utility for testing storage performance of any storage drive or controller. We use the default benchmark setup.

M.2 PCIe Performance

For M.2 testing we use a Toshiba OCZ RD400 256GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD.

The peak M.2 NVMe throughput was as expected for the 32Gbps connection enabled by this motherboard. Thermal throttling was fairly minimal since the M.2 SSD caught some of the airflow off the graphics card and CPU cooler because of its central and open location.

However, over a longer period of sustained use, thermal throttling started to occur more frequently so Gigabyte should consider a way of dealing with heat from M.2 devices. Modern computer cases with strong internal airflow should be able to mitigate the heat for the most part.

USB Performance

We test USB 3.0 and 3.1 performance using a pair of Transcend SSD370S 512GB SSDs in RAID 0 connected to an Icy Box RD2253-U31 2-bay USB 3.1 enclosure powered by an ASMedia ASM1352R controller.

USB performance is typical for the controllers used, Intel Z270 and ASM2142, on both the USB 3.0 and 3.1 interfaces, respectively.

SATA 6Gbps Performance

For SATA 6Gbps testing we use an OCZ Trion 150 480GB SSD.

SATA performance is par for the course.

Audio

Rightmark Audio Analyser is a freeware benchmarking utility designed to objectively test the performance characteristics of audio solutions. We setup a line-in line-out loop and execute the record/playback test before generating the results report you see below. A sampling mode of 24-bit, 192 kHz was tested.

Audio performance is Excellent across the board which reflects the latest Realtek ALC 1220 codec being utilised by Gigabyte's audio implementation. Gigabyte's Z270X-Ultra Gaming didn't perform as well as the Maximus IX Formula (which is a much more expensive motherboard and uses many more audio components), but the results recorded are stronger than many Z170-generation motherboards running what used to be the best codec prior to Z270's release, Realtek ALC 1150.

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