ECS Elitegroup Z77H2-AX (V1.0) Black Edition Extreme Pro Reviews

At this point, we would like to give our friends at ECS a well-deserved “Thank you” for allowing us the opportunity to review the Z77H2-AX motherboard. Out of the box, the board is a work of art with enough gold to garner a spot at Fort Knox. ECS made sure to integrate in plenty of add-ins to more than justify the price tag, offering 3 different networking adapters, plenty of USB and SATA ports, not to mention support for 3-way NVIDIA SLI or AMD Crossfire. Couple that with its stock performance, and you have the makings of a champion. However, as was stated previously, the board fell short for me in the overclocking area. It barely managed to scratch the surface on memory overclocking and would not overclock the CPU speed at all (over the stock CPU Turbo mode settings that is).

The ECS Z77H2-AX Black Extreme 'Golden Board' comes with a lot of features, average performance, and no automatic overclocking ability (that we could get to work). Carrying a retail price of $309.99 I honestly expected more from the ECS Z77H2-AX Black Extreme 'Golden Board'.

ECS has struck gold with aesthetics on its Z77H2-AX motherboard, though its high price and its heavy power usage will not appeal to everyone.

To the surprise of many, I really really like the ECS Golden Board Z77H2-AX. Its BIOS is broken, and overclocking isn't easy at all, but its extra capability, and relatively high performance that can hang out with the bigger boys is not something that can be ignored. ECS isn't traditionally a name people think of when it comes to high end products, and for a really expensive, limited edition option, they've done a damn fine job for a first venture. This BIOS issue is a big thing to the average user, but I'm not the average user, so it's not something I consider really all that important, although it does affect the final score. The added PCIe connectivity is something personally that I require, and it meets my needs there; it overclocks with our test CPU just like any other product once you overclock using the right method, and runs cooler overall while consuming similar power. To be honest, I find it hard to believe that this product is coming from ECS, and after having spent some time talking to them about what's going on and how things are changing, I'm really excited to see how things progress from this point, because there is really nothing wrong here that cannot easily be fixed with just a single BIOS update. That's it. Its hardware is perfect, comparable to even Gigabyte in performance, and this is from ECS. A little bit of BIOS issues are expected from ECS, and because they were so easily overcome, I've really got to congratulate ECS on providing their best product ever.

ECS has delivered a high-end board with the Z77H2-AX Golden Edition that has everything the end user could want in a feature set, alongside the excellent overclocking potential. Not to mention the fact that this limited edition board appears to have been touched by good old King Midas, using gold on many of the Z77H2-AX Golden Edition’s components to really deliver on the bling factor. Bling has its place in the world, but the main reason for the gold coloring and plating is that the material is highly conductive and resistant to corrosion. ECS Gold 4ever features ensure that the motherboard is reliable and offers long term stability through the use of gold plating on specific components on the PCB including the CPU socket, memory slots, PCIe slot contacts, chokes, and capacitors. Gold is also a status symbol of sorts, showing you have the best product around – this is the message the board is designed to convey. To reach "Golden Board" status, each board is put through a battery of tests including a 72 hour torture test, a 50°C burn-in test, and ESD protection on the requirement level of NASA's space program. Each board is further refined and tweaked for high level performance, so that it can take the step from just a Black Extreme Series to the pinnacle of the ECS Z77 line up. When you look at the cost of a new motherboard, the extensive feature set ECS has empowered the Z77H2-AX. Packaged with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth capabilities, Multi-GPU support, ESD Protection, 15μ gold contacts in the PCIe slots, memory slots, and CPU socket pins, Lucid MVP switchable graphics, and a host of others Intel-specific features, this board carries a price premium at $319 – currently the highest priced Z77 board at Newegg, which is about $45 more expensive than the next closest offering.

We were impressed with the gold plating effect of the board but its luster waned somewhat as we examined certain implementations of the board like a missing DVI port, lack of clear markings of SATA connector types, badly positioned PCIe x1 slot and a warped PCB. One of the most important highlights of the board was its multi-GPU support in 2-way x16/x16 mode and even 3-way multi-GPU support due to the presence of a PLX PXE 8747 switching controller to support double the number of PCIe Gen 3 lanes. This feature was neither highlighted in its manual nor its product page on ECS website. On the whole however, we have to say that the board has the makings of a high-end board with its wireless connectivity options, mSATA connector and support for extra PCIe Gen 3 lanes. It remains to be seen if all that glitters is really gold after we put the board through its paces with an Ivy Bridge processor so watch out for our lab test in the near future.

The ECS Z77H2-AX is a high-end motherboard, meaning it is targeted to the user who wants to buy a motherboard loaded with extra features. This comes in the form of an additional PCI Express x16 slot (allowing you to install up to three video cards under SLI or CrossFireX modes), six USB 3.0 ports (motherboards based on the Z77 chipset usually come with four), a mini PCI Express slot (for you to install a small SSD unit or expansion card based on this form factor), two independent eSATA-300 ports, support for Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, voltage monitoring points, and an adequate voltage regulator circuit. Under the hood, however, is where one of the most important aspects of this motherboard lies: the PLX PEX8747 switch chip. This chip allows the second PCI Express x16 slot to work at x16 when two video cards are installed (not x8 as is the norm), and the third PCI Express x16 slot to work at x8 and be compatible with the PCI Express 3.0 specification when an “Ivy Bridge” processor is installed. It is simply unbelievable how ECS is not explaining this very important feature in its manual or on its website.