EVGA Z87 Stinger Pro Reviews

Before continuing with the review wrap-up, we would like to take this opportunity to give our friends at EVGA a hearty “Thank You” for allowing us the opportunity and pleasure of reviewing the Z87 Stinger motherboard. EVGA is no stranger to design mITX form factor boards, taking all the design wins for its previous generation Stinger and integrating them into its Z87 Stinger design. EVGA was able to design the Z87 Stinger with sufficient space around all components and on-board ports so that the board did not fell cramped without leaving off necessary features by using space on both sides of the board for power circuit placement. Other decisions like the vertical orientation of the CMOS battery and the use of well-designed heat sinks helped to minimize the space taken by these normally space-hogging parts. The Z87 Stinger's coloration was well picked with its black base and red and chrome accents giving it a sleek appearance. Best of all, its minimal 6-phase digital power system did not appear to affect its stock nor overclocking performance in the least. Even with the best designs, there are always a few questionable design decisions and performance-related gotchas. Performance-wise, the Z87 Stinger performed on-par or better than its competitors with a single exception, its measured memory bandwidth. The board exhibited a full 4k less memory bandwidth than the other Intel Z87-based boards, even though the memory was verified to be running at 1600MHz and in Dual Channel mode. However, this decrease in bandwidth seemed to be more of a notable oddity than an actual performance issue, since the board performed as well or better than other Z87 boards across the other benchmark tests. The other major oddity was the exclusion of an integrated Wi-Fi solution. EVGA included Bluetooth with an integrated antennae, and for the price, the addition of a Wi-Fi chipset and antennae would not have been a stretch. However, they do include an on-board mPCIe port which can be used to add in your only Wi-FI card if desired. The only other major questionable design decision was with the placement of power circuitry in close proximity to the CPU back plate on the board's backside. Depending on the back plate used with your CPU cooler, there is a risk of damaging or crushing those chips.