BIOSTAR Hi-Fi Z77X Ver. 5.x Pro Reviews

The BIOSTAR Hi-Fi Z77X motherboard is priced at $129.99 after $20 MIR currently. That is worth keeping in mind if you are looking for a budget-minded motherboard that showed to give good stability under our stress testing. The Hi-Fi Z77X showed superior overclocking abilities for a board of its price, but you need to be aware of the BIOS caveats and vDroop issues if you plan to make this an overclocking tweaking project. We had decent results with the Hi-Fi Z77X’s main feature, its sound solution, but it was not terribly outstanding in our usage but certainly seemed to be better than other Realtek implementations we usually see on mid-level motherboards.

Biostar has done a pretty good job with the Hi-Fi Z77X motherboard. It does a pretty good job at stock, and although it definitely isn't the most efficient when it comes to overall performance, it IS the most efficient when it comes to power used under normal usage. The audio rendering is pretty damn good too, although I do feel that you need decent audio hardware to be able to take advantage of what is offered. The pricing is fantastic, and when it came to CPU overclocking, the Biostar Hi-Fi did quite well indeed. Memory overclocking and memory support are, at this time, incredibly unimpressive. I was not able to get over 2000 MHz with any of the memory kits I have on-hand, although I have had no such issues with other boards. Only one BIOS was released by the time I tested the board, so Biostar had several months to put out an update, but they did not. They really need to update the BIOS in order to bring things up to what I consider a decent level for overclocking. This Hi-Fi Z77X could be great, but is, until they update the BIOS, just of excellent value. It is actually pretty good if you ignore the memory side of things.

Regarding the audio I think Biostar has done a good job, but admittedly I am not an audiophile. I damaged my hearing through years of listening to loud music and working in a machine shop. I don’t own a multi-thousand dollar audio system, but I can tell you that this does sound better than any onboard audio I’ve ever heard. I don’t think it would be enough to satisfy someone who is used to a really high-end sound system, but I think it is important to note that it performs better than my other boards and enhanced my movie and gaming experience.

The Biostar Hi-Fi Z77X performs just like you would expect a Z77 motherboard to perform. It works great, supports high speed RAM, and runs like a champ. The features are easy to use and very self-explanatory. The Hi-Fi Z77X doesn't really outperform other systems in any areas besides the audio. The audio performance, however, is rock solid. If you want powerful sound, this is your board. I definitely like the appearance of the Biostar Hi-Fi Z77X. The blue and black theme is appealing and I like the look of the heatsinks. The isolated portion of the audio shows up with a yellow line and looks pretty cool. Also, the Hi-Fi resistors and capacitors in the audio section of the board look pretty awesome. Biostar stepped up on the construction of the Hi-Fi Z77X. The motherboard uses all 100% solid state Japanese capacitors. The MOSFETs are covered by heatsinks and well protected. The motherboard is solid and uses a multi-layer PCB to separate the Audio components from the rest of the board. The 13 phase power design is above average as well.

If you are looking for a better audio solution without breaking the bank, the BIOSTAR Hi-Fi Z77X is a great option for you.

The Biostar Hi-Fi Z77X is targeted to the mainstream user who wants a motherboard with an above-the-average audio section. It brings all the features that fulfill today’s average user needs, such as four USB 3.0 ports and two SATA-600 ports, as well as a few features that exceed these needs. These additional features include three PCI Express x16 slots, a very decent voltage regulator circuit, outstanding overclocking features, a POST diagnostics/temperature display, and, of course, the audio section. The audio section uses a high-end codec with an on-board amplifier and extra care to make sure the audio section will receive the least amount of electromagnetic interference as possible, thereby increasing audio quality. Because of that, this motherboard is also highly recommended for the user who works professionally with audio and video editing. The lack of more SATA-600 ports may be seen as a drawback, and the absence of an on-board optical SPDIF output is rather weird on a motherboard where the main highlight is its audio section. Even with these drawbacks, we believe the Biostar Hi-Fi Z77X is a good pick, especially when you take into consideration its price. We hope Biostar releases a more high-end version of this motherboard for the enthusiast user, with more SATA-600, USB 3.0 ports, possibly more PCI Express x16 slots, and a switch chip.