I think they already did, on my mobo (z87mx-drh) i see the system information viewer available for download, the last time i checked easy tune it didn't have the smart fan option anymore.
Boards have really become things of beauty that are also well thought-out like the colocation of all the OC buttons on this board. But I'm a bit stumped that there are OC boards distinct from gaming boards: aren't gamers the primary customers of OCing? Not just a nit: I wanted the best effort on audio on this, and it's not available because this isn't a gamer board?
No, there is a group of people who just try to get the most out of their hardware for no real reason. Just so they can say they did. These are the same people cooling with liquid nitrogen, which is totally impractical. They don't care about performance or what they're doing with the computer. It's all about the numbers and bragging rights.
If you're a gamer your needs would be better served with a gaming-focused board. The only reason a gamer would want to pick this up is if it was going really cheap.
ian, can you check please the ram compatibility as regards using 4 generic 1333 dimm's in all these gigabyte boards, as it seems that many have a big problem even posting with 4 dimms installed including my gigabyte Z87M-D3H that's had all the bios installed through factory to currently 11a for that board an still only 2 dimms (in the dimm3 and dimm4 slots) will post and work in single channel mode, no matter what 3 or 4 dimms will not even post never mind boot and function for a time before as per other reports crashing....
it seems many gigabyte boards with 4 dimm slots have massive problems with no sign of a bios fix that actually works for generic (fully tested individually as god) 1333 dimm's
I'm still waiting for a bare-bones power board. All the performance, but no extra features that I really don't need or want. The most important one is on-board sound. Don't need it, don't want it. I will ALWAYS use a card for sound. Always. Video on-board is not needed either.
This is about as bare bones as you will find. Much of the HD audio and networking functionality is built into the chipset. Although an ethernet PHY and an audio DAC are required to implement this, it would be a waste not to include this functionality because it is basically "free" with 90% of the digital side of these functions happening in the Z97 chipset itself. It would be like a motherboard maker not including any PCI-E or USB 3 ports, if Intel does all of the work, why not?
This board should have been tested with new Devil's Canyon CPU. What's the point of using year-old 4770K?...
BTW, where is Devil's Canyon review? Sometimes Anandtech is severely lagging in real computing stuff review, hurrying to post a lot about iCrap and other smartphone toys...
If you are looking for a motherboard with an outstanding price, quality components, and a support team you can count on look no further than the motherboards from Gigabyte. It is well-known for years as they produce some of the toughest board and now giving you another state of the art motherboard loaded with new features.
Why don't you guys pry that heat sink off offer a more nuanced analysis of the board's VRM? There's so little to differentiate motherboards based on the same chipset these days; this is one of the few areas where they still differ significantly. It is good to see they're using screw fasteners on the heatsinks (like my z87 board) which I would expect have much higher mounting force/better heat transfer than the push pins used on some other gigabyte z97 boards.
I'm hoping the GIGABYTE GA-Z97X-Gaming G1 starts to drop in price soon. Seems like a great design other than Intel's flaw in their lack of PCIe lanes for standard processors.
Could anyone tell me if this motherboard will work with i5 4690 and four NVIDIA GPUs ?
My problem is that in a 4 GPU config, this motherboard runs at 8x 4x 4x 4x. Where as the CPU only supports max 16x express lanes. Now if the GPU is locked to 8x in first PCIe slot, then does that mean the i5 4690 will hit a bottle next after 3 GPUs? Considering that the first PCI slot will not run below 8x. Hence the 16x express lanes won't get divided into 4x 4x 4x 4x. Instead due to this, the motherboard it will run at 8x 4x 4x. I hope I didn't confuse anyone.
This rig I am building is for GPU rendering. And GPU rendering runs fine without SLI. No ATI either.
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apertotes - Tuesday, June 17, 2014 - link
I am glad to know that they moved fan control out of Easy Tune. Do you know if this improvement will carry on to Z87 motherboards also?Lucian2244 - Wednesday, June 18, 2014 - link
I think they already did, on my mobo (z87mx-drh) i see the system information viewer available for download, the last time i checked easy tune it didn't have the smart fan option anymore.GeorgeH - Tuesday, June 17, 2014 - link
Do I need to calibrate my monitor? I already knew that the graphics cards are not included (4-Way graphics support picture, 1st page).isa - Tuesday, June 17, 2014 - link
Boards have really become things of beauty that are also well thought-out like the colocation of all the OC buttons on this board. But I'm a bit stumped that there are OC boards distinct from gaming boards: aren't gamers the primary customers of OCing? Not just a nit: I wanted the best effort on audio on this, and it's not available because this isn't a gamer board?Flunk - Tuesday, June 17, 2014 - link
No, there is a group of people who just try to get the most out of their hardware for no real reason. Just so they can say they did. These are the same people cooling with liquid nitrogen, which is totally impractical. They don't care about performance or what they're doing with the computer. It's all about the numbers and bragging rights.If you're a gamer your needs would be better served with a gaming-focused board. The only reason a gamer would want to pick this up is if it was going really cheap.
BMNify - Wednesday, June 18, 2014 - link
ian, can you check please the ram compatibility as regards using 4 generic 1333 dimm's in all these gigabyte boards, as it seems that many have a big problem even posting with 4 dimms installed including my gigabyte Z87M-D3H that's had all the bios installed through factory to currently 11a for that board an still only 2 dimms (in the dimm3 and dimm4 slots) will post and work in single channel mode, no matter what 3 or 4 dimms will not even post never mind boot and function for a time before as per other reports crashing....it seems many gigabyte boards with 4 dimm slots have massive problems with no sign of a bios fix that actually works for generic (fully tested individually as god) 1333 dimm's
cylemmulo - Wednesday, June 18, 2014 - link
How the hell would you get the front panel connectors on when you had quad cards?bj_murphy - Wednesday, June 18, 2014 - link
Just FYI, I think you linked an i7-4820K instead of an i7-4770K in your build sheet.Narg - Thursday, June 19, 2014 - link
I'm still waiting for a bare-bones power board. All the performance, but no extra features that I really don't need or want. The most important one is on-board sound. Don't need it, don't want it. I will ALWAYS use a card for sound. Always. Video on-board is not needed either.Wall Street - Saturday, June 21, 2014 - link
This is about as bare bones as you will find. Much of the HD audio and networking functionality is built into the chipset. Although an ethernet PHY and an audio DAC are required to implement this, it would be a waste not to include this functionality because it is basically "free" with 90% of the digital side of these functions happening in the Z97 chipset itself. It would be like a motherboard maker not including any PCI-E or USB 3 ports, if Intel does all of the work, why not?TiGr1982 - Friday, June 20, 2014 - link
This board should have been tested with new Devil's Canyon CPU.What's the point of using year-old 4770K?...
BTW, where is Devil's Canyon review? Sometimes Anandtech is severely lagging in real computing stuff review, hurrying to post a lot about iCrap and other smartphone toys...
haardrr - Sunday, June 22, 2014 - link
june 26 is the date the devils canyon review will appear. my guess based on the date that Newegg starts selling the Devils Canyon 4970 Khaardrr - Sunday, June 22, 2014 - link
um, err, make that a 4790k, not a 4970k...dragonhockey - Sunday, June 22, 2014 - link
If you are looking for a motherboard with an outstanding price, quality components, and a support team you can count on look no further than the motherboards from Gigabyte. It is well-known for years as they produce some of the toughest board and now giving you another state of the art motherboard loaded with new features.Joepublic2 - Monday, June 23, 2014 - link
Why don't you guys pry that heat sink off offer a more nuanced analysis of the board's VRM? There's so little to differentiate motherboards based on the same chipset these days; this is one of the few areas where they still differ significantly. It is good to see they're using screw fasteners on the heatsinks (like my z87 board) which I would expect have much higher mounting force/better heat transfer than the push pins used on some other gigabyte z97 boards.boe - Tuesday, June 24, 2014 - link
I'm hoping the GIGABYTE GA-Z97X-Gaming G1 starts to drop in price soon. Seems like a great design other than Intel's flaw in their lack of PCIe lanes for standard processors.OClock - Wednesday, April 8, 2015 - link
Could anyone tell me if this motherboard will work with i5 4690 and four NVIDIA GPUs ?My problem is that in a 4 GPU config, this motherboard runs at 8x 4x 4x 4x. Where as the CPU only supports max 16x express lanes. Now if the GPU is locked to 8x in first PCIe slot, then does that mean the i5 4690 will hit a bottle next after 3 GPUs? Considering that the first PCI slot will not run below 8x. Hence the 16x express lanes won't get divided into 4x 4x 4x 4x. Instead due to this, the motherboard it will run at 8x 4x 4x. I hope I didn't confuse anyone.
This rig I am building is for GPU rendering. And GPU rendering runs fine without SLI. No ATI either.