Asrock Z87E-ITX

Lol, don't think those WiFi antenna cables are going to make it :p Great placement on the socket,though!
 
Actually now that I think about it, the location kind of still sucks. It's too close to the other edge. It needed to be in the middle like asus's z77 ITX. Any big heatsink will overhang the side of the board, so unless your case has room, you'll probably run into worse problems than the asrock z77e-itx (well for huge heatsinks that cover the majority of the motherboards area). I don't think I can fit my AXP-140 on it... it might be close, like how it is on the Z77E-ITX.
 
ND40oz said:
I didn't see mSATA mentioned, hopefully they have one on the back of the board like the Z77E.
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I'm hoping it does too. I love msata slots on motherboards. I don't want to buy motherboards unless they have one :) Makes systems so much neater.
 
ND40oz said:
I didn't see mSATA mentioned, hopefully they have one on the back of the board like the Z77E.
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TheBlueChanell said:
Good chipset + 6 SATA ports on an ITX.
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Does the Z87 chipset have only six SATA ports? If so, it could point to a lack of mSATA and eSATA on this particular board.

BTW, wouldn't you rather have NGFF? Isn't that supposed to replace mSATA?
 
Zap said:
Does the Z87 chipset have only six SATA ports? If so, it could point to a lack of mSATA and eSATA on this particular board.

BTW, wouldn't you rather have NGFF? Isn't that supposed to replace mSATA?
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Kinsley is supposed to have 8 6.0Gbps sata ports, so it should have enough for an extra esata and an msata.
 
Zap said:
Does the Z87 chipset have only six SATA ports? If so, it could point to a lack of mSATA and eSATA on this particular board.

BTW, wouldn't you rather have NGFF? Isn't that supposed to replace mSATA?
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I had forgotten about NGFF. I would definitely prefer that to msata, but I hope most of the Z87 ITX boards offer at least one or the other.
 
Looks promising but cpu placement could be too high and run into some clearance issues with the case
 
Kaos_Drem said:
The 8 ports you are quoting include 2 controlled by an ASMedia controller.
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I've only seen the slide for the Intel DZ87KLT-75K/DZ87KL-70K which makes no mention of an ASMedia controller, do you have more concrete information showing a block diagram of the Z87 chipset?
 
ND40oz said:
I've only seen the slide for the Intel DZ87KLT-75K/DZ87KL-70K which makes no mention of an ASMedia controller, do you have more concrete information showing a block diagram of the Z87 chipset?
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Based on the information on the prototype boards currently being shown. The chipset supports 6 SATA III, with extra ports being supplied by third party controllers.

Gigabyte has an atx board that has 10 SATA ports. The reported information on it says 6 SATA III by the chipset and 4 SATA II by an external controller. They have another board that is 6 SATA III and 2 SATA II.

Gigabyte and others also have atx boards that just have 6 ports(all SATA III). So 6 ports will be the standard, even for m-itx(finally).

None of the boards shown thus far have msata or similar tech. They are still prototypes so we will have to wait and see.

Its also still TBD if thunderbolt will trickle down to m-itx. It is probably not going to happen(unfortunately).
 
Anyone order this board yet? Thinking about it, but also thinking I might wait a week or two to see if anyone experiences any issues.
 
I picked up this board yesterday along with an i7. Killer deals from MicroCenter - $150 for the board and $280 for the CPU.

Going to connect it up soon, run Ubuntu off the mSATA and have 6 data drives off the board for a ZFS storage array.
 
Are the mSATA and eSATA slot / port on the board both also SATA3 / 6Gbps?

What's the brand / model number / wifi chipset of the mini-PCIe wifi card that comes with it?
 
Synomenon said:
Are the mSATA and eSATA slot / port on the board both also SATA3 / 6Gbps?

What's the brand / model number / wifi chipset of the mini-PCIe wifi card that comes with it?
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I'm not sure on the type/speed of the mSATA and eSATA, but hopefully 6Gbps otherwise the mSATA will be limited.

I wrote down the brand/model of the wifi card, but don't have that on me right now. Will reply later today unless someone beats me to it.
 
Zap said:
That case it is in is somewhat interesting.
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Nobody else interested in that case? In the pics, looks almost like a mock-up and not an operational system because it is missing the power plug (just an empty hole or blank).

raiderj said:
I picked up this board yesterday along with an i7. Killer deals from MicroCenter - $150 for the board and $280 for the CPU.
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I checked, and the nearest MC to me (70 miles away) does not have it yet. Boo!

ND40oz said:
mSATA and ESATA are shared with onboard ports 4 and 5, so they're full bandwidth sata3 ports, you just can't use the onboard when you're using them.

http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z87E-ITX/index.us.asp?cat=Specifications
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Good find. I guess that saves on PCB space and BOM from lack of a 3rd party chip, while giving people options. At least the mSATA will be on the Intel controller, guaranteeing the best performance.

What I would like to see, however, is a 3rd party chip for eSATA that supports port multipliers. ;)

(SATA3_5 connector is shared with the eSATA port; SATA3_4 connector is shared with the mSATA/mini-PCI Express slot)
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I've never really seen the point in eSATA port multipliers, give me an LSI chip with an 8088 connector if I want to hook an enclosure up externally.
 
Zap said:
Good find. I guess that saves on PCB space and BOM from lack of a 3rd party chip, while giving people options. At least the mSATA will be on the Intel controller, guaranteeing the best performance.
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A SATA-600 port from a 3rd party controller is almost useless, as only SSD's will be able to use that speed which those controllers can't even reach. But the added latency is actually much worse so it's just wasted if meant as an upgrade from SATA-300. If anything, six SATA ports is more than enough for most people and if that doesn't suffice, you are probably doing a fileserver build, which means you won't be needing the PCI-e slot for a videocard which opens it up for a decent SAS/SATA controller.
 
Phuncz said:
A SATA-600 port from a 3rd party controller is almost useless, as only SSD's will be able to use that speed which those controllers can't even reach. But the added latency is actually much worse so it's just wasted if meant as an upgrade from SATA-300. If anything, six SATA ports is more than enough for most people and if that doesn't suffice, you are probably doing a fileserver build, which means you won't be needing the PCI-e slot for a videocard which opens it up for a decent SAS/SATA controller.
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Exactly what my plans are with this board. Eventually I'm going to pick up an 8-port HBA to use with ZFS in Ubuntu, then I'll have 6 onboard SATA ports to use. Figure one will be used for the OS (mSATA), then I can use four for another storage array, and the last SATA/eSATA port for a slimline optical or external drive.
 
Wonder what the heatsink compatibility is like on the Z87E-ITX vs. Z77E-ITX. I have a NT06-Pro. on my Z77E-ITX and it just barely clears the back of my video card.
 
Thanks for those pics.. Good to see they gave us enough space this time.

Can anyone who has this board give us the brand and model number of the wifi card that comes with it?
 
The wifi chip that it comes with is the AzureWave AW-CE123H.

AzureWave Wiki Page

The chipset for the wifi module is a Broadcom BCM4352. Appears to be only two streams (2x2), and I think it should support 5G N, but I can't confirm that. Will swap the chip into my desktop later today in order to test out. I also can't find drivers except on the ASRock driver disc.

Broadcom 4352

EDIT: Wifi module does support 5GHz N. Now running the module in my desktop (ASRock Z77 ITX) and connected to my 5GHz-only N network. Haven't tested the Bluetooth radio, but the drivers installed just fine from the disc.

EDIT 2: Just tested the BT module - works great with a headset for making a call with Google Voice. About a 1/2 hour conversation with no complaints on voice quality.
 
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What would be different about the motherboard if they changed to SO-DIMM's ? I don't see anything new from what is visible.
 
Phuncz said:
What would be different about the motherboard if they changed to SO-DIMM's ? I don't see anything new from what is visible.
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It would give a bit more space, maybe the sata ports/cables can actually get thru in between the ram and gpu.
 
So you're saying they are making a different layout, just so you can lead your SATA cables another way ?
 
Phuncz said:
So you're saying they are making a different layout, just so you can lead your SATA cables another way ?
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No, I'm saying it would do more good than bad if they changed to SODIMMs since most people use 1600Mhz ram anyways.
 
Anyone knows how the audio compares to the Asus ROG Maximus VI Impact Mini-ITX? I don't see "Purity Audio" in the specs or on the board, but it is running the Realtek ALC1150. The headphone amp and DTS connect are very welcome though.

I just want a mITX board with decent sound for once. I'm not sure I want to sacrifice the mSATA or 2 additional SATA ports just to go for the Asus which is going to definitely be more expensive.
 
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