The Z68 chipset has been out for nearly three months now, where they combined the best from H67 and P68, while also adding SSD caching technology. EVGA is hardly famous for being first to market, but now that the first three Z68 have arrived.
EVGA is better known for developing motherboards for enthusiasts and extreme overclockers, and its lineup now has boards with the not-so-new Z68 chipset from Intel. The first motherboard is called EVGA Z68 FTW and according to EVGA be the exact same motherboard as P67 FTW beside the chipset and a redesigned power section. With that in mind it is not a surprise it has the same specifications as P67 FTW.
It comes with six PCI-E x16 slots, two SATA 6 GB/s, four SATA 3 GB/s, 7.1 channel HD audio, two Gigabit Ethernet ports, USB 3.0 and several USB 2.0 ports – all SATA ports and the 24-pin connector are angled for better cable management. The PCI-E ports also have an Nvidia NF200 bridge chip for support for three graphics card in SLI plus physics or QuadCrossFireX. We also see buttons for Power, Reset and Clear CMOS on the edge of the board.
EVGA Z68 FTW has a 12 phase design for the processor and around the socket we see a massive heatsink for cooling the whole shebang. Other functions include EVGA’s own EVBot for overclocking and monitoring the system without software, a LED POST for diagnostics and most likely a feature-packed BIOS. The board will be available in two versions, one with just the motherboard and one with two accessories.
EVGA Z68 FTW w/ EVGauge and ECP V4 has a control panel you can fit in the front of the case in a 5.25″ slots where you can set voltages and monitor them, while EVGauge will show your CPU frequency in realtime. EVGA Z68 FTW costs $265, and $35 more for the bundle with the accesories.
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Other additions are EVGA Z68 SLI that follows the same pattern as EVGA Z68 FTW and is a refresh of EVGA P67 SLI. Then we have EVGA Z68 SLI Micro that is a mATX board with SLI support. EVGA Z68 SLI and EVGA Z68 SLI Micro cost $210 and $160.
Source: EVGA
