The Intel Core i7 is the current king of the desktop performance market and shows no signs of slowing down. At present, the Core i7 processor is the superior number crunching executioner of choice compared to any other CPU solution to cross this test bench to date. This success would be for naught without the X58 platform which currently solely supports it.
In case you haven’t been following the industry closely, Intel is the only chipset producer that supports the Core i7. Pending legal matters have kept nVidia out of the game. While analysts would say this is why the ICH10/X58 has done so well in the market, we technicians know that it’s the chipset’s stability, reliability, overclocking prowess, and its array of features that actually make it “the choice”.
Today, we have another motherboard that is hoping to be worthy of supporting the Intel Core i7. Introducing, the ECS Black Series X58B-A “Nehalem” Motherboard.
Features and Specifications
The ECS Black Series X58B-A offers many of the same features that other X58 motherboards offer. The important ones being the maximum 6.40GT/s QPI (Quick Path Interconnect), 24GB Triple Channel DDR3 1600 MHz overclocked memory, ATI Crossfire X support, dual Gigabit LAN ports, and standard integrated 8-Channel HD Audio.
New features found on the motherboard include a Reset, Power, and CMOS button right on the PCB. These come in handy if you like to use unorthodox enclosures or modified cases. The CMOS clear button is definitely a plus especially since we will be taking the Motherboard Intelligent BIOS (M.I.B.) for a spin to see if the platform does indeed overclock.
Some other features include 6-Phase power management which is VRD11.1 compliant. Power consumption is one area that manufacturers haven’t been able to cut back on as the X58 system is absolutely a performance based platform. That means there’s not much that can be done other than some fine tuning. It’s the job of ECS’ QoolTechII Heat Pipe heat sinks to help cut down on the thermal issues associated with the performance.
Though ECS’s main product page only mentions CrossfireX in the features section, this particular board does indeed support nVidia SLI as well. You won’t need to update the BIOS or jump through any hoops to get two GTX 285 graphics cards online and start destroying any opponent in your path. A later “A2 Revision” will delete this feature, but since ECS never said it officially existed in the first place, then it really isn’t a loss if it isn’t there later. Just FYI.
Some Bundled Motherboard Goodness
There is something to be said about nice product packaging. ECS marketing went out of their comfort zone just a bit compared to what I’ve seen in the past. It’s been interesting to see where ECS has been going with the “Black Series” theme.
The box opens up in such a way you’re presented with a peak at the motherboard on one side and the bundle on the other. You’ll find a cool graphic displaying a dragon with its jaws locked on to a crest in the center.
Inside the bundle box, you’ll find a manual, CD, 6 x yellow SATA cables, black eSATA cable, and I/O PCI bracket. All of the SATA cables are a welcome sight since the board doesn’t offer any ATA ports. That’s one nice thing about going Core i7 and X58: No more antiquated IDE drives or flat ATA cables!
The Motherboard Layout
ECS’ new look is nothing like it was five years ago. Their themes were anything but cool with its mismatched and odd pastel colors. The Black Series theme continues to give ECS an image that has done pretty well especially amongst gamers on a budget. The color scheme really does do a pretty decent job of getting your attention with eye-popping, enthusiast level colors from the DIMM Slots and USB headers to the heat sinks.
Being a budget enthusiast’s platform doesn’t mean skimping out on components. You can see that the motherboard continues to offer solid state capacitors and the more stout Ferrite Chokes especially around the CPU socket. Keeping the components up to date has really continued to give the motherboard industry a more stream lined look and a far less cluttered appearance.
After looking over the motherboard thoroughly, there were no minor or major design issues. Engineers broke down and used horizontal SATA ports which eleminates any cable or device connectivity issues. They even put the battery between the first PCI Express x16 slot and PCI slot. Also, the auxiliary graphics 4pin molex header appears to be in an equally prudent spot out of the way.
The Realtek 8-Channel audio is a basic standard these days. While you may not always put the HD feature to use, you can find the five common audio jacks and an optical out port when you do. Sometimes, I wonder what it would take for a motherboard to consider using something like ASUS did with Creative’s X-Fi. Something like C-Media’s Oxygen Codec would be a nice update too.
Spinning the board around, you can see all of the default connectivity options. It’s nice to see a dual eSATA port since this is fast becoming a standard on many a desktop system. You’ll also find six physical USB 2.0 ports which might be a limitation for some folks that adorn themselves with USB peripherals. However, there is also the PCI Bracket which puts the onboard USB 2.0 headers to work in the event you need more. And that doesn’t take in to account any of the USB ports your case offers once the system is built.
Installation and Test Configuration
With as little fuss as possible, the ECS Black Series X58B-A was paired up with some of the finest (if not the finest) computer hardware presently available on the planet. Assembly was just about as easy as pressing the power button. Another freshly configured Vista 64 bit operating system was tossed onto a Kingston V-Series 128GB SSD hard drive.
Here are the rest of the test system’s specs including some of our comparison hardware:
- Intel Core i7 975 Extreme Edition [D0 Stepping] Processor
- ECS X58B-A “Nehalem” Motherboard (As reviewed)
- ZOTAC Geforce GTX295 Video Card
- Kingston HyperX 6GB 2000 MHz DDR3 Triple Channel Memory Kit
- Kingston SSDnow V-Series 128GB Solid State Hard Drive
- Seagate 500GB SATA II Hard Drive
- Kingwin 1000 Watt Mach-I Power Supply
The boards we compared against included the:
- GIGABYTE GA-EX58-EXTREME Ultra Durable 3 Motherboard
- ASUS ROG Rampage II Gene X58 Micro ATX Motherboard
As is standard practice, all the latest BIOS, motherboard and graphics cards drivers were installed.
Once the system was up and running, I took a quick look at the M.I.B. BIOS. Just looking at it won’t put it to the test, but it also is responsible for the platform working together with all the system components. Aside from the common sensibly laid out tabs, the M.I.B. page contains any of the settings required for injecting a heavy does of overclock. The BIOS is ultimately the deciding factor in just how well a system overclocks and we’ll be looking at that a little later.
Test Method and Results
To thoroughly test a motherboard, a method to the madness has to be devised. Thus, SISOFT SANDRA was used to test CPU, Memory Bandwidth, and all Input/Output features like USB 2.0 and all SATA functions. Futuremark Vantage, Crysis, Farcry 2, World at War, Left 4 Dead, and Mirror’s Edge follow up with expected 3D performance.
First off, we lead with our favorite batch of synthetic benchmarks…
3DMark Vantage
It’s not surprising to see that the three cousins in our test put out pretty much identical numbers in a synthetic benchmark such as 3DMark Vantage. This only proves that the implementation and BIOS are in check. It is worth noting though that the ECS board does edge out the two other boards ever so slightly, but it’s nothing to get all hot and bothered about.
SANDRA CPU Benchmarks
The system’s overall results here are just about identical with any other X58 platform. Differences will depend on whether or not your board runs the CPU just a little faster like with our highly praised ASUS ROG Rampage II Gene X58 board.
SANDRA Memory Bandwidth
As if there wasn’t enough memory bandwidth on hand in stock form, we had to go and add a little overclocking love for the benchmark elites. That’s almost 32 GB/s for those that want to see the Core i7’s memory controller in action.
Input/Output Benchmarks
Thanks to the very capable and affordable Kingston V-Series SSD, we can finally add a little sustanance to the otherwise, uneventful hard drive IO tests here. Granted SSDs are essentially SATA, but it’s good to see regular and future results as well as confirm there aren’t any incompatibilities or strange performance anomalies.
What About Games?
It would be a shame if the ECS Black Series X58B-A couldn’t keep up on the gaming side. Using some of our favorite benchmarking titles, we went to work to see whether this board was just as capable as others we’ve reviewed.
Crysis
This is the game where a platform’s circuits meets the extreme. Though frame rates can rise and fall like the stock market, it still wasn’t enough to be a problem for any of the X58 platforms including the ECS Black Series X58B-A.
Farcry 2
After a quick stroll through the African country side, the scores are very similar and not far enough apart to matter, especially to a budget gamer. Farcry 2 sure is a nice looking “eye candy” game and it will be on this board as well.
World at War
The ECS Black Series X58B-A blew through the WaW benchmark with ease. Even the game’s massive, graphically intense fighting scenes aren’t enough to slow it down. It stands toe to toe with its costlier cousins.
Left 4 Dead
Again, the ECS X58B-A continues to keep up. The results here are rounded to the nearest whole number. For those nitpickers out there, results are really 1 to 1.5 frames per second different between all three boards.
Now let’s move on to some overclocking and wrap up this review with a tidy little bow shall we?
Overclocking
Navigating the BIOS to find the overclocking features isn’t hard at all. You simply select the M.I.B. page and start slowly increasing the CPU Bus which is at a 133 MHz default. Now that the test system has a very efficient D0 Stepping Core i7 975 Processor, any over volting obstacles, such as massive temperature spikes, have been removed.
The CPU Bus was slowly increased as was the CPU voltage. When the motherboard got to 170 MHz, it seemed like it had pretty much maxed out. But, another hefty increase to the Chipset voltage allowed the system to hit 185 MHz very easily and was quite stable. It seemed like 190 MHz was achievable with some maximum voltage tweaks to the chipset, but we’ll leave that tweaking up to you.
I would like to point out that the motherboard had no issues handling 1600 MHz and 1700 MHz memory frequencies. Kingston’s new memory cooling accessory was used just to make sure heat wasn’t an issue. Again, this was heavily dependent on the chipset voltages all around for best stability. Unfortunately, if you want faster frequencies, it’s going to require a BIOS update to get it there.
Final Thoughts and Conclusion
My overall impressions of the ECS X58B-A “Nehalem” Motherboard are good. They’ve disclosed exactly who this platform is intended to serve and it does what it says. In fact, it goes beyond the call of duty and offers extra performance beyond specifications. This is always a win in favor of any motherboard, no matter what name is on top.
Where one might expect a budget motherboard to some how offer less than exemplary performance, it in fact does not. The test platform was perfectly stable for more than a week’s worth of random and, sometimes, endless abuse. The overall benchmarks alluded to no short comings whatsoever and in many instances matched the performance of slightly higher price point boards like those from GIGABYTE and ASUS.
Currently, the ECS Black Series X58B-A can be found priced at $199 US with a rebate. This makes it equal to or slightly less than other similar performance X58 motherboards. As we found out, there is definitely nothing budget about the performance of this board. What it really comes down to is your personal preference on the brand, maybe the color, and of course, whether or not overclocking is something you want to do with it all day. Some of the components including the cooling system just aren’t as aggressive as higher overclocking boards that we’ve had the pleasure of torturing.
All in all, I have no reservations including the ECS Black Series X58B-A in our current list of recommended and approved motherboards.
Pros
- Reliable and stable performer
- Black Series theme is sharp
- Simple and easy to use BIOS (with decent overclocking features)
- Packaging shows some pride and the bundle is decent
- Priced very competitively in the marketplace
Cons
- Overclocking performance is not the best out of the box
- Some components may not look as “high-end” as other boards.
Overall Rating: 8.5 / 10.0
