After accumulating a ton of experience in the server board area, Supermicro is now also active in the gaming motherboards area, by providing a catchy look theme, a clean motherboard layout but also server-grade components in order to supply to the end-user a durable product. The integrated Avago PEX8747 extends PCI-E lanes to 32, we have a dual-NIC Gigabit Intel solution available which also can be paired in a LAG configuration, M.2 slot for connecting additional storage, a Realtek ALC1150 CODEC for audio and also an 8-layer PCB design.

The UEFI interface of this specific board contains a ton of options, probably many of them will not be touched ever by the regular user, even when attempting overclocking a K-series CPU. Regarding overclocking, the board does come with some automated settings regarding voltages depending on the speed we do set, but as other reviewers reported with several other brands, the preset voltages are a little bit higher than a normal user would normally use. An issue which we have detected during testing is regarding CPU voltage, which does not really apply our custom settings, no matter which value we would set, but would mostly modify itself depending on the current set multiplier. This is a behavior we have seen with other boards too and really hope the next UEFI revision will come with a solution. Enabling or disabling LLC does not seem to solve this, only that with LLC off the preset CPU voltages will be even higher. Another good addition to the UEFI overclocking settings would be the addition of LLC levels.

Another small issue we have already covered and was mostly related to our G.SKILL 3200MHz kit, where the UEFI did not set a correct voltage value when reading the XMP (1.45V instead of 1.35V), which made the system un-bootable at this speed; however, this can be easily corrected when going on Manual mode.

This board is currently available online for about 325 Euros, which is quite a bit high for the mainstream buyer but since this is a product from the high-end segment, we are discussing a different price range already. If the UEFI issues regarding voltage are fixed, we can consider this motherboard with server-grade components a very interesting choice when making a purchase.

Supermicro C7Z170-OCE Z170 LGA1151 Motherboard is Recommended For:

We would like to thank again to Supermicro for making this review possible!