Drive and Audio Performance Results

Our drive and audio testing differs a bit from the rest of our testing for several reasons. First of all, when it comes to drive performance comparisons, nearly every platform on the market is very close to one another, as most do provide external drive-controllers which make the numbers offered very platform agnostic. And finally, with audio, we do not list any numbers except for those reported by the product we are testing in order to provide the most information possible, as each audio CODEC will behave quite differently, and each board does not employ the same CODEC. As such, there is no standard we can use other than the numbers themselves. You can always check our other motherboard reviews in order to make direct comparisons in audio performance.

We tested each drive interface separately in order to provide the most complete numbers possible. Employing HDTune Pro for all of the testing, we tested each drive outside of the OS environment using a separate OS on a separate drive. However, we do use drives with a fair amount of data on the Corsair ForceGT (60% full) to simulate performance in real-world situations, and I also use the same drive to test all interfaces.

HDTune Pro (SATA2)

HDTune Pro (SATA 6Gb/s)

HDTune Pro (USB3.0)

SATA 3 Gb/s performance was quite low, enough so that I thought the drive might be affecting things a bit. However, I test SATA 3 Gb/s, then SATA 6 Gb/s, and lastly USB 3.0, every time, just as part of my routine. SATA 6 Gb/s results allayed any fears I may have had, with the Gigabyte Z77X-UP7 posting the best drive results ever on the Intel Z77 Express PCH and that by a good margin. USB 3.0 performance is quite average, but clearly not problematic. SATA 3 Gb/s is just a bit low and that's that. There is really not much to worry about with only a few MB/s between the top and the bottom spot; however, it isn't the best it could be, although I'll take the better SATA 6 Gb/s performance.

RightMark Audio Analyzer

RightMark Audio Analyzer testing results are superb. Noise is rated as "Poor", which it has been for nearly every board I've tested, but the rest of the results – nearly everything else – is rated as "Very Good", and rightly so. I thought the PCB might help out with this CODEC and, yes, it does; it really lets the CODEC shine.