The Board - Layout

I really love how compact these little mITX boards are, and they require a fair bit of high-level engineering to make everything fit. I find what board makers chose to include where interesting. The ASUS P87I-PRO definitely paints a unique picture, on both its front and back.


The area around the socket appears fairly open, but the large PCB extension here really dominates. Considering the front, the back of the socket is pretty open. I had no issue fitting the Corsair H90 backplate on the ASUS P87I-PRO.


The PCIe slot has a rather interesting clip design, and the DIMM slots use ASUS's usual single-clip latch, although I usually see the latch on the other side.


The ASUS P87I-PRO has four 4-pin PWM-based fan headers, all lined up in a row near the rear I/O towers. The CPU header can detect whether a 3-pin fan is installed or not, adjusting fan speed no matter the type. The other three fan headers are standard PWM headers that will run connected 3-pin fans at full speed.


The rear I/O plate of the ASUS P87I-PRO is almost overly functional, with ten USB ports of varying types, DVI, HDMI and DisplayPort, a few audio plugs, the LAN and Wi-Fi antenna plugs, and a couple BIOS-function buttons. The audio is a bit limited compared to full-size boards, but the option to use digital audio output will meet the needs of those that need more than what the ASUS Z87I-PRO offers. The P87I-PRO has six SATA 6 Gb/s ports, with two near the board's edge and another four right next to the chipset. Those using a lot of drives may have to deal with a small mess of wires, but you will not have any problems at all if you only use a couple.