EVGA Z68 SLI 130-SB-E685-KR LGA 1155 Intel Z68 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Intel Motherboard

Pros: Good looking board, lots of features I like. Works well when it works.

Cons: Not for the novice, this mobo is high maintenance to say the least. It's picky with memory, hdds, and PSU's. I have an i7 2600k, gave it a slight overclock, seems to be working great now, running 2 - 7970s in x-fire. I went thru a few sets of memory and PSU's to get there though. I flashed the bios and tried manually playing around with memory timing and voltages etc. There is just some hardware that this board does not like. As another poster said - compatibility issues galore! Good board all in all, but I would probably not purchase it again.

Pros: Looks good, feels high quality.

Cons: Rampant compatibility problems.

Other Thoughts: I have a Thermaltake ATX V2.2 power supply so I thought I was safe from the "C" post code problem. I was wrong. There is no way to know for sure what power supplies will work with this product and therefore it should not be sold or purchased.

Manufacturer Response:

Hello,

I am very sorry to hear that you are having this issue. Please give us a call at 888-881-3842 so we can work to get this resolved for you.

Thank you,
Brandon B

Pros: SLI Capable, Designed well for airflow, Affordable, Great motherboard for gaming even in this time (2012), EVGA, Easy to build with, and on. Overall this board is great and I enjoyed building with it. (See other thoughts)

Cons: The only reason I knocked off an egg is because it is an old motherboard. However, that means EVGA has had the time to get kinks out.
I did receive a CMOS "Checksun" Error (I assume they meant 'checksum') However I proceeded to install windows and now when I boot the machine I don't receive options to enter my BIOS. I am still able to boot normally and enter windows but it does seem like a strange trait. If I can get any customer representative from EVGA to explain how I'm able to repair this it would be much appreciated.

Other Thoughts: I did research on this board AFTER I bought it (Foolish yes, but I lucked out). Turns out that everything I bought and had fit perfectly for it. In this section I will list the ABSOLUTE PRE-REQS if you decide to purchase this board.

-Power supply requires an 12V ATX v2.2 SPECIFICALLY. I'm not positive 2.3 will work, but after looking online I know 2.2 will.
-Sandy Bridge processor architecture only. The Ivy-Bridge bios update was released for this motherboard, so if you're able to obtain this update you will have Ivy Bridge support.
-It says EATX in the manual, however this is an ATX Sized motherboard
-Memory should be at 1.5V DDR3 1333. You are able to use 1600 MHZ RAM, they will be downclocked to fit the motherboards supported speeds.

These are the bare specifications in order to run the motherboard. Follow those instructions and the motherboard will have everything it needs to boot guaranteed! (Unless you receive faulty parts)

Pros: Cheap, good for when it came out, nice features, pretty, SLI and Crossfire.

Cons: Old, frankly it's out of date and all current CPUs for this motherboard at at end of life.

Other Thoughts: It's a nice motherboard in all honesty and the cheap price of 66 dollars is tempting and I fell for it, I'm going to send this back and get a refund as it doesn't suit my needs. I wouldn't recommend buying this since it's going to be phased out.

Pros: a great board if i could make it work. i dont know much about it. i need your help.

Cons: never turn on. just it shows a C error code in debug screen and this code not apear in the book. nothing else. i want to RMA

Manufacturer Response:

Hello,

I am very sorry to hear that you are having this issue. Please give us a call at 888-881-3842 so we can work to get this resolved for you.

Thank you,
Brandon B

Pros: Cheap for a great motherboard. smooth build. as always love Evga.

Cons: If you don't know what it works with, it could make you cry. New bios allows Ivy Bridge CPUs, but you likely need Sandy Bridge CPU to update bios first.

Pros: SLI, really nice build quality, good documentation and instructions. Also, half the price of Z77 boards when it was on sale; since I was getting an i5-2500k so it worked for me.

Despite all the moaning here about

Cons: Sandy Bridge CPU's only; unless they update the BIOS there's not much of a chance to upgrade. Since they've already started to sell Z77 boards I'm not expecting an update.

Other Thoughts: My rating is heavily influenced by the deal I got the week of Black Friday, otherwise I would have went for a Z77.

Pros: None that I can think of since it doesn't boot.

Cons: Doesn't boot with known working Sandy bridge G620. Tried two different working power supplies and two brands of memory. The board will power up but it will not boot.
Went through the mfg. trouble shooting guidelines with no joy.
Sent it back to New Egg at my expense and they rejected the return because I have removed the barcode to meet the very limited rebate time frame This requirement was not listed on the RMA info from Newegg. ;().!
Newegg suggests I send it to the mfg but they already told me to ship it back to New egg since it was within their 30 day window.

Other Thoughts: I don't mind getting a defective part once in a while , but since this board is known to have major issues why did Newegg sell it to me in the first place?

Manufacturer Response:

Hi,

I am very sorry to hear that you are having this issue. Please give us a call at 888-880-3842 so we can help get this resolved for you.

Thanks,
Brandon B

Pros: Looks nice.

Cons: Isn't compatible with Ivy bridge processors. Isn't compatible with all Sandy bridge processors. I found out about the Ivy bridge support after I had already purchased the processor. I returned it for a Sandy bridge and it still gives the error 55 (memory not installed). Called support and they told me that my new Sandy bridge processor is not compatible.

Other Thoughts: Super frustrating. This time I'll keep the processor and send back the motherboard.

Pros: Very cheap for the features (when I bought it at 60)
USB3/SATA6/ESATA
Lots of PCIE slots
Firewire (not many boards have this anymore)
Debug/POST 7 segment LCD
Dual GigE
Supports overclocking

Cons: Not Ivy Bridge compatible
Picky about power supplies

Other Thoughts: This board is great if you know what you're looking for. I coupled this with a 2700k so I have no need for Ivy. I got lucky and my Corsair CX500 psu booted this board right up. I did hit a post code 45 when I put the thing together, but I discovered I was using a bad memory module and a different one booted the system up perfectly.