NZXT announces the N7 Z370, its first motherboard

[HEXUS]

All-metal covered Intel Z370 ATX motherboard features NZXT’s CAM, HUE+ and GRID+ tech.

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[EvilCycle]

I love those, but even for an idiot like me with ROG board, that is too expensive.

[tekgun]

Looks good, will be interesting to see how these review, and last, but yea too pricey.
edit, $299 in the US nice of them to bump up the UK mrsp to $400 at the current rate.

[adidan]

£300+ wow. Not for me. I'd like a cpu and mobo for that price thanks.

[Slogbelly]

I love the clean look that covering the circuits creates.

[Neostar]

Nice but yea the price is way way too high

Also what about Ryzen?

[philehidiot]

I think this reaches into irrelevance. There might be some niche use for extreme overclocking when you take off the stupid cover but otherwise it's pointless. Games these days are not CPU bound in any real manner. You can get a mid range CPU and it will not bottleneck you for years. Therefore overclocking that CPU is probably not even slightly sensible as there's no benefit for the risk you're undertaking. I have got my CPU liquid cooled and I seriously regret doing it. It may be of some use when the CPU starts to reach end of life and I need to overclock it for the extra oomph but the odds are the cooler will have to go in the bin as well as it's an AIO and I doubt they'll be flogging mounts for new sockets on an obselete product which is what it'll be when this thing needs replacing.

If you really need this kind of reliability under load and serious processing oomph then you're going to be investing in workstation kind of stuff. Not consumer kit which gives negligable tangible benefits over a mobo half the price.

It's very telling that top of the feature list is the RGB lighting. Also, I have never met a gamer who cares that much about noise from the PC under the desk which is drowned out by the noise of the game. I find gunfire tops fan noise quite readily and if I'm playing an RTS I'll usually have music going. On top of that, humans are very good at blocking out continuous droning noises and I doubt any serious PC user notices it to that degree. On top of that, most half decent mobos have fan control, having 9 individual channels isn't really a bonus as if should you care that much you'll probably have one of those drive bay fan controllers and not an extra bit of bloatware running to control it that'll probably be rendered useless at some point thanks to a Windows 10 update.

I also find it frankly hilarious that, at this price, there aren't 5xUSB 3.0 and ZERO USB 2.0 on the back. I'd expect this to be the best of everything and whilst there's a good explanation in that keyboard etc don't need USB 3.0 speeds, this is supposed to be a king of the hill no compromise l33t boastathon board. That the sound card connectors aren't gold plated also seems odd - I know it'll make little difference but still, it's supposed to be the best of the best and most serious sound set ups include gold plated connectors.

One last thing, I'm yet to be convinced about covering the components with this kind of sheet. Unless it is metal and attached to them it is not going to conduct any heat away, it is going to insulate the components and prevent air currents reaching them. To me this is a way of increasing the temperature of components (yes you can say the chips are all sinked but what if one little capacitor goes due to excessive heating and cooling over time, you're still left with a large, expensive door stop) and thus increasing the difference within the heating and cooling cycles which is usually the root cause of electronics failing. If you have 9 bloody fan headers you want that air movement to reach the components and if you're overclocking and pushing said components then you REAAALY want the air to get in there. The MOSFETs are sinked but that stupid casing reduces the efficacy of the sink by obstructing the airflow over it - see it can only really be drawn in over the tips of the sink which negates the whole point of increasing the surface area available to moving air.

I could go on. This is stupid. Don't bother.

[darcotech]

So they basically just covered everything to hide components (which will get hot).

Looks nice, but is is too much aesthetics over technic or functionalities.

[Sunderas]

That is an expensive toaster...

[Ttaskmaster]

While it's not to my personal tastes in terms of styling, as I don't like things that look like they're made of LEGO™, I do still applaud the guys for their efforts and offering us more options!

It's very telling that top of the feature list is the RGB lighting.

The article highlights the RGB controller (the board itself has no RGB features, unfortunately) as just one of several features marketed as exclusive, in some way.
It's still got all the other gumph every other board generally has.

Also, I have never met a gamer who cares that much about noise from the PC under the desk which is drowned out by the noise of the game.

Hi, I'm Tasky - Nice to meet you. I game with headphones on and don't have space under the desk anyway.
This is my wife. She is trying to sleep while I'm playing games. We live in a quiet house in a quiet rural area - If I have the fans over 60% it can wake her up, because she's a stupidly light sleeper.
Now you've met one...

I doubt any serious PC user notices it to that degree.

Firstly, humans do differ. Secondly, most serious PC users I know (including a competitive overclocker) are quite sensitive to even slight changes in their fan noise. Plus some of us actually share our lives with other people.

On top of that, most half decent mobos have fan control, having 9 individual channels isn't really a bonus as if should you care that much you'll probably have one of those drive bay fan controllers and not an extra bit of bloatware running to control it that'll probably be rendered useless at some point thanks to a Windows 10 update.

I do care. I have a bay controller, but it only does four channels. Most I've seen on such a device is 6, I think and even then it still had software running in the background.
I also like having different options, including other components (custom or otherwise) that run off a fan header.

I also find it frankly hilarious that, at this price, there aren't 5xUSB 3.0 and ZERO USB 2.0 on the back.

Quite a few peripherals do work better on 2.0, such as my HOTAS.

this is supposed to be a king of the hill no compromise l33t boastathon board.

Is it?
I never got that impression.
I thought it was just their first attempt at breaking into a new market for them... Sure, it has to be competitive and they need something different brought to the table, but I wouldn't expect them to be utterly spanking ROG boards and all that, just yet.

That the sound card connectors aren't gold plated also seems odd - I know it'll make little difference but still, it's supposed to be the best of the best and most serious sound set ups include gold plated connectors.

I assume anyone even half-serious about their audio will have a DAC or some other über sound device of their choosing which in every way far outperforms anything a computer manufacturer can even conceive, to go with their fancy Ferrari-price headphones...?
Or maybe they didn't bother because they also know it'll make little difference?

One last thing, I'm yet to be convinced about covering the components with this kind of sheet. Unless it is metal and attached to them it is not going to conduct any heat away, it is going to insulate the components and prevent air currents reaching them.

Well it is all metal, but the Sabertooth TUF armour was never meant to be functional either - It was always purely aesthetic. Certainly the ones I used didn't suffer in the slightest from being covered, though, unless you were a clueless Noob with your cooling anyway.

[spacein_vader]

Games these days are not CPU bound in any real manner. You can get a mid range CPU and it will not bottleneck you for years.

Civ 6, Football Manager 2018, Fallout 4 (IIRC,) PUBG as well as various flight/military sims disagree.

Also, I have never met a gamer who cares that much about noise from the PC under the desk which is drowned out by the noise of the game. I find gunfire tops fan noise quite readily and if I'm playing an RTS I'll usually have music going.

Now you've met two. I want my PC to be as quiet as possible all the time, I'm not the only one in my house and even if I am alone not all the games I use have a lot of sound. Football and Motorsport Managers both have minimal sound effects and crowd noise, it'd be more difficult to pick that out over a high speed fan whine.

On top of that, humans are very good at blocking out continuous droning noises and I doubt any serious PC user notices it to that degree.

You don't get more serious than office users and if you put 10 machines in an office with fan noise vs 10 without people WILL tell the difference.

That the sound card connectors aren't gold plated also seems odd - I know it'll make little difference but still, it's supposed to be the best of the best and most serious sound set ups include gold plated connectors.

Maybe they also know it'll make little difference so didn't bother? Also a lot of "serious" sound systems these days use optical connecters, rendering gold connectors redundant.

[philehidiot]

While it's not to my personal tastes in terms of styling, as I don't like things that look like they're made of LEGO™, I do still applaud the guys for their efforts and offering us more options!

The article highlights the RGB controller (the board itself has no RGB features, unfortunately) as just one of several features marketed as exclusive, in some way.
It's still got all the other gumph every other board generally has.


Hi, I'm Tasky - Nice to meet you. I game with headphones on and don't have space under the desk anyway.
This is my wife. She is trying to sleep while I'm playing games. We live in a quiet house in a quiet rural area - If I have the fans over 60% it can wake her up, because she's a stupidly light sleeper.
Now you've met one...

Nice to meet you, I'm Phil, resident prick. Ah you see I've always been shoved / shoved myself into a small room away from any other humans whilst gaming. This allows me to rage-quit in peace and quiet.

Might I suggest rum as a solution to the problem?

Firstly, humans do differ. Secondly, most serious PC users I know (including a competitive overclocker) are quite sensitive to even slight changes in their fan noise. Plus some of us actually share our lives with other people.

I prefer the cold isolation of loneliness. Seriously though, I've never encountered anyone who is affected by it. I wonder if we could do some kind of analysis here and see if there's a correlation. Your friends find fan noise annoying. Mine are non-existent. Let's draw a graph.

I do care. I have a bay controller, but it only does four channels. Most I've seen on such a device is 6, I think and even then it still had software running in the background.
I also like having different options, including other components (custom or otherwise) that run off a fan header.

Don't think this justifies the price of the mobo. Sorry. If they really cared about cooling, their sink / cover / airflow design wouldn't be utterly retarded.

Quite a few peripherals do work better on 2.0, such as my HOTAS.

Not heard about this - better in what way? I've never had an issue except with a Razor keyboard and that was down to the keyboard software / firmware being a bag of rubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishe. I mean, really, what kind of keyboard MAKES you log in to their servers to use your macro keys? Servers are down, no macro keys for you. rubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishs.

Sorry, I'm very tired and ultra grumpy today. I'll probably edit this when the opiates kick in and I'm less bitter about being human and not a dog.

Is it?
I never got that impression.
I thought it was just their first attempt at breaking into a new market for them... Sure, it has to be competitive and they need something different brought to the table, but I wouldn't expect them to be utterly spanking ROG boards and all that, just yet.

Look at the price and the over the top feature set, if you don't get that impression immediately then your brain operates differently to the rest of the race. As does mine, but that's because I'm a sociopathic sh1tlord. Or is could be why. I'm inferring cause and effect here.

I assume anyone even half-serious about their audio will have a DAC or some other über sound device of their choosing which in every way far outperforms anything a computer manufacturer can even conceive, to go with their fancy Ferrari-price headphones...?
Or maybe they didn't bother because they also know it'll make little difference?

To quote the legendary films of Seagal, "assumption is the mother of all f**k ups". I have an ex top of the range sound card which unfortunately uses PCI slots and means I may well have to get rid of it when I next change mobo. I got this second hand as I'm not the kind of idiot to spend £200 on a sound card. There is a huge difference between basic and mid range sound cards and the same with basic and mid range headphones. I have never tested expensive ones. My point was really that this thing is all about appearances to the detriment of function and that they miss a little thing like that out. But it IS interesting how you are slamming me for pointing out the pointlessness of RGB controllers and 9 fan headers (whilst simultaneously screwing up convection by design) yet are aggressively against someone having a decent sound system. Yes there is going over the top (did you ever see that Japanese guy who spent about $70,000 on his own personal grid connection and pylon?! Mental!) but the difference between on board and a dedicated card is quantifiable and easy to hear. And to be pedantic, EVERYONE has a DAC.

*sings* Ohhh, I've got a lovely bunch of hypocrites...

Well it is all metal, but the Sabertooth TUF armour was never meant to be functional either - It was always purely aesthetic. Certainly the ones I used didn't suffer in the slightest from being covered, though, unless you were a clueless Noob with your cooling anyway.

That it's metal doesn't help unless there is a thermal coupling to the components it is trying to cool. It's not just not functional, it's dysfunctional in that it will make cooling worse and decrease the life of your components for the sake of aesthetics. It doesn't matter how clued up you are with your cooling, this limits your cooling only to the nipples of the operation and ignores the rest of it. They go on about how they use ultra-reliable brand name caps and then cook them like this. It's beyond barking (it's somewhere near Upney) and an example of marketing getting in the way of practicality. I suspect anyone with an understanding of basic physics / electronics will remove this stupid cover immediately as it's obviously detrimental to function and lifespan. But if I were a hardcore overclocker, I'd look at this and go "they just don't get it" and move along to a more experienced manufacturer.

P.S. Impressed with you use of the umlaut on "über". That is dedication to pedantry.
P.P.S. This was not a "quick reply". Hexus' button lied to me.
P.P.P.S. Please do take this response in the tongue in cheek manner it was intended, I'm not trying to have a go

[philehidiot]

Civ 6, Football Manager 2018, Fallout 4 (IIRC,) PUBG as well as various flight/military sims disagree.

Y'know I'm supposed to be working here... I'm going on the ones I see used in benchmarks, which doesn't include any of those it must be said. I stand corrected although is there really any major difference between an i5 and i7? Does having an i7 make any of these games more playable or just increase the FPS beyond the point where you're gonna notice? Genuine question, not having a go.

Now you've met two. I want my PC to be as quiet as possible all the time, I'm not the only one in my house and even if I am alone not all the games I use have a lot of sound. Football and Motorsport Managers both have minimal sound effects and crowd noise, it'd be more difficult to pick that out over a high speed fan whine.

You don't get more serious than office users and if you put 10 machines in an office with fan noise vs 10 without people WILL tell the difference.

Again, you're definitely playing different games to me and I'll have to stand erected on that point. As I put above, I'm isolated in a dark room away from civilised people and so frankly it makes no difference to anyone. As for offices, in our office we have loads of fan noise and no one says anything but that's probably because our ultrasound machines create so much noise we learn to blot it out. These are in a dark, quiet room and it just doesn't bother anyone. I'd love to put a dB meter next to one actually and see just how loud it is. What people do whinge about is the heat they put out and lack of adequately maintained air con but hey, welcome to the NHS.

Maybe they also know it'll make little difference so didn't bother? Also a lot of "serious" sound systems these days use optical connecters, rendering gold connectors redundant.

My point was that this thing is hinging so much on aesthetics that the lack of gold connectors just seems odd - when you're screwing your airflow for the sake of looks why omit something like this?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Y'know I'm supposed to be working here... I'm going on the ones I see used in benchmarks, which doesn't include any of those it must be said. I stand corrected although is there really any major difference between an i5 and i7? Does having an i7 make any of these games more playable or just increase the FPS beyond the point where you're gonna notice? Genuine question, not having a go.

FO4 is the worst in terms of optimisation. The Creation Engine used in FO4 and Skyrim is originally DX9 and is based on the Gamebryo engine from the 1990s. With FO4,Bethesda tried to poorly multi-thread it,added DX11 and also implemented a settlement building function,which also has things like factories and logic gates. It also seems to really benefit from an SSD.

The problem is that due to its old origins it taxes one or two cores massively,and then due to their attempts to thread the game better,another 4 threads at a much lower level,so there is an improvement going from a 4C/4T CPU to a 4C/8T one. I suppose since the latest Core i5 is 6C/6T its the perfect CPU for the game.

Also,its one of the few games which shows decent improvements with faster RAM,which is no doubt since it relys so much on one to two threads more than the others.

Now,add modding into it and it becomes quite CPU taxing. Build larger and more complex settlements and have more NPCs,and it can start to affect performance in cells,and make the game really dependent on an SSD.

[Ttaskmaster]

This allows me to rage-quit in peace and quiet.

Having a wife means I'm trained to near-immunit from Ragequit and similar ailments.

Might I suggest rum as a solution to the problem?

Suggestion is noted and politely declined. Vodka or mead are generally better for me, but my propensity toward the frequent handling of firearms, explosives and fast moving vehicles (often at odd and unpredictable times) tends to put alcohol quite low down my list of priorities.

Seriously though, I've never encountered anyone who is affected by it.

I'm a musician. I pick up on, but am rarely that bothered by, fan noise. I don't even need try in order to hear at least five different reverberations from the PCs in the office right now... and there's 43 to choose from, today.

Don't think this justifies the price of the mobo.

No, but tech is increasingly expensive these days, so unfortunately little justification is even needed.

Not heard about this - better in what way?

Never cared to learn the full reasoning behind it, but my CH kit fails and crashes and glitches on USB3, while it's fine on USB2. Must be a powered port, so maybe that's a factor?
But even VR headsets can be quite problematic on 3, sometimes.

I mean, really, what kind of keyboard MAKES you log in to their servers to use your macro keys? Servers are down, no macro keys for you. rubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishrubbishs.

Pfft.... you bought Razer. Your problem. No sympathy!

I'm less bitter about being human and not a dog.

Life ain't always grand for a dog, either... One of mine has epileptic seizures and another just got over pancreatitis!

Look at the price and the over the top feature set, if you don't get that impression immediately then your brain operates differently to the rest of the race.

I looked at the price and then the feature set.
My first thought was that it looked like it was made of LEGO™.
My second thought was that it had no RGB lighting on the board itself.
My overall conclusion is that this is marketed for Gamers, which is the main reason why it costs so much.

Not much more to it than that, although I note that at least they're not really trying to sell it as the best thing in history since sliced bread, like certain other "by gamers, for gamers" companies do...

I have never tested expensive ones.

Anyone even half-serious about their audio would probably suggest that this means you're not even half-serious about your audio. They do with me!

See, I *have* tested some properly expensive sets.... and they are GOOOOOOOOOD....... but they're also expensive and I really don't care all that much, as long as my cheap sub-£100 setup sounds good enough to me. I do have this little box thing that runs my audio, something like a SoundBlaster I think, which was given to me as a gift... but couldn't tell you what it's called or even what brand my headphones are these days... I have red ones. Might be SteelSeries.

My point was really that this thing is all about appearances to the detriment of function and that they miss a little thing like that out.

Welcome to the world of Gaming products.
Don't look at Gaming swivel chairs - You'll burst a blood vessel!!

But it IS interesting how you are slamming me for pointing out the pointlessness of RGB controllers and 9 fan headers (whilst simultaneously screwing up convection by design) yet are aggressively against someone having a decent sound system.

Not slamming. Just commenting on.
RGB controllers do have their uses, sometimes beyond just controlling RGBs too, if you're into that aspect of modding. I'm also not in anyway against having decent sound systems, but note that most decent sound systems don't seem to make use of whatever the mobo has, either. I further note that a lot of professional music studio kit is also not gold plated and I promise you those still manage VERY well!!

And to be pedantic, EVERYONE has a DAC.

Until I was actually given one, I'd have had to Google what "DAC" meant.
I was only given it because my own board was being a bit problematic with the new headsets I had to buy when my last 7.1 USB headset died. Before all that, it was never a problem.

It's not just not functional, it's dysfunctional in that it will make cooling worse and decrease the life of your components for the sake of aesthetics.

Again, other boards have had great success with this approach and avoided any detriment. The benefits may well be purely aesthetic, but that's the selling point in terms of maketing Gamer kit for Gamers.
But neither do they pretend it makes the slightest bit of difference, either, which is acceptable to me if I were to buy one.... which I might if it had lights on the board... and didn't look like LEGO™....

But if I were a hardcore overclocker, I'd look at this and go "they just don't get it" and move along to a more experienced manufacturer.

It's not really an overclocking board though, so all is good!

P.S. Impressed with you use of the umlaut on "über". That is dedication to pedantry.

I have a few choice touches with which I like to colour my text. It seems like the right thing to do. I don't use the French accents so much because I don't know French enough to use them properly.... and because it's French...

P.P.S. This was not a "quick reply". Hexus' button lied to me.

You've not had much chat with me, have you?
That was quick, by my standards!

P.P.P.S. Please do take this response in the tongue in cheek manner it was intended, I'm not trying to have a go

Nah, just nattering along with you.
I usually have touches of humour and jesting in my posts, although it doesn't always come across.

Again, you're definitely playing different games to me and I'll have to stand erected on that point.

Play something like a horror game, where you're creeping through a near silent house and the slightest creak is designed to be enough that you jump out of your skin - That's the sort of game where even a bit of coil whine can irritate.
Most importantly, different people hear different things and hear the same things differently. What is a whisper-quiet fan to one person can be a howling tornado to another... although half the time I think they're just being whining fussy pedants for the sake of it, or putting it right next to a fan grille with their ear directly on the opposite side, but that's just me!

but hey, welcome to the NHS.

Whereabouts?
I used to work at Northwick Park in Harrow. They had awesome sub, sub-sub and sub-sub-sub levels there where Medical Records Dept were hidden away, along with one of the few working Pater Noster lifts remaining!

My point was that this thing is hinging so much on aesthetics that the lack of gold connectors just seems odd - when you're screwing your airflow for the sake of looks why omit something like this?

Marketing, budget, profit, Gamers......

[Ozaron]

Play something like a horror game, where you're creeping through a near silent house and the slightest creak is designed to be enough that you jump out of your skin - That's the sort of game where even a bit of coil whine can irritate.

My last PC used to be able to feed coil whine type noise from my GTX 460 into my audio output somehow. In many games it wasn't noticable, but in some it was. Age of Empires 3 was a fantastic example, running at hundreds of FPS on the menus, with higher FPS causing louder noise.
So, in a Skype call with friends also playing it, they'd hear this same coil whine whenever I spoke. I was in the amusing position of being isolated from civilized humans and *still* able to frustrate them with the noise. Because it was directly fed through my mic output somehow, along with voice. Something to do with uninsulated audio traces, if memory serves.

Back on topic, I actually like the look of it, but I don't much care for the platform or software based controls and the price is disturbing. If they made an AM4 version I have to wonder who would choose it at a price premium over, for example, Taichi.