Closer Look: Intel DH67BL Motherboard

The Intel DH67BL Motherboard that we received for review came in some rather non-standard packaging, so I don't have any comments to make about the box or its contents. The retail version of the DH67BL should include some SATA cables, a driver CD, and all the standard documentation. On a lighter note, that just means less boring explanation of self-explanatory accessories. Let's get into the meat and potatoes of the Intel DH67BL motherboard.

The Intel Desktop Board DH67BL Media Series Motherboard is codenamed "Bearup Lake" and it's microATX board focused on offering the media capabilities of the new Sandy Bridge CPU line-up.

The DH67BL 1155 motherboard is laid out similarly to most any mATX motherboard of recent times. One quickly notable feature of the board is the fact that it has four USB 2.0 headers on the far end. This gives the end the user a possibility of an additional eight USB 2.0 ports, if your case has room for them all. More and more USB 2.0 headers are becoming standard on motherboards now, especially media-centric motherboards, but I still don't find that I use more than one, or at most two of them.

Absent on the DH67BL motherboard are the increasingly common power and reset buttons placed directly onto the board. For a reviewer (as for any enthusiast) these buttons are very useful, since a test-bench environment may not make use of an actual power and reset switch.

The Intel DH67BL motherboard does include the latest SATA technology by including two SATA 6Gb/s ports (in blue) right next to the two SATA 3Gb/s ports (black). An eSATA 3Gb/s port (red) is also available on the DH67BL. This is a nice addition, even though this Media-Series motherboard is targeted towards a more entry-level price point and the very few drives that take advantage of the SATA 6Gb/s transfer rates are certainly not.

The Intel DH67BL offers a standard array of PCI slots for a mATX form factor motherboard. There is a single PCI-Express X16 slot for mainstream users that want to get discrete graphics solution in order to perform more graphically challenging tasks. More importantly for this Media Series motherboard, there are two PCI-Express X1 slots where there might be only one in other mATX boards. There is also a single PCI slot.

The four DIMM slots on the DH67BL motherboard are color-coded so you can make sure and take advantage of dual-channel memory. It's interesting to me that there really isn't any standard to the color coding of these slots. I don't expect them to be all the same color, but some motherboards have alternating colors, indicating that you put a single DIMM in each color for dual-channel use. Other motherboards have the dual-channels the same color, indicating that you use only one color of slot for dual-channel functionality. The DH67BL uses the former method. Just keep your DIMMs together and you'll be able to utilize the dual-channel capabilities.

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