When it comes to Skylake LGA1151 platform, the overwhelming bulk of our coverage has been focused on the Z170 chipset. The reasons for that are numerous, it is the only chipset on which overclocking is enabled, it supports the highest number of PCI-E lanes and PCI-E slots, it can handle more native USB 2.0/3.0 ports, and it also features RAID capabilities. These are all great selling points in favour of the Z170 PCH, but that single chip can cost motherboard manufacturers up to $47. That is a pretty hefty piece of the pie when you're trying to build a motherboard with a $100 to $130 price tag. This is where Intel's more mass-market chipsets come into play.

While there are numerous other consumer chipset options - Q170, H170, B150, H110 - it is the B150 PCH that has been most widely adopted by the motherboard industry as the lower-priced alternative to the Z170 models. While the end result is motherboards that cost less money, they also have less capabilities. As mentioned above, the biggest drawback is the total lack of overclocking, which is highlighted by the fact that even the memory speed is locked to DDR4-2133.

Another noteworthy restriction is the fact that the CPU's sixteen PCI-E 3.0 lanes cannot be split across multiple PCI-E slots, so they are all directed to the first PCI-E x16 slot that usually houses the graphics card. Not only does this preclude any multiple GPU configurations, but it means that the remaining PCI-E slots and high speed I/O interfaces must derive their PCI-E lanes from the B150 PCH. While the Z170 PCH has 20 of its own PCI-E lanes, the B150 only has 8, so there can be bandwidth constraints as you will see later on in this review.