Gigabyte Z68 motherboard with integrated SLC SSD

Gigabyte has decided to simplify matters for those who want the power of an SSD in their desktop, but don't want to deal with the hassle of buying and connecting one. The company's new Z68XP-UD3-iSSD (catchy, no?) motherboard comes with a 20GB Intel SSD 311 mounted right on it. It's not clear if you can simply dump files on it like a normal drive -- what it can do, however, is use Intel's Smart Response tech to cache frequently accessed data, like your OS, to improve performance. Essentially, it turns any hard disk you connect to the system into a hybrid drive with a much larger reserve of flash storage, which should sound somewhat familiar. The board also features the ability to switch between discrete and built-in graphics thanks to Lucid Logix's Virtu. The rest of the features are pretty standard fare: USB 3.0, a pair of 16x PCI-E slots, and 6GB SATA connections. The latest Z68 board from Gigabyte will go on sale early in June and, while we don't have a price, we've done a little (PR) embedding of our own after the break.

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