ASRock Z87 Extreme 4 and Z87 Pro 3 Unboxed

[DalekDoc]

The ASRock Z87 Extreme 4 is a mainstream motherboard which is currently listed for 999 Chinese Yuan or $160.99 US. Since Chinese prices are on the high side, we expect the retail price in US would be around $149.99 US. The motherboard makes use of the Z87 PCH and has a 12 Phase VRM fitted with top of the line components and golden solid state capacitors. It has a brown dual layer PCB and the electrical components along with PCH are cooled off by three separate heatsinks. The Z87 Extreme 4 comes with four DDR3 DIMM slots which support upto 32 GB of memory with rated speeds upto 2666 MHz+ O.C.

Expansion slots include three PCI-e 3.0 x16, two PCI-e 3.0 x1 and two legacy PCI slots. You can note the ASRock XFast RAM, XFast USB and XFast LAN labels near the expansion slots which have been advertised since ASRock’s 7- series motherboards. For storage there are 8 SATA 6GB/s ports near which two USB 3.0 headers are located offering upto 4 USB 3.0 ports. The motherboard has a limited amount of onboard features which include Power on/off, reset switch and a DEBUG LED. The rear I/O panel on the Z87 Extreme 4 includes 6 USB 3.0 ports, dual HDMI, Display port, E-SATA, DVI, VGA, 8.1 Channel audio powered by Sound Blaster core “Purity Sound” chip, Gigabit LAN and a PS/2 port

The other motherboard that got listed is the Z87 Pro 3 which is a cut down version of the Extreme 4. It is listed for 699 which amounts to $110.99 US, the price would end up around $99.99 officially. It comes with only four phase and a single heatsink over them. The CPU is still fed power through an 8-Pin connector, the PCH sits beneath large heatsink. Expansion slots include a single PCI-e 3.0 x16 slot, three PCI-e 3.0 x1 and two PCI legacy slots.

Storage is offered through 6 USB 3.0 connectors while I/O includes HDMI, VGA, DVI, 6 Channel Audio, Gigabit LAN interface. Both motherboards would officially launch in the first week of June.

Read more: http://wccftech.com/asrock-z87-extreme-4-z87/

 

 

[SKOONJar]

I like the direction asrock is taking there boards very simple yet feature packed. If I hadn't got the deal on my msi z77 board I would have gone with a asrock.

[Rommer2258]

i did go asrock with my 2011 MOBO the only problem is the pcb color sticks out in my black and red system 

[RainbowTylernol]

I don't think this looks as good as the Z77 Extreme 4. A little too bland. :/

[AndyCapets]

It might be ok, but the only problems I have with it is the brown PCB and both VGA and DVI connectors that, I personally think, is useless on a motheboard.

[MalcolmSex]

I agree with the consensus. Why brown??!!!!!!

[That Norwegian Guy]

I love new-gen motherboard porn, but why all the low-tier manufacturers first. These boards seem OK, but the brown PCB and lack of anything quirky among the features (like m-Sata or dual ethernet or special BIOS) makes this less than boring.

[GPUXPert]

It's brown T_T . Wait ! might look good with noctua fans !

[That Norwegian Guy]

It's brown T_T . Wait ! might look good with noctua fans !

 

That was their plan all along!!!  :o

[XiaoPigs]

That brown completely turns me off unfortunately. Plus it looks so boring. Perfect for a stealth build I guess

[airdeano]

since the P67 launch of their PCB color hasn't been the fav of mine.

guess it'd welcome the nocua colors pretty well in a C70 desert campaign

build..  always has flaky BIOS tweaks.. hope it is better now..

 

airdeano

[compuwise]

I have been very pleased with my ASRock motherboard.  I am on a very tight budget as I am sure most of us are and this board allowed me to upgrade so many areas of my PC. 

 

First, I had been using an off the shelf Dell computer with only one PCIx 16 v2 slot and a few PCIx 1 v2 slots.  I had USB 2, SATA 3 but could not use AHCI.  There was no setting in the BIOS for AHCI and yes I did try changing the registry key with no luck.  I have one SSD and I was sure I could get more performance out of it with AHCI and I have also thought about buying another identical SSD and putting the two in a RAID 0 but my old mobo did not support RAID.

 

For around $80 USD counting taxes and shipping at Newegg I got this board and just took my old CPU and popped it into the new ASRock H77M board and gained:

 

Two SATA 3 6gig  *but there are also at least 4 SATA 3gig ports

Four USB 3 ports

PCIx 16 v3

PCIx 16 v2

PCIx 8 v2

 

RAID support

 

IDE/AHCI/RAID which boosted me to the max of the Windows Experience Index but I still need to benchmark on a more comprehensive application like 3DMark

 

I have 7.1 sound as apposed to 5.1

 

I have a PS/2 keyboard port for true mechanical keyboards if I wish

 

Also my old board's BIOS had no voltage control and basically no other settings than boot options and time/date.  Now I have HW monitoring, OC Tweaking, advanced settings for Southbridge/Northbridge, every component on the board basically.

 

The board came packed with utilities (most worked, a couple did not) and several applications.

 

Brown is my least favorite color but this chocolate board really did not bother me and not just because it was cheap.  It looks pretty nice but I do agree it is probably hard to match or fit into a current color scheme. It is dark though and may blend into the background.

 

[silencerbob]

No virtuMVP....

[alicskysareblue]

not everybody cares about looks :)  this is the kind of board I'd get, my only problem is that it comes with 2 legacy pci, but then this seems to be a trend in z87, where the lower tierd boards get 2 pci instead of  one and another pci express 1/4

I thought that intel was phasing out legacy pci ? 

[compuwise]

not everybody cares about looks :)  this is the kind of board I'd get, my only problem is that it comes with 2 legacy pci, but then this seems to be a trend in z87, where the lower tierd boards get 2 pci instead of  one and another pci express 1/4

I thought that intel was phasing out legacy pci ? 

 

I think too many devices still use them and it would be a shame to waste a PCIx v3 on an old card. :)

[CobaltMK33]

I've got a 970 Extreme 3, and trust me, the brown PCB stands out.

[Lukiose]

This looks even more dull compared to my Z77 Extreme4-m, but feature wise looks like they didn't compromise anything so i'm good with that.

[That Norwegian Guy]

Brown PCB FTL.

[mgsstar]

Don't really like the Brown PCB. Glad they used an Intel NIC instead of Realtek.