Review Conclusion of ASRock X58 Extreme Intel X58+ICH10R Core i7 Mainboard

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Review Conclusion of ASRock X58 Extreme Intel X58+ICH10R Core i7 Mainboard
Bluetooth 2 Jul 2009

Conclusion

ASRock X58 Extreme is probably the latest X58 board to add onto the pool of mainboards readily available in the mass market. Although it came a bit late compared to the highest end X58 SuperComputer, the X58 Extreme does have it's impressive array of functionalities that is missing from the X58 SuperComputer as we have mentioned in the start of this review. e.g. TPM, Power On/Off, Clear Cmos, Dr Debug. These are features that needs to be present in today's DIY boards. Most importantly, it also features support for OC DDR3-2000 and a V8 Power Phase design and Power eSATA ports. It is also already Windows 7 Hardware Ready. Thus you will be assured of support for windows 7 when it is launched. Other features on this board include Instant Boot to boot up to Windows in 4secs, a new feature Instant Flash. Instant Flash can be done within the BIOS Screen and it will search the attached HDD or USB devices for the BIOS and automatically flash it. The board also supports I.E.S, OC Tuner and Smart BIOS.

Performance wise, the board performs quite similarly to the other X58 board we compared with. The good thing about it is that if we enabled a higher cpu:ram ratio, we were able to o/c the ram to DDR3-1875. We tried to run our Kingston ram at DDR3-2000 at 143x24, it failed. This should be a ram issue.

Installing this board is way easier than the X58 SuperComputer. The AUX 8 pin power plug is no longer blocked. The Power Switches, Clear Cmos and Debug LED also help in troubleshooting the system. AS it only has 3 full length PCIe slots, it should support up to 3 way SLI or CrossFire.

The BIOS options are quite substantial for the overclockers. One thing i like is the EZ OC feature. You can just click on it and it will load the necessary tested timings to run the processor at the rated speed e.g. 3.6GHz, 3.7GHz ~ 4.0GHz without you needing to know how to lower the QPI, what is the best voltage, DIMM speeds, DIMM voltage. Of course, you can DIY if you wish. You can also save your own custom settings in the BIOS for different system scenarios.

In terms of overclocking, the BIOS included a large range of FSB and voltage options available. You can see the BIOS options here. The CPU we have Engineering sample, we aready knew it's BCLK can't be pushed as high as 200MHz. In fact, we managed to do only 3.8GHz if we were to push the BCLK with a lower multiplier of 20x with voltages bumped up.

Instead, we increased the multiplier to 30X and use a small BCLK setting. We managed to see how high this processor can reach by AIR COOL. The max reached is 4.065GHz (30x136MHz) with the help of OC Tuner.

In conclusion, the ASRock X58 Extreme is performs just as good as the X58 SuperComputer. I particular like the OC features and the switches which were missing on the original design. If you have better CPU and ram module, I am sure this board will be able to run at better ram timings since DDR3-2133 is selectable from the BIOS. If you do not need Quad CF/SLI, this board should be enough for your DIY needs.

BIOS used : P1.00.

Discuss

Pros

IES
Wide range of FSB
ASRock OC Tuner
Instant Boot
Debug LED
Clr Cmos switch, Power Button

Cons

3 PCIe Slots

Ratings

Here are my ratings out of 10.

Category	Score
Performance	10 / 10
Features	10 / 10
Ease Of Installation	10 / 10
Overclocking Features	9 / 10
Documentation	7 / 10
Packaging	8 / 10
Cost / Performance	9 / 10
Overall Rating :	9 / 10

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