ASRock X79 Extreme4-M and X79 Extreme4 Review – Sandy Bridge-E meets mATX
by Ian Cutress on December 9, 2011 12:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- ASRock
- X79
In The Box
As mentioned in the Extreme4-M section, if you remember the P67 Extreme4 by ASRock, for ~$160, we got a substantial haul in the box, including a front panel USB 3.0 panel and SSD holder. Though compared to the X79 Extreme4-M, we get more in the box for our extra $10:
4 x SATA Cables
IO Panel
Driver CD
3 Slot SLI Bridge
Tri-SLI Bridge (3 slot, 2 slot – to fit this board)
I am a little disappointed to be honest, given ASRock’s previous tenacity when it comes to box bundling.
Board Features
ASRock X79 Extreme4 | |
Size | ATX |
CPU Interface | LGA2011 |
CPU Support | Intel Second Generation Core i7 Sandy Bridge E |
Chipset | Intel X79 |
Base Clock Frequency | 100.0 MHz |
Core Voltage | Default, 0.6 V to 1.7 V |
CPU Clock Multiplier | Auto, 12x to 60x |
DRAM Voltage | Auto, 1.207 V to 1.806 V |
DRAM Command Rate | Auto, 1N to 3N |
Memory Slots |
Four DDR3 DIMM slots supporting up to 32 GB Up to Quad Channel Support for DDR3, 800-2400 MHz |
Expansion Slots |
2 x PCIe Gen 3 x16 1 x PCIe Gen 3 x8 2 x PCIe x1 2 x PCI |
Onboard SATA/RAID |
2 x SATA 6 Gbps, Support for RAID 0, 1, 5, 10 4 x SATA 3 Gbps, Support for RAID 0, 1, 5, 10 3 x SATA 6 Gbps (Controller) |
Onboard |
4 x SATA 3 Gbps (PCH) 5 x SATA 6 Gbps (2 PCH, 3 Controller) 6 x Fan Headers 1 x 4-pin Molex CFX/SLI Power Connector 1 x HDMI_SPDIF Header 1 x Front Panel Header 1 x Front Panel Audio Header 3 x USB 2.0 Headers 1 x USB 3.0 Header 1 x COM Header 1 x IEEE 1394a Header Power / Reset / Clear CMOS Buttons + Debug LED |
Onboard LAN | Broadcom BCM57781 Gigabit LAN |
Onboard Audio |
Realtek ALC898 7.1 Ch HD, Supports THX TruStudio |
Power Connectors |
1 x 24-pin ATX connector 1 x 8-pin 12V connector 1 x 4-pin Molex CFX/SLI Power Connector |
Fan Headers |
2 x CPU Fan Header 3 x Chassis Headers 1 x PWR Header 1 x SB Header (occupied) |
IO Panel |
1 x PS/2 Mouse Port 1 x PS/2 Keyboard Port 1 x Optical S/PDIF Out Port 1 x Coaxial S/PDIF Out Port 6 x USB 2.0 2 x USB 3.0 1 x eSATA 6 Gbps 1 x Gigabit Ethernet 1 x Firewire 1 x Clear CMOS Audio Jacks |
BIOS Version | 1.5 |
Warranty Period | 2 Years |
ASRock are starting to use Broadcom NICs on their products. As mentioned in the intro, it is nice to see a high end Realtek Audio Codec in there (ALC898). On the flip side, with the 4-pin molex CFX/SLI power connector on board in an odd position, one has to wonder whether it is really needed when other boards do not require it.
Overclocking
At the time of testing, the latest BIOS available for the X79 Extreme4 is the 1.50 BIOS. This, according to ASRock, affords a better overclocking experience. The 1.50 was not available for the 4-M, so we may get different results here.
ASRock always like offering overclock presets, and the X79 Extreme4 is no different. We can select between 4.0 GHz and 5.2 GHz in 200 MHz increments, however your mileage may vary depending on the CPU itself, and cooling. I went straight in at the 4.8 GHz setting, not expecting any trouble. However, while the board did POST, it did not want to load any OS – the screen would hang with a blinking carat, then after 20 seconds the whole board would reset.
On the 4.6 GHz setting, it all went swimmingly – the board booted without issue. When running 3DPM (multi-threaded mode), we saw a constant 4.6 GHz in CPU-Z, although the CPU voltage was fairly alarming, running at 1.496 V at full load. This is about 0.1 volts too much!! From this, a temperature of 83 degrees Celsius was seen in 3DPM, on an open test bed with the Intel All-in-One Liquid cooler. When running a thorough CPU and memory test using Blender, the board would declock the CPU to 3.3 GHz when the CPU hit 84 degrees Celsius, and stay there until the end of any CPU load, wholly negating any overclock.
When adjusting the settings manually, I used my common X79 overclock presets – CPU at 1.4 volts, Power Limits to 500W and Core Limits to 500A. With this, I went straight in with a 46x multiplier (4.6 GHz) without issue. During 3DPM-MT, the highest temperature seen was 76 degrees Celsius. However, during the Blender test, due to the lower voltage compared to the auto settings in the previous paragraph, it took about 7 minutes to reach 84 degrees Celsius, and then the CPU backed off to 3.3 GHz. I turned off CPU Thermal Throttling in the BIOS, and reran the test. This time, at 85 degrees Celsius, the board decided to shut off completely, with no warning whatsoever. This must be an ultimate temperature failsafe for the board, however it does leave us with what to suggest with an appropriate overclock. With an ASRock it seems, it all depends on your cooling – our 4.6 GHz manual adjustment only hit the throttling after several minutes of 100% CPU, so could offer good speed in all but the most strenuous loads.
For memory overclock, we have several options (with a CPU frequency of 100 MHz), from DDR3-800 to DDR3-2400, going up in typical memory straps, as well as standard XMP. At 1866 MHz and 2133 MHz, the board gave automatic subtimings of 9-11-9-28 2T. At 2400 MHz, which did not work with the Extreme4-M, we had a completely stable system with the Extreme4, with automatic timings of 10-12-10-33 2T. This was completely Blender stable. Unfortunately, the system doesn’t offer further straps than this, so we had to bump the CPU bus frequency to see more. At the 1.25x gear ratio (125 MHz on CPU, multiplier was lowered accordingly for the same CPU overall speed), the straps offer different values, including 2000 MHz, 2333 MHz, 2666 MHz and 3000 MHz. At 2000 MHz, the memory defaulted to 11-11-11 which equates to JEDEC settings on the memory. Thus at 2333 MHz, when the board didn’t boot, I assume it was trying to implement 9-11-9-28 2T, which for this kit is a no go.
An overall overclock of 4.6 GHz and DDR3-2400 (for all 16GB) is a respectable result, limited only by the cooling and the thermal throttling of the board.
54 Comments
View All Comments
unixfg - Sunday, December 11, 2011 - link
Maybe you could explain why you think they're wrong rather than just calling them names. They seem to be pretty much right-on regarding the point of having swap/pagefile on disk.twoBitBasher - Friday, December 9, 2011 - link
You guys surely must have got more modern drives lying around, especially when Anand is constantly reviewing the bleeding edge!I would have liked to see what this board can do. It is for enthusiasts after all, isn't it?
DanNeely - Friday, December 9, 2011 - link
Benchmark platforms can't change rapidly. When they do you can no longer compare new scores to old. As a result the parts not being compared typically don't get swapped out until obsolete.Thrawn7 - Saturday, December 10, 2011 - link
I don't consider the thermal throttle to be a bad thing at all. Throttling at 80c+ temperatures is good behaviour. Its a better guarantee for stability when you either have a cooling failure or are too lazy to have good cooling in the first place.Clearly these Sandy-E is the hottest overclocking chips ever from Intel.
Basically, to overclock to the typical 4.7 Ghz range the Intel liquid cooling solution is insufficient. Not that surprising given the performance of that is probably about the same as a mid-range $40 120mm heatsink soluiton.
To do a decent overclock you'll need a H100 or Noctua D14 at fairly high rpms or better still a real watercool loop.
etamin - Saturday, December 10, 2011 - link
I was very impressed with the new ASRock color scheme and heatsink design....until the gratuitous use of "X" labeling distracted me. What a shame. (no need to read review now, it's too ugly to consider buying)karma77police - Saturday, December 10, 2011 - link
ASRock released BIOS update few days ago for Extreme4 version 1.60 and for Extreme4M version 1.50, which let's you overclock CPU 4.6Ghz for example with very low voltage. They updated C-2 Microcode etc. I am running i7 i3930k on ASRock Extreme 4 with < 1.36V. Temperature does not exceed 60C in Load. I always say reviews are so misleading when it comes to decide what purchase to make.karma77police - Saturday, December 10, 2011 - link
4.5Ghz with < 1.36VEJ257 - Saturday, December 10, 2011 - link
The chart say 6xDDR3 slots. Is that a typo or is that actually how it's setup?etamin - Sunday, December 11, 2011 - link
Yeah, that's strange for X79. But it is 6. There is also a photo of it on the ASRock site.Ryomitomo - Monday, December 12, 2011 - link
Asus also released USB Boost, which is similar to Asrock USB XFast. I'd like to see USB Boost vs USB XFast in future reviews.