ASRock Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 Review

[siopao1984]

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ASRock Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 Review by VR-Zone.com

Today we venture into ASRock's lastest top-of-the-line Z68 board which is in a class of its own; a feature packed beauty with an affordable price tag. Follow us as we take a good deep look at what makes the board what it is, from its unique technologies to what makes it roar. Follow us to answer questions like, how do you get PCI-E 3.0 with an NF200? How is the VRM on the Extreme7 Gen3 comparable to other boards? How is this board priced lower than other NF200 bearing boards?

Introduction



ASRock was established in 2002 to compete against Tier 2 motherboard makers like DFI, ABIT, and ECS. Traditionally many think of ASRock as ASUS's entry level board maker, as ASUS is thought of as catering to the high-end market segment. While things aren't so clear anymore as to who owns who, it is pretty much accepted that ASRock isn't owned by ASUS any longer, but they still seem to buy in bulk and thus we see a lot of the same parts used, even parts that are exclusively made for ASUS. In fact after ASUS split with Pegatron, Pegatron used ASRock to compete against ASUS. To make things even stranger it seems like ASRock is still using some of ASUS’s R&D, foundries, as well as buying in bulk with them. While officially they are not the same company, they sure do have many common similarities. It seems that perhaps ASUS didn't know or maybe wanted ASRock to become what it has become today, a motherboard brand which has come a long way in very little time.

With the introduction of LGA1155 based chipsets ASRock shot through its lower tier status and is now competing head to head with GIGABYTE and ASUS. The way ASRock is able to do this is with lower prices, since ASUS and ASRock share a lot of the same parts, ASRock is able to obtain parts at a bulk price/contracts that they couldn't negotiate on their own. Then their parent company Pegatron shares foundries with ASUS, so when ASUS outsources to Pegatron they can use the technology ASUS used to manufacturer that board. It is not as devious as that sounds, and its really a great thing for ASRock fans.

Yet this Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 has a 3 year warranty, 2oz copper PCB (something pretty much unique to only a few ASRock boards), Japanese Solid Caps (that are sprayed gold to indicate good quality?), as well as some technologies that make this reviewer wonder, are they trying to compete against the Z68X-UD7 and the Maximus 4 Extreme-Z?

To begin the review a block diagram of the Z68 platform:



Compared to the earlier P67, the Z68 chipset adds Intel HD Graphics support, as well as Intel Smart Responce Technology (SSD Caching). Intel should have initially released the Z68 chipset, as its gains from P67 are very minimal. This motherboard also has Lucid Virtu technology which allows for switchable graphics, DVI, HDMI, D-SUB, and DisplayPort are all avaible. ASRock doesn't do everything like ASUS, first they don't use the Intel PHY, instead they use Broadcom controller, the first time i have seen one on a $280 board. They also use a PLX bridge chip to better the use of the 8 PCI-E 2.0 lanes that the PCH offers, this allows them to add another 16x (4x pghysical) slot to the board, while simultaneously running 3 x USB 3.0 and 2 SATA 6GB/s controllers.

[nekkabhabes]

nice find... payter kau na board da

[siopao1984]

A Look at the Extreme7 Gen3

The cover of the box actually open to reveal the board and some more features. The box looks clean, and like other board has many of its key features advertised on the reverse side.



Next we look at the plethora of accessories, everything you need is included, from a front panel USB 3.0 bay, to MOLEX-to-SATA power connectors.



The accessories include:

- 1 x ASRock SLI_Bridge_2S Card
- Quick Installation Guide, Support CD, I/O Shield
- 6 x SATA Data Cables (optional)
- 2 x SATA 1 to 1 Power Cables (optional)
- 1 x 3.5mm Audio Cable (optional)
- 1 x Front USB 3.0 Panel
- 4 x HDD Screws
- 6 x Chassis Screws
- 1 x Rear USB 3.0 Bracket
- 1 x PS/2 Mouse/Keyboard + USB 2.0 Bracket
The one that gets me the most, is the PS/2 keyboard/mouse adapter, since the backpanel lacks a PS/2 port, they found a way to provide it.



The board is very easy on the eyes, the gold capacitors are a nice touch on the ASRock board, but do feel a bit overdone. The heatsinks are very big and they craftsmanship is well done. You can see that the PCB isn't that black, it's more of a brown color. This is caused by the copper in the PCB, and is not unique to this board.



The backpanel I/O is pretty busy, from video outputs to USB 3.0 and dual NIC, we can see why the PS/2 port was left out. A lot of users like to see ClearCMOS on the backpanel, so they can clear the CMOS from outside the case, instead ASRock placed it on the board itself, personally we like it on the board.

Backpanel I/O:

- 1 x D-Sub Port
- 1 x DVI-D Port
- 1 x HDMI Port
- 1 x DisplayPort
- 1 x Optical SPDIF Out Port
- 2 x Ready-to-Use USB 2.0 Ports
- 1 x eSATA3 Connector
- 4 x Ready-to-Use USB 3.0 Ports
- 2 x RJ-45 LAN Ports with LED (ACT/LINK LED and SPEED LED)
- 1 x IEEE 1394 Port
- 1 x Clear CMOS Switch with LED
- HD Audio Jack: Rear Speaker / Central / Bass / Line in / Front Speaker / Microphone
Next we move on to some of the main features this board has to offer, and the hardware behind them.



We really like to see the Port 80H POST CODE display on all high-end motherboards. It’s a invaluable tool for overclockers and system builders. The buttons for power, reset, and clear CMOS are next to each other which is very nice to see, and there is an option in the BIOS to turn off their backlights if needed. The front panel headers aren't color coded, but some of them are separated from the main bank of pins to make placing the connectors easier. We can also see the BIOS ROM which is made by Winbond (like found on the Maximus IV series) it’s a 64MByte chip and it’s removable in case you need to replace it. This board has full UEFI (AMI) capabilities, and we found a few issues with the BIOS, but nothing serious. We do however expect a dual BIOS configuration on a top of the line motherboard, the UD7 and the Maximus 4 Extreme both have dual BIOS as do many entry-level boards nowadays.

The PCH heatsink is very nice; the gold characters are like those on the GIGABYTE UD7. You can also notice there are an astounding 10 SATA ports, the black ones are SATA3GB/s from the PCH, and first pair of grey ports are SATA6GB/s from the PCH, and the last four grey ports are SATA6GB/s from two ASMedia ASM1061. This is the first board in which we see ASMedia SATA6GB/s controllers, the second generation Marvell controllers (SE9172 & SE9182) you find on the Maximus IV Extreme and Z68X-UD7 are actually very good performers and in many cases outperform Intel. In this case ASRock has put a sticker on the Intel ports, saying that they should be used instead of the ASMedia, as Intel provides better performance. With the first generation Marvell SATA 6GB/s controllers, the SE9127/28 we saw the same type of warning from manufacturers.



Three ASMedia ASM1042 (plus each has a BIOS ROM) provide USB 3.0 connectivity, 2 ports a piece for a total of 6 USB 3.0 ports(4 on backpanel, 2 through single internal header). Two BroadCOM BCM57781 provide dual 1 Gigabit NICs, which are teamed through a ASMedia ASM1453 which is a 2:1 MUX/DeMUX it can basically connect them together for teaming. Then we have a VIA VT6315S which provides us with two Firewire 1394a/1394 ports. Moving on we have a nuvoTon NCT6776F which provides SuperI/O capabilities; voltage, temperature, and fan monitoring and fan control. The nuvoTon chip also provides the PS/2 capabilities. Two ASMedia ASM1442T are located next to the backpanel, they level-shift the digital output of the iGPU video into HDMI and DVI.

Here is an excerpt from the manual; you should be able to locate everything:



Now we were very suprised to find a nice allotment of fan conectors, 7 in total bunched around the board. Now when we say bunch you must be thinking, what? Well if you take a look we see fan connectors right next to each other, in many cases side by side. There are 3 fan connectors very close togehter above the CPU socket, and two in the bottom row of internal I/O connectors. Now going back to the row of I/O connectors, there are just many, from audio connectors to more USB, and 1394A. What we are impressed with is that ASRock has placed the USB 3.0 internal connector on the far edge of the motherboard, next to the memory DIMMs. This position is excellent for a front panel USB 3.0 bay, which is provided in the package.

Now we move onto the spacing between the CPU socket and the memory slots. A lot of users demand extended clearance between the socket and first memory slot, because it’s better for very large coolers teamed with very tall memory module heatsinks. The issue with extending that distance is that it can hurt memory overclocking and performance, as shorter traces result in better signal quality .



Power delivery to all the PCI-E slots is very important when running 4 cards, but when running 3 GPUs it can make a difference in overclocking as well. In most current generation cards, like the GTX500 series, the memory of the card draws power from the PCI-E slot and the GPU cores from the 6/8 pin GPU power connectors. Each PCI-E slot provides at least 75 watts per GPU, so an extra connector is required for 4 graphics cards and recommended for 3.



Extra power delivery to all the PCI-E slots is very important when running 4 cards, but when running 3 GPUs it can still make a difference in overclocking as well. Most current generation cards, like the GTX500 series, use the PCI-E slots power to power peripheral units like the memory, then the GPU cores will get their power from the 6/8 pin GPU power connectors. Each PCI-E slot provides at least 75 watts per GPU, so an extra connector is required for 4 graphics cards and recommended for 3.



Again we see the beauty of the heatsinks. A large heatpipe connects the VRM heatsink to the NF200 heatsink, as that is what this is cooling. the NF200 chipset provides 32 PCI-E lanes no matter its input, in this case the board has the ability to either use the NF200 or to disable it for single card operation. We will cover how that works on the next page.

[siopao1984]

A Very Close Look at the Extremities of the Extreme7

In this segment we will take a upclose look at two of the most important physical aspects of this motherboard; power delivery and the PCI-E 3.0+NF200 implementation. We shall begin this section with a bare shot of the board, without the giant heatsinks.



With the heatsinks removed it is easy to see a straight 12 phase voltage regulator that provides power to the CPU. It's divided into an 8+2+2 phase design, using three different PWMs. First lets cover the question we asked in to the intro, how does this board achieve PCI-E 3.0 with an NF200. First let me show you a nice shot of the PCI-E system of the motheboard:



Let’s start with the parts, and maybe you will figure it out on your own. First in this picture above the NF200 we have eight 2-lane bi-directional PCI-E 3.0 NXP L04083B PCI-E switches, which can switch a total of 16 lanes in two different directions. The green chip underneath is the NF200. Then we see the PLX Bridge chip PLX PEX8608, but the PLX chip really has little to do with the NF200, instead ASRock says in their advertising that it helps better manage the PCI-E 2.0 lanes of the PCH. Since there are so many third party controllers (USB 3.0, SATA6G, NICs, PCI, 1394a) that use the PCI-E 2.0 lanes of the PCH, the PLX bridge can better manage the lane allotment. One 16x slot is a 4x slot and that 4x is directly connected to the PCH. Now there are 4 other PCI-E 2.0 switches, the ASMedia ASMT1440 which switch the output from the NF200 for SLI.

Now here is how it gets PCI-E 3.0 with the NF200: those 8 switches are able to switch 16x lanes from the CPU to the second PCI-E 16x slot, or to the NF200, totally bypassing the NF200 if only one card is in slot 2. As long as those switches are PCI-E 3.0 capable then you can have PCI-E 3.0. Of course if you run any type of SLI, or put any card in any of the other 16x slots (except the 4x slot) the second PCI-E 16x slot with automatically disable.

Here is ASRock's "caution" directly from their manual:



Now we made a chart to show you the PCI-E/NF200 configurations of different LGA1155 motherboards.



To begin, the NF200 isn't the strongest chip in the clan, yes it provides 32x lanes whether it has an 8x or 16x input, but it does cause additional latency. The Z68X-UD7 has an all lane attachment to the NF200, meaning none of its lanes bypass it, GIGABYTE wants users who don't need 3-way SLI to just buy the Z68X-UD5 as it’s basically the same board without an NF200 at a better price point. The ASUS Maximus IV Extreme-Z probably has the best configuration; you can have a single slot at 16x without NF200, as well as 8x/8x SLI/CF without NF200, which is the best way to do it on LGA1155 platform. On top of that since the Maximus IV Extreme-Z has 8 lanes directly connected to the first slot, and the NF200 still outputs 32 lanes with the other 8 lanes, it can run 3-Way SLI/CF at 16x/16x/8x. EVGA's Z68 FTW is almost the same, except it can’t run 2-Way SLI/CF at 8x/8x native, but it can run 3-way at 16x/16x/8x. The ASRock can run one slot at 16x native with PCI-E 3.0, or it can run SLI/CF like the Z68X-UD7. That pretty much sums up LGA1155 NF200 configurations in all their simplicity and complexity.

Now that we have covered that we can move on to more interesting stuff, the voltage regulators. The question lies, does the voltage regulator on this board stand up to other top of the line boards? Well let's take a look!



We can see that the board uses some very nice inductors, looks like the same type as on the GIGABYTE X58A-OC, GIGABYTE called them Max Power Ferrite Choke, and they were capable of up to 50A per inductor. These are probably similar, but they look a bit different and have a different rating. Now you only see so many output capacitors, but don't be fooled these caps have a very high capacity, 820uF a pop. Now we move on to the MOSFETs, the Low RDS(ON) MOSFETs in this case are the same brand that ASUS uses on their mainstream boards, NXP, but these are NXP PH9030AL for both high-side and low-side, they can provide about 40-50A per phase in good temperature conditions, but their specs show a great decline in output with increased in temperature. Of course their output at high temperatures is still very great.

There are two odd things about the VRM on this board, first of all the VRM uses three PWM control ICs and second ASRock uses ST driver instead of the CHiL ones.



The CHiL 8328 is a powerful 8-phase VRM, in this case all 8 phases are used and not doubled, they go through ST6743 drivers, 8 of them. Apart from the ASUS boards ASRock is the only company from which I have seen the use of this specific PWM. The funny thing is that ASRock decided to use a 3+1 phase Richtek RT8859M and only use 2 of its phases for the iGPU, and uses two RT9618 drivers instead of the ST drivers. A separate unknown Richtek controller is used to power the VCCIO/SA two phases, the unknown controller has integrated drivers. The two phases for the VCCIO/SA use different inductors.

The memory VRM is shown below, it has two phases.



Each phase uses the same high current MOSFETs as well as the unknown PWM from Richtek which has integrated drivers.



On the back of the board you can see the drivers in a straight row, as well as 3 peripheral ICs. Guess there just wasn't enough room on top of the board.



Here is something we thought should be pointed out. The PCI-E Slot locks are very cheap, and they aren't automatically engaged when a card is in the slot. Users have to manually lock the card in, and unlocking is not so easy.

[siopao1984]

BIOS

The BIOS is based on the AMI UEFI BIOS template that most motherboard makers are using now. The template might be the same, but the look and feel of every BIOS is different. We had a few problems with the BIOS, first it was not overclocking friendly, if we wanted to select a voltage we could not type it in, instead the user has to scroll down the list. Same issue with inputting a DRAM timing, you have to first change one setting from auto to manual, and then go the box below and select a timing, once again you cannot keyboard input. ASRock’s LLC is confusing, it is basically reversed. Level 1 is the strongest LLC and Level 5 is the weakest, ASRock shows users a graph, but it’s very small and you might not give it a second look. Apart from that we updated the BIOS without issues, it was actually very simple and easy, but the lack of a second BIOS chip makes updating the BIOS a bit tense.



OC Tweaker







DRAM Timings





Load Line Calibration and Voltages





Advanced CPU Configuration













HW Monitoring



Boot and BIOS Flash

[nekkabhabes]

ayus kau bossing oi.. ang price ani ron is php 14,000

[siopao1984]

Software

ASRock provides some good software to help you use your motherboard's features. First of which is the ASRock Extreme Tuning Utility, AXTU. It provides what you would expect, but in a fairly decent format, and it is pretty stable as well. There is also hardware monitoring through this software.



It is a good piece of software, but if you are new to OCing and you don't want to manually OC through BIOS, maybe you should becuase ASRock had some nice pre-loaded OC options, which do not require manual tweaking



XFAST LAN program. You can monitor and control some things about the network. Also the system boots and the transparent monitoring widget is displayed.



This is the xFAST USB program, it is supposed to help USB speed.



This is ASRock's Instant boot program, it is supposed to help boot times, but i am glad to report that this board boots extremely fast.

Overclocking:

We had some issues overclocking this board. They might be because the board is new, and it needs a more mature BIOS, but we did update to the latest BIOS. First of all this CPU we are using can do 5.2 GHz as a max clock, on this board we were only able to manage 5.075 GHz, and that wasn't so simple. The issue was with the CPU PLL voltage, not to be confused with the CPU PLL Overvoltage setting. LLC Levels are also reversed; we found level 2 is to be stronger than level 4. Through a process of elimination we were able to pin point that the CPU PLL Voltage needs to be increased to 1.9v in our case to obtain out overclock.



OC Tips for ASRock Z68 Extreme7 Gen3:

- LLC Levels are reversed, Level 1 is strongest, Level 2 is perfect LLC, and Level 5 is outrageous.
- CPU PLL VOLTAGE needs to be increase (~1.9v), and CPU PLL Overvoltage set to ON
- All power saving features on the Advanced CPU features page can be disabled
- SpeedStep needs to be left on

The only other issue we can think of is that we couldn't easily hit DDR3 2133, there are limited sub timings available for change and even those have limited selection. The increments to change the voltages for components could be better.

The board overclocked alright, 5.07ghz is nothing to laugh at, it is just not a board made for the bench table.

[siopao1984]

Test Setup



Benchmarks:















In some instances the ASRock Extreme7 Gen3 comes in the lead, in other cases within the same benchmark each board wins in different aspects. What we can gather from this is that while the Maximus IV Gene-Z might be built for benching and overclocking, the ASRock is built for everyday use and as a gaming machine, as demonstrated in the PCMark7 benchmark. The board would go great in a workstation or gaming rig that needs the best hardware and performance.

[siopao1984]

Conclusion

There are many more things right this this motherboard than wrong, but that is what motherboard reviews are about, to show the reader all sides. We have shown you what has been done right, such as the PCI-E 3.0 and NF200 arrangement. We have also taken time to talk about the short falls of the board, such as the lack of overclocking friendliness of the product. If ASRock is going to compete in the ultra-high-end with ASUS and GIGABYTE, they need to start putting more effort into making their BIOS more overclocker friendly, as overclocking is something that we only see spreading as time progresses. ASRock’s Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 falls short of $280 USD, that means it is about the same price as ASUS and GB high-end boards which do not have NF200s, but similarly priced to the EVGA Z68 FTW which is at $300 respectively. There is no denying that the ASRock Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 is the best priced NF200 bearing board and the feature set of the board is rich. We do see that configuration of the NF200 on the Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 is better done than on the Z68X-UD7, but not as good as the Maximus 4 Extreme-Z except for the fact that it supports PCI-E 3.0.

Where the ASRock falls short between both boards is in overclocking, while we haven’t tested the Maximus IV Extreme-Z, we tested the Maximus IV Gene-Z which should overclock as well or a bit worse than its record-holding big brother. Not only was overclocking easier on the Maximus and the UD7, it was also a bit higher. Even with UEFI, ASrock managed to make overclocking a tiny bit harder than it needs to be, whether it’s because you cannot type in your voltages or because you have to click four times to set each DRAM timing, we think ASRock has room for improvement in terms of the UEFI. Perhaps they could add a few more keyboard shortcuts. One thing we did like about the ASRock’s UEFI was that it doesn’t have the hover-and-then-it-will-auto-click “feature” we saw with the ROG UEFI, which makes it hard to navigate the ROG UEFI. Instead the ASRock UEFI was very easy to navigate. There was however a compatibility problem, but not with our gaming mouse this time, instead with a wired USB 2.0 gaming keyboard which wouldn’t work with the UEFI no matter which USB port we used. We ended up trying a cheap dell USB keyboard and it worked perfectly.



We can easily see ASUS influence on the ASRock products, but there is something to point out, and it can only be noticed if you look at the ICs. ASMedia parts were used for the following purposes: USB 3.0, SATA 6GB/s, PCI-E 2.0 switchs, 2:1 PCI switch, HDMI/DIV level shifters, and PCI-E to PCI Bridge. In total there are a total of 13 ICs on the board in which ASMedia with its logo is written on the IC (means they are bigger than a BIOS IC). We have never seen a motherboard with so many integrated circuits made by the same company and used for different purposes. It isn't really a bad thing, just something we found to be uncommon.

Here is the epiphany moment, ASUS owns ASMedia. Furthermore we saw the famous CHiL 8 Phase VRD12 Digital PWM on this board, which is a sign of ASUS’s influence. None of this is a bad thing; it’s actually a very good thing, as ASRock is basically giving the user the benefits of ASUS hardware engineering, but at a lower price point. If you are thinking the Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 is inferior, you would be wrong. It uses an 8 layer 2oz copper PCB, with all Japanese Capacitors, high quality MOSFETs, Digital Overclocking CPU Core PWM, very expensive inductors, along with an NF200 with a PLX bridge; things reserved for only for the best boards. While the implementation isn’t quite the same as the Maximus IV Extreme, the money you save is significant, making the ASRock Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 a better value.

While we would like to see some ASUS UEFI techniques implemented into the ASRock UEFI, and some better overclocking capabilities, the Z68 Extreme7 Gen3 really is the best value for the money at the $250USD plus price point. You really can’t beat the value, and no product is perfect. The bottom line is that while this board has no place on a bench table, instead it has a perfect spot in a workstation that will incur heavy tasking or hardcore gaming. The pleasant aesthetics of the board don’t hurt either.

[friedrich]

Very nice mobo. I'm not a fan of its xfast USB bundled software though. I'm having problems with it as it freezes my windows explorer and the software itself every time I punch in my Flash drive.
Maybe it's just my flash drive, hehehe.