Review: asrock z87 extreme9 / ac
Table of contents:
A couple of weeks ago we tested the Astrock B85 Fatal1ty class low / mid range. Now is the time to go to the highest end of the Taiwanese manufacturer with your ASRock Z87 Extreme9 / ac.
It is an ATX format motherboard, a very sober aesthetic with more matte black colors, compatibility with fourth-generation Intel Haswell, PCI Express 3.0 connections, dual thunderbolt ports, dual GigaBit network connection and support for four maximum graphics cards status controlled by the PLX chip.
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Technical characteristics
ASRock Z87 Extreme9 / ac
ASRock presents its product in a large and robust box. The cover comes with a window that tells us all the benefits of this wonderful motherboard. While the back we have all the most interesting features and specifications.
Many motherboards have passed through my hands and this brings one of the best bundles on the market:
- ASRock Z87 Extreme 9 / ac motherboard.Instruction manual and quick guide.CD with drivers.Back, SATA cabling, USB 3.0 bay adapter and extension cable, Flexible and rigid SLI / CrossFire bridges, two molex to connect SATA cables feeding.
The WI-SD panel is a combo of 4 connections, USB 3.0 connections, SD card reader and Wifi connection. We make its connection directly by a USB 3.0 cable to the motherboard and a floppy disk molex supply.
The two cables for the wifi antennas must be installed on the mini-pci card that is between the PCI Express slots.
The ASRock Z87 Extreme9 / ac is ATX format : 30.5 x 24.4 cm. As usual by the Taiwanese manufacturer it keeps its PCB color brown. Accompanied by black and silver colors in the rest of expansion ports and heatsinks.
Compatibility with up to 32GB DDR3 at 2933mhz with overclock. Although this plate we have seen tests reaching 3000 mhz with major brands such as Corsair, G.Skills or ADATA.
We have 5 PCI Express 16x slots, this allows us to install up to four graphics cards at a time with 16x configuration. This is due to the PLX PEX8747 chip that allows a more powerful connection than those provided by the standard Z87 chipset (8x-8x).
WE RECOMMEND YOU Rock X370 Killer SLI Review in Spanish (Complete Analysis)Here are the possible settings:
- 1 card: x16 (PCIE1). 2 cards: x16 (PCIE1) / x16 (PCIE4). 3 x8 graphics cards (PCIE1) / x8 (PCIE3) / x16 (PCIE4).4 x8 graphics cards (PCIE1) / x8 (PCIE3) / x8 (PCIE4) / x8 (PCIE6).
To have greater stability with MultiGPU systems, ASRock has thought about including a Molex PCI connection to give more power to graphics cards. This only includes the highest quality motherboards on the market.
To offer the most stability and overclocking, the board uses 100% Premium Gold Capacitors made in Japan. These solid capacitors are elegant, high-gloss with a gold coating that represents long life and stable performance.
It has 12 feeding phases and the best existing MOSFETs are Dual-Stack.
Double EPS power connection.
We also have 10 SATA 6.0 Gb / s connections. The first six are from the Intel chipset itself that supports RAD 0, 1, 5 and 10. The last four are controlled by the ASM1061 chip that supports the technologies: NCQ, AHCI, Hot Plug and Port Multiplier.
Finally, among the extras we have a dual-band wireless network card (2.4 / 5 GHz), a bluetooth 4.0 connection, a double internal USB 3.0 connection and the debug led to detect any error at the moment.
Purity Sound: This is a combination of various solutions (hardware and software) that deliver fantastic sound, driven by the Realtek ALC1150 chip. What are the improvements? Integration of a 115dB SNR DAC, Premium TI 5532 600 ohm headphone amplifier, shielding and interference isolation.
In the rear ports we have a PS / 2 connection, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, dual thunderbolt, double gigabit 10/100/1000 Intel, e-sata and sound card.
Regarding the expansion terms, it comes with five PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slots and a single PCI-e 3.0 x1 slot, offering a total of ten SATA 6.0 Gbps ports, integrated WiFi connectivity, the Purity sound chip, two Thunderbolt ports, two display outputs in the form of HDMI and DisplayPort, plus six USB 3.0 ports, two USB 2.0 ports, two Gigabit Ethernet ports, a PS / 2 combo connector, and an eSATA port.
Test bench and tests
TESTING BENCH |
|
Processor: |
Intel i7 4770k |
Base plate: |
ASRock Z87 Extreme 9 / ac |
Memory: |
G.Skills Trident X 2400mhz. |
Heatsink |
Liquid refrigeration. |
HDD |
Samsumg 840 250GB |
Graphic card |
Gigabyte GTX780 Rev 2.0 |
Power supply |
Antec HCP 850 |
To check the stability of the processor and the motherboard, we have made an extreme OC of up to 4600 mhz with Prime 95 Custom by liquid cooling. The graphics we have used is a Gigabyte GTX780 Rev 2.0. We go to the results:
TESTS |
|
3dMark Vantage: |
P48031 |
3dMark11 |
P14739 PTS |
Crysis 3 |
39 FPS |
CineBench 11.5 |
10.3 fps. |
Resident Evil 6 Lost planet tomb Raider Meter |
13501 PTS.
140 FPS. 65 FPS 62 FPS |
Final words and conclusion
The ASRock Z87 Extreme9 / ac is the ASROCK TOP range motherboard. It has a standard ATX format : 30.5 x 24.4 cm and its peculiar design: gray, silver and black. Aesthetically very elegant and sticks with many components.
What I liked most about this motherboard are its components: 100% Premium Gold capacitors, 12 power phases and Dual Stack Mosfet that will give us stability and above all, a large overclock margin. Another of its great points is the incorporation of the PLX chip that allows us to connect up to a 4 way SLI / CrossFireX with 16x configurations. Quite a luxury, considering that very few motherboards are able to offer us this type of configuration.
ASRock does not forget about storage and includes 10 SATA 6.0 Gbp / s connections. Six of them are from the Intel controller and the other four from Asmedia. It allows us to configure RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10.
To test the capacity of the motherboard we have installed a GTX 780 graphics card at 1250 mhz, an i7-4770k processor and a 250 gb at 500 mb solid state disk (read / write). The board has allowed us to overclock between 4500-4700 mhz without vrdoop. The feelings have been great. Good job!
In short, if you are looking for a top-of-the-range motherboard, with a lot of extras, wireless connection, dual gigabit, dual thunderbolt and a wide overclock. The ASRock Z87 Extreme9 / ac must be among the chosen ones. Its price is almost prohibitive to oscillate at € 320,
ADVANTAGE |
DISADVANTAGES |
+ QUALITY COMPONENTS. |
- |
+ CHIP PLX FOR 4 WAY SLI - CFX. | |
+ OVERCLOCK CAPACITY. |
|
+ PURITY SOUND CARD. |
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+ DUAL THUNDERBOLT AND LAN. |
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+ 10 SATA CONNECTIONS. |
The Professional Review team awards you the Platinum medal:
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