ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Motherboard Review @ [H]

While it has been stated many, MANY times that the broken PCI-E slot was not used in the review, I feel that the fact that it was broken period means that it slipped through proper QC. That alone means that no one is sure that the PCI-E was the ONLY dysfunctional part.

But at the same time, and using the same principle, one can assume that just because one thing is right, doesn't mean everything else is perfect.

The point of my comment, is sure, the board was 'broken', it should, or should not have been reviewed (They can do what they want.), but that has already been taken in account. THEIRS was broken, YOURS might not be. If you want to base your purchase off of ONE review, then that's your prerogative. As for myself, and hopefully others out there, I try to stay well informed before I make a purchase.


tl;dr. This review is perfectly fine. Do your own research and create your own opinion.

thanks for the review
 
wuzupfoo said:
To update, I returned the original mobo and kept everything else. Everything is fine now except one thing that is making me nervous. My mouse wont work right on the new board's UEFI. It was fine on the old board so I know its not my mouse and it works fine in windows but now in the UEFI it only registers Y axis movement...

Looked for a new bios to see if I could flash it but none exist as far as I can find. Either way I have emailed Tech Support about this but this one might go back to MicroCenter again!!
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Check the Bios. the Asrock's are now shipping with 1.1 bios, and they are having issues with USB mouses. This has been a known issue for a while. Upgrade the bios to the Beta bios, or downgrade to the 1.0. No performance changes in either, just a fix to that UEFI

How do I know? same thing happened to me. Did some research on other forums and found the answer.
 
Met-AL said:
It's the "RMA back good stuff to trial and error your PC's problem" is what we got touchy about. RMA abuse ultimately leads up to more and more RMA restrictions in the future. What you were doing was no different than somebody going to Best Buy and buying a video card to use while he RMA'd his own back and then returning it later when he got his other card back from RMA.

It's odd how the motherboard was working fine until we gave you flack about this and now it's busted.

Good luck with your PC. Once you get it working, it will be one heck of a fast PC.
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Well, it's a bit of moot point. But they're not really similar, one is trial and error, which is perfectly fine. You need to be sure you get what you pay for.

And the other is return-fraud, which is illegal
 
Met-AL said:
It shouldn't but it's worth a try. I have read about many problems about mice and UEFI BIOS utilities in general.

Here in this thread, it's suggested that it's another USB device causing the problem. (and it's an ASUS board... that is having this exact same problem)
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1579454

Anyways, I plugged mine in up there and it works like a charm. Logitech MX1000
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Hmm the reason I dont suspect its my mouse is that in my first board the BIOS was fine and mouse worked fine. One would assume that if it worked before and a BIOS version has not changed, which I dont think it has, it would be the same and the affected board is defective in some way.

Btw I have a G5. I do have a random garbage $5 mouse somewhere in storage so I will try that when I get home.. might as well get that possibility cleared up.

Also I only have one other USB device attached at the moment, a keyboard.
 
dlewis4 said:
Check the Bios. the Asrock's are now shipping with 1.1 bios, and they are having issues with USB mouses. This has been a known issue for a while. Upgrade the bios to the Beta bios, or downgrade to the 1.0. No performance changes in either, just a fix to that UEFI

How do I know? same thing happened to me. Did some research on other forums and found the answer.
Click to expand...

whoa wait really? why cant I find the bios on their site..

bah nm, their search site wasnt working this weekend. I assumed there were no downloads available.. which I thought was weird, anyways I will try and flash.. hope this works!
 
The [H] reviewers love Asus. I’ve had many Asus boards, including a P5K Deluxe that still runs but is not without its problems. The eSata port never worked, and it’s damn finicky about what graphics cards go in it. I recently bought a P8Z68 Pro/Gen3 and a PCI express slot was inop. When I went to return it to Microcenter, low and behold another buyer was there returning his P8Z68 board due to a different PCI slot inop. Furthermore, there was nothing particularly special or noteworthy about the board anyway.

Like so many others, I purchased the ASRock model reviewed here last week (in spite of this review) and find it to be a real gem so far, with no problems or idiosyncrasies. Right out of the box it was more polished than the ASUS, with better packaging, a fine USB 3.0 header and front panel adapter, and color-coded labels—complete with text—on the I/O shield.

Not sure why people (including the reviewers) get so hung up on the PCB. Make it as thick as you want and the board can still be junk. Get one “warped” and it may last you ten years. While the quality with different boards surely is definitely tied to manufacturing, often what you end up with is just a result of dumb luck. Experiences will differ from one user to another, of course. As an example, a user here said that they miss Abit. I had one of their p35 boards and it was nothing but trouble. Wasn’t surprised at all when they went under and thankful they did.

My experiences are also not scientific since they represent only one person. Having said that, the [H] review reflects the views of a couple of people and that’s not exactly scientific. I use the information as a guide, nothing more. But the review gets people talking, and that’s not a bad thing since we can all benefit from the experiences of many rather than the few.

(Although I haven’t had as much experience as many here, I built my first PC in 1986 and several since.)
 
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What about the Etron USB3.0 controller? Lots of people complain of the faulty drivers and problems with USB 2.0 devices plugged into USB 3.0?

Some people were also reporting that the front panel USB 3.0 is not working with full USB 3.0 speed, due to the chipset limitations.

I trust [H] guys with their hardware recommendations, if Dan and Kyle tell me not to buy stuff, I won't buy it.
 
MorgothPl said:
I trust [H] guys with their hardware recommendations, if Dan and Kyle tell me not to buy stuff, I won't buy it.
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Yes, because the ADs on the front page from Asus, Galaxy and Thermalright have absolutely NOTHING to do with any hardware they recommend.

All hardware review sites are the same, when you guys learn....

ps: you definitely don't see an AD from ASRock on the front page....
 
Pitbully said:
Yes, because the ADs on the front page from Asus, Galaxy and Thermalright have absolutely NOTHING to do with any hardware they recommend.

All hardware review sites are the same, when you guys learn....

ps: you definitely don't see an AD from ASRock on the front page....
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You must not have actually read any of these articles if you really think that.
 
MorgothPl said:
What about the Etron USB3.0 controller? Lots of people complain of the faulty drivers and problems with USB 2.0 devices plugged into USB 3.0?
Click to expand...

USB 2.0 devices work fine on the 3.0 ports.

MorgothPl said:
I trust [H] guys with their hardware recommendations, if Dan and Kyle tell me not to buy stuff, I won't buy it.
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Nice that you have that sort of faith, but expert, experienced users will trust the grey matter between their own ears.

I'll test the 3.0 speeds and get back to ya.
 
Dan_D said:
You must not have actually read any of these articles if you really think that.
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Actually, I've read most of them, but there's only so much "Asus and Gigabyte love" I can stand. I mean really, your 12 freeking reviews, 10 of them have been Asus or Gigabyte motherboards.....really, we get you love Asus, but is it necessary to review every single board in their lineup and to give most of them an editors choice award? Just paging back a few pages, I see out of the last 36 reviews, there was like 8-9 that were not Gigabyte or Asus....doesn't SEEM biased at all....
 
spacing guild said:
I've had mine for months...it's solid as a rock. OC is easy as pie. [H] got a bad board.
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Or maybe you just got a good one? It's hard to say. I can say that both of the ASRock boards I looked at initially weren't very good. The third one I've looked at is WORLDS better. Still testing with it but so far the results seem encouraging.
 
Dan_D said:
Or maybe you just got a good one? It's hard to say. I can say that both of the ASRock boards I looked at initially weren't very good. The third one I've looked at is WORLDS better. Still testing with it but so far the results seem encouraging.
Click to expand...

So does that mean you will do an update to the article showing the improvements, assuming that is what your results show?
 
Like myself and others, Techspot also loves the Asus z68 Extreme4 Gen3, rating it as outstanding:

http://www.techspot.com/review/395-asrock-z68-extreme4/page17.html

And The SSD Review also gushes, "...it is refreshing to see manufacturers like ASRock providing rock-solid motherboards... Overall, I give the ASRock Extreme 4 a solid and well-deserved 10/10 perfect score..."
 
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Damnt, why do I always find the bad reviews after my purchase?!?

I just bought a
ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL
Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 ...

I thought I did good enough research, but obviously not.. Am I gonna be screwed with that board? Newegg hasn't shipped it yet, I put in purchase yesterday, is there a way to stop order/ or just change out mb before shipped? And I am about at my budget with this setup, mb was 121 or something, any reccomendations?
 
Hello there,
I am building a i5 rig and I was wondering which motherboard would be better, ASRock P67 Extreme4 Gen3 or ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3. I prefer to have a rock stable board even if that costs me a bit of overclocking potential! I have also set my eyes on Gigabyte GA-Z68XP-UD3P. Please share your opinion with me, thank you! :D
 
j[a]son;1038271475 said:
Hello there,
I am building a i5 rig and I was wondering which motherboard would be better, ASRock P67 Extreme4 Gen3 or ASRock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3. I prefer to have a rock stable board even if that costs me a bit of overclocking potential! I have also set my eyes on Gigabyte GA-Z68XP-UD3P. Please share your opinion with me, thank you! :D
Click to expand...

I'd pick the Gigabyte board. What I've seen from ASRock's Z68 line has been less than impressive so far. Quality seems hit and miss. I don't like that.
 
From the [H] review:
The BIOS or UEFI was the worst part. It wouldn’t respond to key commands for setting the multiplier manually. It kept inputting 16 every time I’d set the system to 40x.
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What keyboard were you using? My Microsoft Sidewinder X4 had exactly the same problem with Asrock Z68 Extreme 4 until I turned "Legacy USB 3.0 Support" option to "Enabled". My old PS/2 KB worked percetly with that option disabled though.

edit: I must say I find it ridiculous that you recommend ASUS P8Z68-V Pro in the review since ASUS cut corners and left out the PLX chip found in other similarly priced boards and because of that all of the features of the board can't be used at same time:
The real reason why we can’t hand the win to the P8Z68-V Pro is its compromised expansion card slots. Using the bottom slot at x4 results in two x1 slots and two onboard controllers being disabled. In other words, the bottom graphics card slot turns out to be more gimmick than feature, and may cause system builders to feel like they’ve been duped. That type of tomfoolery might be acceptable in lower-priced segments, but this is a $210 board!
Click to expand...
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...8z68-v-pro-gigabyte-z68x-ud3h-b3,2939-18.html
 
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aop said:
From the [H] review:

What keyboard were you using? My Microsoft Sidewinder X4 had exactly the same problem with Asrock Z68 Extreme 4 until I turned "Legacy USB 3.0 Support" option to "Enabled". My old PS/2 KB worked percetly with that option disabled though.

edit: I must say I find it ridiculous that you recommend ASUS P8Z68-V Pro in the review since ASUS cut corners and left out the PLX chip found in other similarly priced boards and because of that all of the features of the board can't be used at same time:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...8z68-v-pro-gigabyte-z68x-ud3h-b3,2939-18.html
Click to expand...

Legacy USB keyboard support was enabled. I always check this because Gigabyte's knack for leaving this disabled by default led me to the behavior. I was using the Logitech G15 rev1 at that time I believe. And most board's today won't allow you to use all the features at the same time. Their OROMs are all a mess. Later ASUS boards don't even bother enabling RAID support on secondary controllers because of this. I get what they are saying on Tom's Hardware about the expansion slots, and I agree, but that particular issue doesn't bother me that much. I've seen a lot of things like that on boards over the years. Screwed up OROMs for the RAID controllers bothers me a hell of a lot more than the P8Z68-V Pro's expansion slot mess does.
 
The ASRock board (and the Ext3-Gen3) was at the top of my short list, so I'm glad that I came across your review. That said, for guys who are as attuned to and reflective about subtleties and how things ought to be done as you two (or three) are, I'm puzzled by your reply to why you didn't get a replacement board. Was that decision affected by your partner's appraisal of his sample?

A good working rule in life is that one time is chance, twice is habit. The importance of this can be seen by taking a look at user comments for all the Z68 boards over at NewEgg, where there are reasonably large samples for some of the boards, including ones you reviewed. With the exception of a very few of those boards, there seems to be major problems with some combination of hardware and software quality control, as well as customer service, including with the Asus, Gigabyte and MSI ones you reviewed. Look not only at the comments, but also at how few of the boards reach or even come close to 80% or higher favorable reviews - 5s and 4s combined. From all that, I take it that 1) the boards you received that worked correctly might have also been more the result of chance than you would probably like, which suggests for any knid of consistency you should have either swapped the good ones for another or, more reasonably, have asked for another ASRock; and 2) among the boards you've recommended or mostly liked, a large body of users are not having the same happy experience as you - and it doesn't appear to be their fault in most cases. I recognize that following and following up on user experience is a practical limitation reviewers face, and your reviews are yours, not a summary of user opinions. Yet still, it's fair to ask what the substantial negative reviewers of your favored boards are coming across that you didn't.

For me, as a shopper for these Z68 boards (ATX), it's been very frustrating trying to feel reasonably confident in a midrange choice, which is how I ended up reading your review. For the past three years, I've used a (AMD) Gigabyte GA-MA-790X-UD4P, which in its NewEgg lifespan of 516 reviews received 75% 5's and only 5% 1's. In switching over to an Intel system (i5), I'd love to find a good, reasonably-priced midrange Z68 board (or maybe soon Z77) with user experience that comes even close to that. Thanks again,
 
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genegold99 said:
The ASRock board (and the Ext3-Gen3) was at the top of my short list, so I'm glad that I came across your review. That said, for guys who are as attuned to and reflective about subtleties and how things ought to be done as you two (or three) are, I'm puzzled by your reply to why you didn't get a replacement board. Was that decision affected by your partner's appraisal of his sample?
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Built many PCs over the last 25 years, and this ASRock is the most trouble free board I've ever owned. Flawless and without idiosyncrasies. The Asus Z68 was returned due to problems.

The only other one I'd try at this point is the MSI, for its five year warranty. Try one, buy locally and hopefully you'll get a good one. If not then take it back.

BTW, [H] is very fond of Asus, but I just picked up their PA246Q monitor and it buzzes. Others report it, though rare. It's all chance with anything you buy... unless it happens again. ;)
 
5icko said:
Built many PCs over the last 25 years, and this ASRock is the most trouble free board I've ever owned. Flawless and without idiosyncrasies. The Asus Z68 was returned due to problems.

The only other one I'd try at this point is the MSI, for its five year warranty. Try one, buy locally and hopefully you'll get a good one. If not then take it back.

BTW, [H] is very fond of Asus, but I just picked up their PA246Q monitor and it buzzes. Others report it, though rare. It's all chance with anything you buy... unless it happens again. ;)
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Very true. My ASRock 890GX Extreme3 - purchased in October of 2010 - has been amazing. It's taken an insane amount of torture every day since I bought it and it still kicks on beautifully. I'm surprised it still works at this point, to be honest.
 
Glad I saw this review before my return period was up. I haven't been thrilled with my ASRock board (it's great, just not what I really wanted) and decided to go ahead and return it and buy the new Asus P8Z77-V. I'm stoked for it to get here!
 
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Anyone try this mobo with a 3770K?

I bought the Extreme4 Gen3 a few months ago on sale at Amazon, and had it sitting on a shelf waiting for Ivy Bridge. Picked up a 3770K on Saturday at Microcenter for $289.99 - 5% Coupon + tax = $296 out the door.

Question is: do I open the mobo box and try it with the 3770K, or sell the mobo as new and just get a z77 board instead...?

Thanks in advance, -SS
 
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