ASRock have released a range of motherboards for X79, and today we have looked at the X79 Extreme4-M, a microATX board with all the Sandy Bridge-E credentials, and its bigger brother, the X79 Extreme4. Along with this, ASRock are also planning on releasing an Extreme3, Extreme7, and an ultimate version Extreme9, all at various price points.
It is good to see a microATX board on the X79 market, despite the host of problems that it presents – the premium of space, the ability to use (and abuse) all the additional benefits X79 to offer, and the potential of making the board a lot cheaper than the full ATX brethren. ASRock are offering the X79 Extreme4-M for one cent less than $225 (MSRP), compared to the larger X79 Extreme4, which weighs in at just less than $235 (MSRP). In an age of austerity, a few dollars here and there can count, even if you splash out on an X79 and Sandy Bridge-E system.
However, there are points to note. These two boards are considerably cheaper than the ASUS P9X79-V Pro and Intel DX79SI I have reviewed so far. So, as you would expect, there are a couple of features you might not get. The biggest one to note is the memory – while on all the boards we have quad channel, for the smaller sum of money you only get one DIMM per channel, compared to two DIMMs per channel on the more expensive boards. As a personal option, this affects fewer people than you may think – of all the people who are going X79, enthusiasts (as opposed to professionals) rarely need more than 16 GB of memory. Given the low cost of 4GB DDR3 sticks, these ASRock boards can easily be filled with memory at little cost. If you need more, you could look at 8 GB sticks just coming onto the market, otherwise yes, you will need two DIMMs per channel motherboard.
In comparison between the two ASRock boards, you get a lot more than $10 difference in terms of extras on the full size ATX X79 Extreme4 than the price difference suggests – more PCIe slots and space for add-on cards, more SATA 6 Gbps ports and more in the box in terms of cables and SLI connectors. Thanks to the extra space, the PCIe x16 slots are also more beneficial for airflow in dual GPU setups on the Extreme4. As a result, you may see the mATX Extreme4-M being sold with small discounts (e.g. currently $219 at time of writing, saving £6) to reflect the true difference.
The Extreme4 also performs slightly better, especially in the memory overclock, though that may be down to the updated BIOS version which ASRock had not released for the Extreme4-M at the time of testing. Nevertheless, the Extreme4 would be my choice if I had to choose between these two boards for performance. If you absolutely need a mATX board, the Extreme4-M is not a bad choice. However, you will not be pushing any of the boards too hard on a CPU overclock. And for the noise conscious, you will definitely have to change that default CPU fan setting of a constant 100%.
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