ASRock motherboards OK?

Larc wrote:
On Tue, 14 Feb 2017 14:34:12 -0500, Paul wrote:

| Larc wrote:
| I mainly bought ASUS motherboards over the years and have mostly been happy with
| them. Never bought one in their lower priced line, ASRock. But I'm considering
| upgrading my main system since it's been about 3 years and I found a new ASRock board
| I really like:
|
| http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Fatal...ance/index.asp
|
| It has all the features I would want except a DisplayPort connection, but I have a
| graphics card for that (GTX-1050). Of course H270 can't be overclocked, but I never
| do that anyway. The board supports the 7th generation CPU I'm thinking of without
| needing a BIOS update. I'd use 16GB of DDR4 2400 RAM in it, which is supported with
| the 7th generation CPU.
|
| Newegg has a good price on it, especially considering all its features: $119.99 plus
| $7.87 shipping less $10 MIR, so net a bit less than $118.
|
| Anybody here have experience with ASRock? Good, bad or indifferent?
|
| Larc
|
| I only have one of their motherboards. Generally the
| hardware is decent. The BIOS on mine was a bit lacking,
| but at the time, there were some legal issues (lawyers)
| which were causing the company to not fix the BIOS properly.
| A guy in Germany fixed the BIOS, and I flashed that in and
| was happy after that. (Working EIST...)
|
| Asrock usually has a different mix of connectors than an
| Asus board, so that's one of the things you might spot
| when buying one. I think mine had two PS/2 connectors at
| the time, which is what I was looking for.
|
| Mine had a VCore chip suited to overclocking, but was
| missing the BIOS code to make it viable. I ended up
| doing my own "volt mod", because I could get the
| datasheet for the regulator. Since it wasn't stable
| at +33%, I had to back out and run it stock. At stock,
| the DDR2 on that board, was one of the most stable
| boards for memory, that I'd had to date.
|
| *******
|
| You should be using the reviews on Newegg in any case,
| to spot problems before you have to deal with them.
| Download the manual, and go through the manual before
| even considering buying it. Look at the Newegg or Amazon
| reviews, and see what is known about it. I don't know
| if any forums discuss Asrock. Asus has vip.asus.com
| forum server, but I don't know if Asrock has any unofficial
| forum or not.
|
| I'd say they're definitely worth considering. I'm happy
| with my purchase, and got value from it. But like visiting
| a car lot, there's lots of little research things you
| can do before you buy.
|
| One of my pet peeves today would be "is the Vcore heatsink
| big enough" ? I see a lot of fairly tiny heatsinks
| out there. And my last purchased motherboard, that's
| about the only thing holding it back from being
| a great motherboard. Is a ****ty Vcore heatsink choice.
| I never gave it a thought before I bought it, but once
| it overheated, I could immediately see what a dope
| I had been. For not reviewing that before purchase.
| If I'd noticed that, I probably would have rejected
| that one, and spent another $100 on a better motherboard.

Problem is this motherboard is so new that not many have reported on it. Amazon
isn't even selling it yet. Newegg has 2 reviews of the micro version, which are both
good, but none for the full ATX version I'm looking at. Goldfries gave it 5 stars,
for whatever that's worth.

https://www.goldfries.com/hardware-r...rmance-review/

Larc

The memory on the system, is probably fast enough to deal with
the I/O traffic. The figure is my estimate of DDR4-2400 dual
channel times about 60% efficiency.

16 Lane PCI Express (video) --- Kaby_Lake --- Dual-Channel memory (approx 23GB/sec)
|
| DMI V.3 (4 lane)
|
4 Lane slot for video ------- H270_PCH
} | | 6- |
4 lane | | 4L | Sata |
M.2 | | M.2 | Ports | M.2 (Wifi keyed)

The design is over-subscribed on the lower portion,
sharing 4GB/sec full duplex on DMI, with the potential
PCH sources and sinks.

Transfer from one M.2 to the other M.2, is not
impeded, due to the full duplex lanes. One goes "Up",
the other goes "Down" in that case, of disk to disk transfer.

However, if you RAID0 the two M.2 slots, then the DMI
is a potential bottleneck. If you installed two
Samsung SM951 modules, you would not likely get double
the performance via the two M.2 slots.

And if you use a video card in the second slot, it can
be "cut down" to x2 rate, depending on the other x1 slots.
And usage of the x4 video card (gaming), would cause a
reduction in the M.2 performance at that instant
in time.

Even with the Z270 PCH, the situation would be no better,
due to the limitations of DMI.

These limitations have always been there, as Intel
scales the DMI as the I/O bandwidth on the PCH (Southbridge)
goes up. But they would always be over-subscribing it.
There are "more loads" on the bottom of the diagram,
than the middle of the diagram can handle. Intel relies
on users "not being too adventurous", for them to not
notice.

(Your DMI is the 4 lane Rev.3 one, 4GB/sec full duplex...)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Media_Interface

The manual is chock full of rules about "plug this in,
and this item is switched off". This is due to the
flexible I/O on the PCH. The PCH has output pads
on it, with more than one function. The motherboard
designer has to figure out the "sharing", and this
results in usage of one function, having an impact on
another.

http://asrock.pc.cdn.bitgravity.com/...erformance.pdf

The diagram on page 25 here, shows the PCH design with
shared I/O. The source of the "rules" in the manual.

http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www...heet-vol-1.pdf

This motherboard would be a lower tier one, because
no attempt is made to add PCI Express switches or
muxes, to change the population characteristics. The
processor x16 supports x8/x8 bifurcation, with the
usage of external mux chips. You would see maybe
four small chips between video card slots, allowing
x16/x0 or x8/x8 operation, if both video card slots
were driven off the processor (for Crossfire or whatever).

If that were done (two video card slots, run off CPU
interfaces), the PCH would not be used to drive the
x4-limited slot (the one that occasionally runs at x2).

So basically, this motherboard design exposes the user
to all the limitations of the PCH. No attempt is made
to add extra chips to "pad" the characteristics to make
them "more human".

The LAN uses a MAC in the PCH, and a small PHY chip drives
the RJ45 on the I/O plate. So "it's an Intel LAN", but
usage of GbE on the PCH, chews into that wonderful
sharing diagram.

By using all that Intel has provided, that brings
down the silicon cost for the motherboard. But it
also brings with it, those "rules" in the manual.

The design still needs a sound chip. Intel hasn't
added that to the PCH... yet :-)

There's nothing wrong with the board. Just that
it "isn't as whizzy as it looks". It will make
a fine single video card gaming computer, with
a single M.2 and a mix of SATA drives. Then you
can use the remaining PCI Express x1 slots for
the occasional I/O card. If you were thinking of
doing RAID0 across the M.2 slots, then some
of the more expensive M.2 drives may have their
"headroom clipped'. With one M.2 drive, you
probably won't notice.

Paul

Bill wrote:
Larc wrote:
Problem is this motherboard is so new that not many have reported on it.

I usually stick with somewhat-tested configurations--because I am not an
expert (like Paul and Flasherly, here). And I STILL have run into some
hiccups! : ) I even payed Gigabyte and extra $40 last time around
for a ("Black") "burned-in (48-hour)/tested" motherboard. I didn't
really care for that "sucker tax"! : ) But the cost of failure, as you
may know, can be inconvenient and time-consuming...


The dropout rate on boards was around 3% at one time.

That's the rate where a user finds a functional problem
that requires them to return the motherboard at retail.

That information was collected by a retailer, and posted
on the retailer web site. However, the motherboard makers
did not like that, and threatened to cut off the supply
of motherboards, so the "rating" had to be removed from
the web site :-)

That's the only info I know of that was made public.

Paul

On Tue, 14 Feb 2017 22:31:11 -0500, Flasherly wrote:

| On Tue, 14 Feb 2017 17:44:40 -0500, Larc
| wrote:
|
| I'll be getting a new CPU if I decide on this board, an i3-7300. That's 51W and runs
| at 4.0 GHz. There are 4.1 and 4.2 GHz versions as well, but wouldn't be faster
| enough to justify the extra cost.
|
| Ah...a dually, though that's still scorchingly fast for that kind of
| wattage.
|
| I can chug-down my quads, at their limitations for stuttering and
| latency stuff, with multiple instances of audio processing modules;
| Mostly audio compression and combinations thereof tied to band-pass
| filters. Only not sure if it's a parallel-processing issue or speed
| related, being just the AMD, as I haven't tried it with the Intel
| (both are quads rated for 2.2G).
|
| How about that...
| Wiki [mis]lists the upper range of Skylake at 4 cores
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...ar chitecture
|
| Whereas identifies a i7-5960X at 8 cores here
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...icroprocessors
| (where I got that first 35-watt model)

The CPU I'm thinking of getting is a Kaby Lake. That series came out in early
January. The i7-7700 (65W) makes my mouth water, but I simply don't need that much
processor. An i3 will suit my limited needs just fine. After all, that's what I'm
using now (i3-4150).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaby_Lake

Larc

On Wed, 15 Feb 2017 00:43:41 -0500, Paul wrote:

| Problem is this motherboard is so new that not many have reported on it. Amazon
| isn't even selling it yet. Newegg has 2 reviews of the micro version, which are both
| good, but none for the full ATX version I'm looking at. Goldfries gave it 5 stars,
| for whatever that's worth.
|
| https://www.goldfries.com/hardware-r...rmance-review/
|
| Larc
|
| The memory on the system, is probably fast enough to deal with
| the I/O traffic. The figure is my estimate of DDR4-2400 dual
| channel times about 60% efficiency.
|
| 16 Lane PCI Express (video) --- Kaby_Lake --- Dual-Channel memory (approx 23GB/sec)
| |
| | DMI V.3 (4 lane)
| |
| 4 Lane slot for video ------- H270_PCH
| } | | 6- |
| 4 lane | | 4L | Sata |
| M.2 | | M.2 | Ports | M.2 (Wifi keyed)
|
| The design is over-subscribed on the lower portion,
| sharing 4GB/sec full duplex on DMI, with the potential
| PCH sources and sinks.
|
| Transfer from one M.2 to the other M.2, is not
| impeded, due to the full duplex lanes. One goes "Up",
| the other goes "Down" in that case, of disk to disk transfer.
|
| However, if you RAID0 the two M.2 slots, then the DMI
| is a potential bottleneck. If you installed two
| Samsung SM951 modules, you would not likely get double
| the performance via the two M.2 slots.
|
| And if you use a video card in the second slot, it can
| be "cut down" to x2 rate, depending on the other x1 slots.
| And usage of the x4 video card (gaming), would cause a
| reduction in the M.2 performance at that instant
| in time.
|
| Even with the Z270 PCH, the situation would be no better,
| due to the limitations of DMI.
|
| These limitations have always been there, as Intel
| scales the DMI as the I/O bandwidth on the PCH (Southbridge)
| goes up. But they would always be over-subscribing it.
| There are "more loads" on the bottom of the diagram,
| than the middle of the diagram can handle. Intel relies
| on users "not being too adventurous", for them to not
| notice.
|
| (Your DMI is the 4 lane Rev.3 one, 4GB/sec full duplex...)
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Media_Interface
|
| The manual is chock full of rules about "plug this in,
| and this item is switched off". This is due to the
| flexible I/O on the PCH. The PCH has output pads
| on it, with more than one function. The motherboard
| designer has to figure out the "sharing", and this
| results in usage of one function, having an impact on
| another.
|
| http://asrock.pc.cdn.bitgravity.com/...erformance.pdf
|
| The diagram on page 25 here, shows the PCH design with
| shared I/O. The source of the "rules" in the manual.
|
| http://www.intel.com/content/dam/www...heet-vol-1.pdf
|
| This motherboard would be a lower tier one, because
| no attempt is made to add PCI Express switches or
| muxes, to change the population characteristics. The
| processor x16 supports x8/x8 bifurcation, with the
| usage of external mux chips. You would see maybe
| four small chips between video card slots, allowing
| x16/x0 or x8/x8 operation, if both video card slots
| were driven off the processor (for Crossfire or whatever).
|
| If that were done (two video card slots, run off CPU
| interfaces), the PCH would not be used to drive the
| x4-limited slot (the one that occasionally runs at x2).
|
| So basically, this motherboard design exposes the user
| to all the limitations of the PCH. No attempt is made
| to add extra chips to "pad" the characteristics to make
| them "more human".
|
| The LAN uses a MAC in the PCH, and a small PHY chip drives
| the RJ45 on the I/O plate. So "it's an Intel LAN", but
| usage of GbE on the PCH, chews into that wonderful
| sharing diagram.
|
| By using all that Intel has provided, that brings
| down the silicon cost for the motherboard. But it
| also brings with it, those "rules" in the manual.
|
| The design still needs a sound chip. Intel hasn't
| added that to the PCH... yet :-)
|
| There's nothing wrong with the board. Just that
| it "isn't as whizzy as it looks". It will make
| a fine single video card gaming computer, with
| a single M.2 and a mix of SATA drives. Then you
| can use the remaining PCI Express x1 slots for
| the occasional I/O card. If you were thinking of
| doing RAID0 across the M.2 slots, then some
| of the more expensive M.2 drives may have their
| "headroom clipped'. With one M.2 drive, you
| probably won't notice.

Many thanks for all the great info.

Yep, that board does look fancy. But that's not what attracted me to it. Who's
going to see that in a closed Antec P100 case anyhow? There are certain features I
need, one being an optical output for audio. This is one of few H270 boards I could
find that has everything I want and will support the 7th generation CPU I want
without needing a BIOS update first. As for the setup, I won't even be using M.2
connectors at the start, if ever. My current Samsung 850 EVO SSD (C and a couple
of SATA III HDDs (E: & F work for me. And my gaming doesn't get more adventurous
now than mahjong and spider solitaire. Most of my graphics demand involves general
use and video, including 4K, and some photo tweaking. My GTX-1050 handles that OK.

I've always done a motherboard upgrade about every 3 years, also with a new CPU more
often than not. Then I pass parts down the line sequentially to 2 other boxes. The
ASUS Z87 board I'm using in my main system now is getting a bit long in the tooth
since it wasn't all that current when I bought it (Z97 was already out). In this
case, parts would go directly to #3 since #2 already has a more current board (H97)
and the same CPU (i3-4150).

Larc

On Wed, 15 Feb 2017 13:46:45 -0500, Larc
wrote:

The CPU I'm thinking of getting is a Kaby Lake. That series came out in early
January. The i7-7700 (65W) makes my mouth water, but I simply don't need that much
processor. An i3 will suit my limited needs just fine. After all, that's what I'm
using now (i3-4150).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaby_Lake

Larc

As mentioned, decent cooling with decent-looking outfit doing
recycles/pulls -- I've been extra pleased on select used Ebay CPUs.
(I've never bought from an individual yet...prefer some large Ebay
shops doing a brisk and large volume in the flipping-CPU business.) Be
forewarned, though, it can be addictive -- open a few tabs and go a
comparative what-if scenario -- cost to something new over how much
more that stretches into the "pull market." Were it me, though Intels
can get pricey quick, I'd be curious angling that for a quad (3.5Ghz
is already pretty swift for the electron super-highway).

ore I3-4150 3.5GHz 3Mb Cache Dual Core Socket 1150 CPU Processor SR1PJ
$87.50

http://stores.ebay.com/VR-Assets/Pro...4&_sop=3&_sc=1

On Thu, 16 Feb 2017 02:43:51 -0500, Flasherly wrote:

| ore I3-4150 3.5GHz 3Mb Cache Dual Core Socket 1150 CPU Processor SR1PJ
| $87.50
|
| http://stores.ebay.com/VR-Assets/Pro...4&_sop=3&_sc=1

That CPU has held its value well. Only $22.50 less than I paid at Newegg almost 3
years ago, new with heatsink and fan (I never use those that come with CPUs - just
remove the pushpin clips to keep as backups).

Larc

On Thu, 16 Feb 2017 12:22:38 -0500, Larc
wrote:

That CPU has held its value well. Only $22.50 less than I paid at Newegg almost 3
years ago, new with heatsink and fan (I never use those that come with CPUs - just
remove the pushpin clips to keep as backups).

And a difference of one dollar less than this sale Newegg posted
yesterday...
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...82E16819113349

New. . .for $136
https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-list...&condition=all

.. . .
$130 -- AMD FX-8350 Black Ed Vishera 8-Core 4.0 GHz (4.2 GHz Turbo)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/AMD-FX-8350-...408?rmvSB=true


Though 135-watts for something definitely bigger than a grapefruit
heatsink I put on my Intel for a lark on a CoolerMaster $20 sale for
their Hyper 212+. (Barely breaks 90F, and no matter how hard pushed
exceeds 100.)

12-7-2014
INTEL CORE 2 QUAD Q8200 SLG9S 2.33GHZ 4MB CACHE 1333MHZ DESKTOP CPU
PROCESSOR
Qty: 1
$24.99
Choose a shipping service
USPS First Class Package
Sold by ci-elec ( 15912 ) EBAY

There used to be a day I loved updating anything anytime. Used to
often. As soon as I done with build, I'd sell it for a little extra
and do it again a step or two up. This Windows 10, love it or leave
it for *NIX -- well, it's something else (besides I suppose being
grateful there at least is software still available for hardware).

Flasherly wrote:
On Thu, 16 Feb 2017 12:22:38 -0500, Larc
wrote:

That CPU has held its value well. Only $22.50 less than I paid at Newegg almost 3
years ago, new with heatsink and fan (I never use those that come with CPUs - just
remove the pushpin clips to keep as backups).
And a difference of one dollar less than this sale Newegg posted
yesterday...
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...82E16819113349

New. . .for $136
https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-list...&condition=all

. . .
$130 -- AMD FX-8350 Black Ed Vishera 8-Core 4.0 GHz (4.2 GHz Turbo)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/AMD-FX-8350-...408?rmvSB=true


Though 135-watts for something definitely bigger than a grapefruit
heatsink I put on my Intel for a lark on a CoolerMaster $20 sale for
their Hyper 212+. (Barely breaks 90F, and no matter how hard pushed
exceeds 100.)

12-7-2014
INTEL CORE 2 QUAD Q8200 SLG9S 2.33GHZ 4MB CACHE 1333MHZ DESKTOP CPU
PROCESSOR
Qty: 1
$24.99
Choose a shipping service
USPS First Class Package
Sold by ci-elec ( 15912 ) EBAY

There used to be a day I loved updating anything anytime. Used to
often. As soon as I done with build, I'd sell it for a little extra
and do it again a step or two up. This Windows 10, love it or leave
it for *NIX -- well, it's something else (besides I suppose being
grateful there at least is software still available for hardware).

As a result of this thread, I looked up (price/performance) of my
i7-4790k cpu.
Paid $339 in Jan/2015, and now it is $374 (newegg) and $335 (amazon).
This seems (quite) atypical. FWIW, I've been very happy with it.

Bill

On Thu, 16 Feb 2017 17:10:48 -0500, Bill wrote:

| As a result of this thread, I looked up (price/performance) of my
| i7-4790k cpu.
| Paid $339 in Jan/2015, and now it is $374 (newegg) and $335 (amazon).
| This seems (quite) atypical. FWIW, I've been very happy with it.

Some CPUs are like fine wine. They get more expensive as they get older.

Larc

On Thu, 16 Feb 2017 17:10:48 -0500, Bill
wrote:

As a result of this thread, I looked up (price/performance) of my
i7-4790k cpu.
Paid $339 in Jan/2015, and now it is $374 (newegg) and $335 (amazon).
This seems (quite) atypical. FWIW, I've been very happy with it.

You know it. Which is why I'm also happy with my Intel quad Q8200
SLG9. Intel never has skimped on integrity --known then and I suppose
now as the programmers' programming chip-- and their resale values
would reflect that.

I personally dropped Intel on the 386, as it seemed they kept that
artificially priced too long (before AMD/Cyrix/TI) could manage to
break into the "virtuality" of congruent parallel processing. Rather
broke down and bought a 386SX, the price which left me with a bad
taste. Didn't come back until Intel decided to go head-to-head with
AMD on their low-balled Duron line -- well along in advancements to a
586/Pentium field. The Q8200 SLG9 is more or less a result, at least
doesn't seem so long to me, along with the past CPU pulls I've been
buying from recycling shops on Ebay. Perhaps I've run as long with
non-Intels, then, up to the five Intels, or so, I've bought to include
this Q8200 SLG9.

AMDs can afford now to be almost an indulgence, also the first time
I've kept two computers running simultaneously, both a same-rated AMD
and Intel, similarly placed and manufactured same branded Gigabyte
MBs, both having been run round the clock and never turned off
approaching a decade. Icing for the pound cake, as it were.