With the release of the 4th Generation Core
CPU, aka Haswell, Intel has released the latest reason to reach for your back
pocket: the Socket 1150 design. Just five pins separate this from the physical
design of the last generation of Socket 1155 boards, but Haswell’s radical
reshaping of its power design and I/0 structures are justifications for the
change. Sadly, this means you’re going to need an entirely new motherboard if
you want to use Intel’s latest chips.
If you’re expecting this Series 8 chipset
to be a massive upgrade from the Series 7, you’re going to be sorely
disappointed; just like Haswell’s CPU performance, this is an incremental
improvement over the prior generation. The number of USB 3.0 ports natively
supported has increased to six, while integrated graphics users can look
forward to using three independent displays. DisplayPort 1.2 is also included,
though plebs like us will probably stick with HDMI for the time being. Storage Kings
will also appreciate the increase to six SATA 6GBb/s ports, with most
motherboard manufacturers using third party controllers to add a couple more.
Other than a few power saving features, that’s about it for improvements you’ll
notice.
Version 1 of the Series 8 chipset had a bug
that caused USB 3.0 devices to wig out when the PC woke from sleep, but Intel
has since resolved the issue in the C2 version of the chipset.
We’ve sourced a healthy range of PC
gamer-focused boards from the major manufacturers to see which one fits the
bill. Note that all of these boards use the Z87 chipset, just one of several in
the Series 8 range. This is the premo edition, aimed at enthusiasts, with top
tier performance and over-clocking. To our surprise, we noticed some rather
large performance differences amongst the many samples, something that we
really hadn’t expected. A motherboard is a motherboard is a motherboard, or so
we thought, but as you’ll see the choice of PC backbone can influence overall
system performance by 10% or more. All motherboards were updated to the latest
publically available BIOS at the time of testing, and benchmarked with an
i7-4770, 2 x 4GB of Patriot memory at 2133MHz, a Radeon HD 7970 and a Corsair
Neutron 256GB SSD. Onboard audio was tested with a variety of music and games
piped through a set of premium Audio Technica ATH-A700s. Game tests were run at
low detail, to ensure the GPU wasn’t the bottleneck.
High scored all around
You might notice an abundance of high
scores on the following reviews. We certainly did, but we can’t artificially
mark scores down when the products are all such high quality. It can be
explained by the fact that we asked the most respected motherboard
manufacturers to send their best products – with decades of experience poured
into each platform, it’s no surprise they’re all superior products. However,
they’re all rather different in their scope and purpose, so it’s still worth
seeing which the right one for your specific needs is.
ASRock Z87 Extreme4
No nonsense and to the point
Price: $205
This spin-off company from ASUS knows how
to deliver quality products at absolutely rock-bottom price, and the Z87
Extreme4 is no exception. It’s by far the cheapest board in the roundup, yet
has everything a basic gaming PC could need. There are plenty of expansion
slots, with three full lengths PCIe x16 slots ready for SLI or CrossFire, twin
PCIe 2.0 x1 slots, and two PCI slots for those hanging onto old Sound Blasters
or Wi-Fi cards.
ASRock
Z87 Extreme4
While the audio is based around the
relatively cheap Realtek ALC1150 chip, it’s been EMF shielded and beefed up
with quality amps and components. During testing, we didn’t notice any hissing,
though Realtek’s trademark flat tone was still evident. Interestingly ASRock
has added HDMI in, a rare feature on motherboards and something video cappers
will love. An extra two SATA 6 GB/s connections are included in addition to
Intel’s six, along with an additional four USB 3.0 ports on top of the usual
six.
Unfortunately, lackluster memory performance
hurt this board’s overall benchmarks, posting some of the slowest results in
the test. As a result, we’d only suggest the Z87 Extreme4 to those on the
tightest of budgets, who value features over frame rates.
Verdict: 7/10
·
An excellent feature set and price is let down
by lack sure overall performance
·
Affordable gaming board
·
Good onboard audio
·
Well specced
·
Very poor memory performance
·
Slowest overall game performance
ASUS Maximus VI Extreme
Built for the Bunker
Price: $480
If you don’t have a tank of liquid nitrogen
under your benchmarking desk, this is probably bot the motherboard for you.
Designed for the extreme tweaking, this award-winning board took out 10 of the
11 awards at Corsair’s pre-Computex 2012 overclocking competition. Even we were
a little scared by the plethora of overclocking options in the BIOS. It comes
with a remote control-sized box called the OC Panel, which brings all of the
usual voltage and other onboard overclocking features to a central, easy to use
location, perfect for those high-pressure overclocking events.
ASUS
Maximus VI Extreme
If you do decide to use it purely for PC
gaming, it’s got plenty of extras worth considering. The PLX chip necessary for
four-way SLI or CrossFire is included, and there’s also an 802.11ac/Bluetooth
4.0 /mPCIe Combo II card. Sadly the audio solution is rather mediocre for this
price point. Given the high price, we expected excellent performance, but a
couple of average results dragged the higher speed benchmarks down. Still, if
you’ve got money to burn and need the ultimate over-clocker, look no further.
But if you’re looking for a gaming board, there are better options for a lot
less moolah.
Verdict: 8/10
·
If you want the ultimate overclocking board, the
Extreme is the pricey answer to your needs.
·
Incredibly deep BIOS
·
4 ways SLI/CrossFire
·
8802.11ac/Bluetooth/mPCIe combo card
·
Very expensive
·
Lackluster audio solution
·
A few odd benchmark results
ASUS Maximus VI Hero
Half-price Hero
Price: $285
ASUS’s Republic of Gamer products rarely
fail to impress, but their premium feature set is usually matched by a sizeable
price tag. The Hero is a new strategy from the company, delivering most of the
goods at a more reasonable price. It’s still a little bit more expensive than
competing gamer boards, but ASUS has decked it out with plenty of goodies.
ASUS
Maximus VI Hero
The biggest difference compared to other
ROG boards is few PCIe slots, with twin PCIe 3.0 x 16, one PCIe 2.0 x 16 and 3
PCIe 2.0 x1. That’s still plenty for a dual SLI or CrossFire board, but it
can’t handle triple or quad GPUS. The BIOS is almost identical to the Extreme,
with an insane amount of new tweaking options; if only the manual better
explained them. The audio solution has been beefed up over the Extreme, with
ASUS’s SupermeFX solution, which we believe is the Realtek ALC1150 with better
EMF shielding, as well as higher quality amps and capacitors.
Performance was exceptional, taking the
lead in several of our tests. It’s still a little pricey for our liking, but
that should drop in a month or two but even at today’s price this is an
excellent basis for any high-end gaming PC.
Verdict: 9/10
·
Republic of Gamers quality at a much reduced
price. Sure sounds like a great idea to us!
·
Rich feature set
·
Solid onboard audio
·
Includes all the things
·
No PCI slots
·
Not the best audio quality
