ASRock Z97 Extreme4 Motherboard Review

[section_title title=”Conclusion”]Conclusion

Now that we have had a good test and play with the ASRock Z97 Extreme4 how does it hold up? Will it hold its own vs other more expensive boards? Let’s take a look.

Touching on the design first I find this board very aesthetically pleasing. As I said in my previous Extreme6 review I think ASRock have done a good job offsetting the colours and making sure the blue isn’t overdone, though it would have been nice to see a couple blue PCIE slots to help offset the RAM slots but this is just me being extremely picky. Leaving the colour appearance of the board aside a moment it also designed to provide very good functionality and access to all the ports and connectors; I had no problems with installation in my Corsair Air 540.

Taking performance into consideration and the Extreme4 is right on par with its bigger brother, the Extreme6. While it may not sit in the number one slot for our benchmark results it is still more times than not towards the top of the list and rightfully so. If you look at the benchmarks the Extreme4 is right up there with boards costing anywhere from £30-£50+ more. Let us also not forget the Extreme4 matched the best overclock I have ever had on my 4770k, allowing me to push it to 4.8GHz. When a sub £100 board is competing with boards costing £50 more you really can’t turn your nose up at it and should seriously consider taking a bit closer look.

Comparing the features of the Extreme4 to that of it’s bigger brother we are only missing out on a couple of things, the Ultra M.2 and Mini PCI Express slots. This is easily overlooked when you consider the price which we will go over in a second. That being said the Extreme4 is still a feature rich board including things like Purity Sound2 which includes 7.1 CH HD Audio and DTS Connect via the Realtek ALC1150 Audio Codec, Crossfire and SLI support, HDD Saver and Intel Gigabit LAN. The Extreme4 also covers all the bases for graphic output options allowing for HDMI, Display Port, D-Sub and DVI-D connections. 

Now lets have a quick look at the price, which at the time of review is just shy of £100. This is an absolute brilliant value for such performance and it will not be easy to match this. When you take into consideration all the features including things like a built in Display Port and future proof upgrades to the likes of Broadwell CPUs, couple that with amazing performance in overclocking and synthetic benchmarks you surely can’t go wrong. All things considered, I doubt you’ll find a better board for under £100.

All-in-all I have to say this is the first motherboard I have reviewed that actually blows me away. While a lot of that definitely has to do with the price there is no denying the ASRock Z97 Extreme4 is a force to be reckoned with.

The Extreme 4 has blasted all of our tests, earning it a Gold award and considering the price it easily nets a Value award too.

I would like to thank ASRock for sending this board in for review and look forward to seeing more from them in the near future.