Intel S1155 by stefan @ 2012-05-21
The latest Fatal1ty Z77 Professional board from ASRock does not disappoint regarding overall performance and continues to sport the same catchy black/red theme, along with a redesigned UEFI interface, plenty of connectivity ports and software for enhancing and fine-tuning performance from inside Windows OS.
At first I would like to thank ASRock for offering me a sample of their Fatal1ty Z77 Professional Motherboard for review.
"ASRock Inc., established in 2002, target at entry to mainstream segment MB business, is an energetic company with the combination of technology and humanity. Devoting efforts to bring customers the innovative and reliable motherboards with the design concept of 3C, "Creative, Considerate, Cost-effective", ASRock has successfully established a well-known leading brand of the best price-performance motherboard in the industry. ASRock products' high recognition stems from company’s devotion to bring the most cost-performance products to users.
Besides creative features and solid products, ASRock engineers also pay special attention to EMI, thermal, acoustics and details to achieve complete customer satisfaction. In addition to price-performance, creative and considerate features, ASRock also pay special on the issue of eco-environmental protection with the released of ROHS products and energy saving functions to save the environment.
To succeed in this ultra-competitive industry, ASRock provides great products with speed-to-market, cost and service to customers.
Facing the constantly changing technologies of motherboard, ASRock will always keep the vision of the future and develop future-proof products upon our 3C design concept to our customers.
It is the commitment to our customers and products, like the spirit presented in our maxim:
"Motherboard, We Master It!" "
XFast 555 Technology : XFast RAM / XFast LAN / XFast USB
Virtu Universal MVP - Uncompromised Game Response Performance
ASRock motherboard support Lucid Virtu Universal MVP technology that improves your PC’s visuals, with faster response times, improved video processing and smoother media playback, all with low power consumption. Brilliantly designed for gaming, Virtu Universal MVP™ switchable graphics software assigns tasks dynamically to the best graphics resource and features two exciting techniques – HyperFormance™ and Virtual Vsync™.
Intel® Smart Connect Technology
Intel® Smart Connect Technology keeps content always up-to-date! It means that your email, favorite apps, and social networks are continually and automatically updated even when the system is asleep. Smart Connect will periodically wake up the PC while in a sleep state and check updates for things like email, Twitter, Facebook, etc. No more waiting for the latest world news or friends’ updates to be delivered—just enable this function and you’re up-to-date and ready to go.
Intel® Rapid Start Technology
Intel® Rapid Start Technology gets your device up and running faster from even the deepest sleep, saving time and battery life. It quickly returns where you left off with a PC that goes from deep-sleep to full awake in a flash. The ultra-responsive capability gives your device the power to quickly resume to Windows® 7 OS within few seconds and ensures ultra-low power consumption when on standby. With Intel® Rapid Start Technology, users can jump right back into everything they were doing!
Intel® Smart Response
Intel® Smart Response Technology accelerates the system response experience by putting frequently-used blocks of disk data on a solid-state drive (SSD), providing dramatically faster access to user data than the hard disk alone can provide. For users who are tempted to connect the SSD and HDD on ASRock motherboard, Intel® Smart Response Technology can make the SSD become the "Cache of the HDD" to boost up the HDD access speed. ASRock motherboards with Intel® Smart Response Technology are able to drive 4X faster performance boost than a HDD-only system.
ASRock OMG (Online Management Guard)
Fast, Easy and Free – ASRock OMG technology allows you to establish an internet curfew or restrict internet access at specified times. Administrators are able to schedule the starting and ending hours of internet access granted to other users. Normally, ISPs (Internet Service Provider) will charge for internet curfew service. The service controls “all” the PCs connected at home through network remotely but all the PCs in that network will be restricted to access the internet at pre-setup times. However, ASRock OMG is a free tool for controlling internet access of each single PC. Parents can easily control internet access through BIOS setup to protect their kids from using Internet at inappropriate time, and meanwhile, enjoy their own internet space.
Internet Flash
Internet Flash searches for available UEFI firmware updates from ASRock servers. System can auto-detect the latest UEFI from our servers and flash them within UEFI setup without entering Windows® OS.
Premium Gold Caps
Top-Class Quality Guaranteed
Premium Gold Caps are luxury capacitors. These 100% Japan-made solid capacitors are sleek, high gloss caps with a premium gold coating representing long life and stable performance.
Digi Power
More Precise, More Efficient
By adopting digital pulse-width modulation (PWM), the ASRock motherboard can provide CPU Vcore voltage more efficiently and smoothly. Compared to analog PWM, digital PWM can optimize the CPU power solution and provide a proper and stable Vcore for the processor.
16+8 Power Phase
To improve CPU power solution, this board is designed with the advanced 16+8 power phase design which signatures tough components and smooth power delivery to the CPU.
4 x DDR3 2800+(OC)
This motherboard unlocks maximum memory performance, coming with 4 DIMM slots for dual-channel memory, supporting up to DDR3 2800+ (OC) MHz!
Dual LAN – Teaming
Dual LAN with Teaming function enabled on this motherboard allows two single connections to act as one single connection for twice the transmission bandwidth, making data transmission more effective.
Fatal1ty Mouse Port
Fatal1ty Mouse Port is a customizable technology for PC gamers that is a part of F-Stream. After plugging the USB mouse into the Fatal1ty Mouse Port and running F-Stream, gamers can use Fatal1ty’s personal preferred mouse polling rate at 500 Hz. F-Stream also provides the flexibility for gamers to adjust the mouse polling rate from 125 Hz to 1000 Hz. This is helpful for professional gamers to experience smoother game play and faster response time to the mouse.
Limitations:
1. Some USB mice may not support 1000 Hz mouse polling rate.
2. The Fatal1ty mouse port does not support USB 2.0 mouse.
3. The Fatal1ty mouse port may not support some wireless USB mice.
4. The Fatal1ty mouse port does not support the USB mouse which is connected to the USB hub.
Next-Gen PCI-E 3.0 Support
The ASRock motherboards support the Next-Gen PCI-E 3.0! PCI Express 3.0 can maximize the bandwidth for the next-gen PCI Express 3.0 VGA cards, provide ultimate graphics performance.
Get PCI-E 3.0 Benefits
• Higher bit rate - 8.0GT/s
• Higher bandwidth per lane - 1GB/s
• Higher efficiency - 98.5% encoding efficiency
• 100% backward compatible with previous PCI-E 2.0 / 1.0 standard
Intel® HD Graphics Built-in Visuals
Intel® HD Graphics, simplifies your designs by eliminating additional discrete graphics hardware, while integrating stunning visuals and performance for immersive gaming.
THX TruStudio
THX TruStudio is specially designed to bring the same great audio experience found in live performances, films, and recording studios to the PC.
Graphical UEFI – The Revolutionary BIOS Interface
Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) is a revolutionary BIOS utility which offers tweak-friendly options in an advanced viewing interface. Compared with traditional BIOS design, the latest UEFI utility provides lots improved functions. The major features of UEFI include:
1. Graphical Visual Experience – UEFI provides an improved visual interface with colorful icons and makes your computing environment more versatile to replace the traditional dull BIOS page.
2. Mouse Enabling – Besides keyboard control, you can freely use mouse to select your ideal settings in UEFI as well.
3. Supports 3TB bootable HDD - UEFI breaks the limitations of 2TB bootable HDD on traditional BIOS. With UEFI, you can enjoy 3TB bootable HDD size.*
UEFI System Browser
UEFI system browser is a useful tool included in graphical UEFI. It can detect the devices and configurations that users are currently using in their PC. With the UEFI system browser, you can easily examine the current system configuration in UEFI setup.
Fatal1ty F-Stream – The All-in-1 Tuning Software
The Fatal1ty F-Stream tuning program is an all-in-1 software utility that supports overclocking and hard-ware tuning such as energy usage, H/W monitor, fan speed control, Fatal1ty Mouse Port Configuration and XFast RAM.
In Hardware Monitor, it shows the major readings of your system.
In Fan Control, it shows the fan speed and temperature for you to adjust.
In Overclocking, you are allowed to adjust the CPU frequency, ratio and some voltages for optimal system performance.
In Mouse Polling, gamers can freely adjust the mouse polling rate. In Energy Saving, the voltage regulator can reduce the number of output phases to improve efficiency when the CPU cores are idle without sacrificing computing performance.
In XFast RAM, it fully utilizes the memory space that cannot be used under Windows® OS 32-bit CPU.
As the last Fatal1ty branded boards we have reviewed in the past, the Z77 Professional motherboard from ASRock comes in a black/red themed cardboard box, with a photo of Jonathan Wendel aka Fatal1ty on the frontal side of the packaging:
A list of product specifications can be found on one of the box sides:
Most of the motherboard features are explained on the back side, with example photos:
For sorting purposes inside the warehouse, we will also find a small sticker with the product serial number:
The box insides have changed a little since the Z68 Fatal1ty Pro and P67, which featured an additional enclosure for extra protection; going back to the insides, where we will find the documentation along with the bundle on the top layer and on the bottom, the motherboard:
Here is the list of bundle that comes with the board:
-2x SATA HDD Power Cables
-6x SATA Data Cables
-1x ASRock SLI_Bridge_2S Adapter
-1x Front USB 3.0 Panel with 4x HDD Screws and 6x Chassis Screws
-1x Rear USB 3.0 Bracket
-1x I/O Panel Shield
As documentation, we will find a Software Setup Guide, the Quick Installation Guide, a leaflet explaining the VIRTU MVP technology and another one regarding ASRock “555”; of course, the drivers and software DVD is also supplied inside the package:
The Software Setup Guide will let us know how to operate the functions inside the UEFI interface:
Inside the Quick Installation Guide explains the motherboard components functionality and how to perfom the hardware setup:
The VIRTU MVP leaflet also takes us though the installation steps and guides us though the UI of the application:
The ASRock “555” leaflet explains the advantages of using XFast LAN, XFast USB and XFast RAM:
For additional protection against bumps and scratches, the motherboard is also protected by a foam material frame:
While the motherboard has a dark brown PCB, the heatsinks, slots and connectors have a red/black theme; ASRock usually likes to keep a very clean design, but this time some chips did not fit on the frontal side and were put on the back:
The ASMedia ASM1442T high speed TMDS level shift IC is located on the top left side, for the HDMI output interface in the back:
One of the two Broadcom BCM57781 Integrated Gigabit Ethernet Controller can be seen near the first PCI-E x1 slot, the other one being hidden underside the large VRM heatsink:
The PCI-E x1 slot has nearby two additional fan headers and also the CD_IN header:
One of the more recent audio CODECS from Realtek can be seen on this board, ALC898, which also supports Dolby Home Theater:
A Nuvoton NCT6776D Super I/O Chip can be located further on the left side of the PCB:
On the bottom of the PCB, we will find the following (from right to left):
-Power LED Header
-Chassis Speaker Header
-System Panel Header
-2x Chassis Fan Connector
-2x USB 2.0 Headers
-Clear CMOS Jumper
-Front Panel IEEE 1394 Header
-Infrared Module Header
-Floppy Connector
-Front Panel Audio Header
-HDMI_SPDIF Header
The ASMedia ASM1083 PCI Express-to-PCI bridge offers support to the two installed PCI slots on the board:
Between the first two red PCI-E slots we will find the CMOS battery location:
The PLX PEX8608 switch chip is located near the Z77 heatsink:
Also here we will also find the Dr. Debug LED display along with the UEFI chip:
On the right bottom corner, ASRock has put some nicely designed Reset and Power buttons:
No less than 10 SATA ports are offered, which are color coded (SATA 2 in black and SATA 3 in red):
The ASMedia ASM1061 controller is placed for controlling the extra SATA3 ports (since Z77 comes only with support for two):
The heatsink on the PCH is large and features the Fatal1ty logo:
Near the color-coded memory slots, we can find an USB 3.0 header (for the supplied Front Panel), an IDE header and also the 24-pin ATX power header:
We are used to see the 8-pin ATX power header to the top left side of the PCB; on this board it is right in center, near two additional fan headers, one which is PWM:
The motherboard features a 16+8 power phase design and the MOSFETs near the CPU socket are covered with heatsinks:
The board comes with two PCI-E x16 3.0 slots and one PCI-E x16 2.0 slot; in the case we have only one video card installed in the first slot, it will run at full x16, but when we are dealing with a CrossfireX or SLI setup, the first and second slots will run at x8. Besides these, we can also find two PCI-E x1 slots and other two PCI:
The VIA VT6330 combo controller is placed on the back of the PCB and takes care of the Firewire interface and also of the IDE:
The second chip found on the back of the motherboard is the EtronTech EJ188H, which is in charge of 4 out of the total 6 USB 3.0 ports on the I/O:
Here is what we can find on the I/O panel:
-PS/2 Keyboard/Mouse port
-6x USB 3.0 Ports
-1x DisplayPort Port
-1x HDMI Port
-5x USB 2.0 Ports
-1x USB 2.0 Fatal1ty Mouse Port
-Clear CMOS Button
-1x eSATA3 Port
-1x IEEE 1394 Port
-2x LAN RJ45 Ports
-Audio Ports
The UEFi interface of the Fatal1ty series has been reworked, so now we have a much better looking GUI; the menus are split into multiple sections like Main, OC Tweaker, Advanced and so on. Inside the Main menu displays information regarding the currently installed UEFI version, the installed CPU and its frequency, microcode, cache, total installed memory. Here we also have some new options: System Browser which displays a photo of the motherboard and shows which hardware has been installed in the available slots and OMG allows us to restrict the Internet access for users during some hour intervals:
The OC Tweaker menu is the most interesting because here we can fine-tune the system performance; for people that do not want to spend a lot of time working with different settings, ASRock has available some pre-optimized values for overclocking. Here we will be also able to adjust the CPU Ratio, the BCLK, enable or disable Intel SpeedStep and Turbo Boost. For avoiding certain throttling issues, we are also able to modify the power limits:
Further down, we have the XMP detected values of the installed memory modules which we can load right away, or we can go to the manual route and work with the timings inside the DRAM Configuration menu. The system voltages can be also adjusted here:
The last part of the OC Tweaker menu allows us to save the modifications in three different slots:
The DRAM Configuration menu allows us to change manually the memory timings; the settings we do not want to alter can be left on Auto setting:
The Advanced menu has multiple sub-sections like CPU-Configuration, North Bridge Configuration and so on; here we will be also able to execute the Instant Flash utility or Internet Flash (which will only work if we have an active connection available):
Inside the CPU Configuration sub-menu, we are allowed to select how many cores we want active, enable/disable processor states, Thermal Throttling or Intel Virtualization:
The North Bridge section lets us select the Primary Graphics Adapter, the PCI-E 2,4 link speeds; in the same menu we will be able to enable or disable other features like IGPU Multi-Monitor, Render Standby or Deep Render Standby:
The South Bridge section lets us enable/disable controllers concerning Audio, LAN, Firewire or IDE:
From the Storage Configuration sub-menu, we can select the SATA controllers we want enabled, along with the SATA mode:
The Intel Rapid Start Technology, which is a new zero power hibernation mode, can be enabled or disabled from the respective menu:
The same things we can say about Intel Smart Connect, which keeps our e-mail and social networks updated, while the computer is in sleep mode:
The rest of the controllers like Floppy, Serial or Infrared can be disabled from the Super IO Configuration section:
Most power management options we already know can be modified from the ACPI Configuration menu:
Inside the USB Configuration menu, we will be able to enable or disable such interfaces:
The H/W Monitor shows the live CPU and motherboard temperatures, fan RPMs, and voltages; from the same menu we are able to define fan profiles or enable the Dehumidifier function which powers on the system automatically to dehumidify the system after entering S4/S5 state:
The Boot menu allows us to set the boot priorities, but also to enable/disable the Full Screen logo or Boot Failure Guard:
From the Security menu, we can define a Supervisor and an User password:
Finally, from the Exit menu we can Save/Discard or Load the board defaults:
CPU: Intel I5 3570K Retail
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14
Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty Z77 Professional
RAM: GeIL Black Dragon 2x4GB DDR2133 (@1600)
Video: Sparkle X560 Calibre
Power Supply: Cooler Master 850W
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 320GB 7200.10
Case: Cooler Master ATCS 840
Stability at 4.7GHz could be obtained with a 1.280V value inside the UEFI and LLC Level 1; the same CPU on the Z68 Fatal1ty Professional needed about 1.285V to reach total stability :
With the latest version of AIDA64 utility, we can reveal more information regarding the motherboard, the CPU IMC and the Z77 chipset:
Motherboard
Ivy Bridge IMC
Z77 Chipset
On the supplied DVD, we will also find an interesting suite of applications; the first one would be F-Stream Tuning, which allows changing the system operating parameters; the menu list is located on the left, from where we can enumerate Hardware Monitor, Fan Control and so on. The Hardware Monitor menu shows the current values for the CPU Speed, Ratio, Base Clock, Temperatures, Fan Speeds and, of course, Voltages:
Inside the Fan Control tab we can find the same controls as inside the UEFI interface:
Inside the Overclocking menu, we are able to adjust the BCLK and CPU multiplier on the fly, along with the system voltages:
If we have installed the mouse in the Fatal1ty port, then the respective menu becomes active and we can change the current polling rate (default is 500Hz):
If the system is not overclocked, we can enable power saving features inside the Energy Saving menu:
XFast RAM utility can now be found in F-Stream and with it we will be able to create a RAMDisk for storing temp files or any other files (will be deleted upon reboot unless backup function is selected):
The Z77 Fatal1ty Professional motherboard does also come with the Instant Boot application, which considerably boosts the computer boot time:
ASRock XFast LAN is another application on the installation disk, that helps optimize the Internet connection. After the application has been installed, we will see on the desktop the Real-Time Analysis status window, with which we can easily recognize which data streams we are currently transferring:
ASRock XFast USB boosts the speed of the connected USB drives like Flash or External HDDs:
THX TruStudio (the lite version of the Pro) is an application for audio signal enhancement:
SmartView is a portal for connecting with other social websites, playing games and so on:
MediaEspresso Media Converter is offered in a 30-day trial:
Intel Rapid Start is hibernation on a hidden partition on our SSD drive, to make the system wake up faster:
With Intel Smart Connect, we will be able to keep the social applications updated like Facebook, email, Twitter, even when the computer is held into a sleep state:
An interesting set of multimedia applications from MAGIX is available for installation:
AIDA64 CPU Queen
AIDA64 PhotoWorxx
AIDA64 Zlib
AIDA64 AES
AIDA64 CPU Hash
AIDA64 FPU VP8
AIDA64 FPU Julia
AIDA64 FPU Mandel
AIDA64 FPU SinJulia
Cinebench R10 CPU Score
Cinebench R11.5 CPU Score
CrystalMark
PCMark05 System Suite
PCMark Vantage Suite
PCMark 7
3DMark 2001 Default Run
3DMark 2003 CPU Score
3DMark 2005 CPU Score
3DMark 2006 CPU Score
3DMark Vantage CPU Score
3DMark 11 Performance Score
PerformanceTest 7 CPU
SuperPI 1.5 XS 2MB
wPrime 32M
x264 Encoding
Crysis
Street Fighter 4
Far Cry 2
Dirt 3
Just Cause 2
The board supports the Virtu MVP technology; to download the latest version of the application, we can go ahead and navigate to the Lucid website. The interface has multiple tabs and in the Main one, we can disable or enable the GPU Virtualization feature and set the location/behavior of the In-Game icon:
Virtu MVP is based on two technologies: HyperFormance and Virtual Vsync which can be enabled or disabled from the interface. HyperFormance is meant to remove redundant rendering tasks within the graphics pipeline for improving the overall game performance and frame rate; Virtual Vsync enables us to run the games at higher FPS, with no image tearing artifacts:
The next tab shows us the compatible applications with Virtu MVP; if a game/benchmark is not listed, we can introduce it manually into the list, by clicking on the Add button:
In the About tab, we can see the currently installed application version:
While the monitor was connected to the dedicated VGA card, we have performed some benchmarks to see the performance differences in all available modes:
Run 1= HyperFormance Off , Virtual Vsync Off
Run 2= HyperFormance On, Virtual Vsync Off
Run 3= HyperFormance Off, Virtual Vsync On
Run 4= HyperFormance On, Virtual Vsync On
During testing, we have experienced the same issues as with the ECS board, meaning that Far Cry 2 was displaying artifacts (a lot of areas were getting black in the surrounding areas) and Just Cause 2 refused to run the benchmark (black screen), even if there were no issues navigating inside the main menus.
ASRock has released another good looking board with the Fatal1ty branding, this time sporting the Z77 Chipset. The digital 16+8 VRM allows us to overclock the CPU to extreme speeds while on LN2 and the supported memory goes up to 2800+.
The board also comes with plenty of connectivity options like dual video outputs (HDMI, DisplayPort), no less than 6 USB 3.0 ports in the back and other 6 USB 2.0, dual LAN; for the front panel, we also have one internal USB 3.0 header and two other USB 2.0.
For people that want to keep their old heatsink/CPU water block, the manufacturer has also drilled extra holes for LGA775, a feature named by ASRock C.C.O. .
The first two PCI Express x16 3.0 slots were designed in such a way so we could fit two video cards even with triple-slot cooling systems.
With the coming of the Ivy Bridge chipset series, the UEFI interface has been redesigned and now we have even a better looking interface, featuring System Browser, O.M.G., or Internet Flash.
For getting the most out of our system, ASRock has included applications like XFast LAN for traffic shaping and minimizing ping times, XFast RAM for creating a RAMDrive and offloading the temporary, cache files there and XFast USB for enhancing USB bus speeds.
Regarding the system performance results with this board, it seems we have another winner, this board succeeding to defeat the motherboards tested in the past in most of the benchmarks.
We have enumerated a lot of positive features of the products; like all hardware items in the past there are some negatives too. First, we could say that the central "Fatal1ty Gaming Gear" heatsink is a little too tall; this also means that we are limited when choosing a board to fit in that first x1 slot. Secondly, we would have liked to see removed the legacy IDE and Floppy interfaces, because most gamers today will be tempted very much to use the faster SATA interfaces for SSDs or larger capacity HDDs. By eliminating these we think that there was enough space to fit a mSATA port and maybe an extra USB 2.0 header.
The board can be found in online stores for about 210 Euros.
I would like to thank again to ASRock for making this review possible!