Every time we get ASUS Republic of Gamers hardware at the Tbreak office, everybody gets excited, and for good reason too. Not once has an RoG hardware failed to impress us, and surely the Crosshair IV Extreme would be no less than its predecessors.
Based on the AMD 890FX/SB850 chipset, the ASUS Crosshair IV Extreme will support any AM3 based Phenom II, Athlon II and Sempron 100 series CPU. Since this is a Republic of Gamers enthusiast motherboard, packed in along with the instruction manual and the drivers CD is an extra eSATA expansion bracket, 3x SATA 6.0GBps cables, 1x SATA 3 cable, 1x USB cable, rear i/o panel cover and an RoG sticker for your case. There’s also a set of voltage reading cables and three additional temperature sensors for the CPU along with a CrossFire cable added in for good measure.
Speaking of CrossFire, the Crosshair IV Extreme has 5x PCIe x16 slots. In a 3-way SLi or CrossFire, 3 of the slots will run at x16 speeds, otherwise in a 4-way SLi or CF setup, 2 slots run at x16 speeds while the remaining 2 run at x8 speeds. Moving up the board we see the sharp looking heatsink on the Southbridge controller as well as the Lucid HYDRA chip. The latter is especially interesting as the Hydra chip allows multiple GPUs from different manufacturers to be run on the Crosshair IV Extreme, i.e. you can run a GTX 580 along with an HD 6870 if you wish. Sadly the HYDRALogiX drivers failed to install (both the one’s supplied with the motherboard and the latest v1.7.102 from their website) so we couldn’t test this feature.
Moving to the top right we see the PCIe switches and the Probelt voltage plugs for simple readings, a process made easier thanks to the included voltage dongles. The 5 PCIe switches turn the corresponding PCIe slots on and off. This greatly helps if you have a multi-GPU setup and want to remove one card for whatever reason (whether it failed or you want to not run an AMD or Nvidia card) then this is far easier than shutting down the PC and unplug the whole card. We always welcome onboard Reset and Start buttons, but the enthusiast nature of the Crosshair IV Extreme shows when there’s an additional CPU core unlocker button on the motherboard itself (right of the Start button).
Just near the CPU plug you can see the Northbridge controller with a mini 40mm fan. Don’t let this little sucker fool you though, it can scream real loud when temperatures start going above 50C.
Here’s the full laundry list of all that makes the ASUS Crosshair IV Extreme worthy enough to be called as one of the best AMD 890FX motherboard on the market.
Specifications
| CPU | AMD Socket AM3 ;Phenom™II /Athlon™II /Sempron™ 100 Series Processors AMD 140W CPU Support AMD Cool ‘n’ Quiet™ Technology Supports 45nm CPU |
| Chipset | AMD 890FX/SB850 |
| System Bus | Up to 5200 MT/s ; HyperTransport™ 3.0 |
| Memory | 4 x DIMM, Max. 16 GB, DDR3 2133(O.C.)/2000(O.C.)/1600/1333/1066 ECC,Non-ECC,Un-buffered Memory Dual Channel memory architecture *Due to CPU spec., AMD 100 and 200 series CPUs support up to DDR3 1066Mhz. With ASUS design, this motherboard can support up to DDR3 1333MHz. Please refer to www.asus.com or user manual for Memory QVL. When installing total memory of 4GB capacity or more, Windows 32-bit operation system may only recognize less than 3GB. Hence, a total installed memory of less than 3GB is recommended. |
| Expansion Slots | 5 x PCIe 2.0 x16 (dual @ x16, triple @x16, quad@x16 x16 x8 x8) 1 x PCI 2.2 |
| Multi-GPU Support | Support Lucid HYDRALOGIX / ATI CrossFire™X Technology |
| Storage | SB850 Chipset 6 xSATA 6.0 Gb/s ports Support RAID 0,1,5,10 2 x JMicron® 363 controllers: 2 x SATA 3Gb/s ports (Gray) 1 x Power External SATA 3Gb/s ports at rear (SATA On-the-Go) 1 x External SATA 3Gb/s ports at rear (SATA On-the-Go) * Due to the Windows XP/ Vista limitation, the RAID array with the total capacity over 2TB cannot be set as a boot disk. A RAID array over 2TB can only be set as a data disk only. |
| LAN | Intel® Gigabit LAN |
| Audio | 8-Channel High Definition Audio CODEC - Blu-ray audio layer Content Protection - Supports Jack-Detection, Multi-streaming, Front Panel Jack-Retasking - Supports 1 Optical S/PDIF out port at back I/O |
| USB | NEC USB3.0 Controller: - 2 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports at rear AMD SB850 chipset: - 13 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports (6 ports at mid-board, 6 ports at rear, 1 port at rear is also for ROG connect) |
| ASUS Unique Features | CPU Level Up MemOK! Onboard Switches: Power / Reset / Core Unlocker / Clr CMOS (at rear) Q-Fan Plus ASUS Fan Xpert ASUS Q-LED (CPU, DRAM, VGA, Boot Device LED) ASUS Q-Connector ASUS Q-Shield ASUS Q-Fan 2 ASUS EZ Flash 2 ASUS CrashFree BIOS 3 ASUS MyLogo 3 |
| Overclocking Features | ROG Connect RC Bluetooth ROG iDirect Power Design: - 8+2 phase CPU power design with ML Cap USB BIOS Flashback BIOS Flashback with onboard switch button Extreme Tweaker ProbeIt iROG PCIe x16 Lane Switch Loadline Calibration Intelligent overclocking tools: - ASUS TurboV Evo - O.C Profile Overclocking Protection: - COP EX (Component Overheat Protection – EX) - Voltiminder LED - ASUS C.P.R.(CPU Parameter Recall) |
| Back Panel I/O Ports | 2 x External SATA 1 x S/PDIF Out (Optical) 1 x IEEE 1394a 1 x LAN(RJ45) port 8 -Channel Audio I/O 1 x Clr CMOS switch 1 x PS/2 Keyboard port(purple) 2 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports 7 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports (1 port is also for ROG Connect) 1 x ROG Connect On/Off switch 1 x RC Bluetooth switch |
| Internal I/O Connectors | 3 x USB connectors supports additional 6 USB 2.0 ports 1 x IEEE 1394a connector 1 x S/PDIF Out connector 1 x En/Dis-able Clr CMOS connector Front panel audio connector System Panel connector 8 x SATA connectors: 6 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors (Red) & 2 x SATA 3Gb/s connectors (Gray) 8 x Fan connectors: 1 x CPU / 1 x PWR / 3 x Chassis / 3 x Optional 7 x ProbeIt measurement points 3 x Thermal sensor connectors 1 x 24-pin ATX power connector 1 x 8-pin ATX 12V power connector 2 x EZ Plug connectors (4-pin Molex Power connectors) 1 x OC Station header 1 x RC Bluetooth header 1 x Core unlocker switch 1 x Power on switch 1 x Reset switch 1 x Go Button 1 x BIOS switch button 1 x Fan connector for thermal module 1 x ROG light connector |
| BIOS | 16 Mb Flash ROM AMI BIOS, PnP, DMI2.0, WfM2.0, SM BIOS 2.4, ACPI2.0a Multi-Language BIOS |
| Manageability | WOL by PME,WOR by PME,PXE |
| Accessories | User’s manual 1 x I/O Shield 1 x ROG Connect Cable 1 x ProbeIt cable set 1 x 2-in-1 ASUS Q-Connector Kit 3 x 2-in-1 SATA 6.0Gb/s Cables 1 x 2-in-1 SATA 3.0Gb/s Signal Cables 1 x Multi-functional module (1-port IEEE 1394a + 2-port USB2.0) 1 x Thermal Sensor Cable Pack 1 x Crossfire cable 1 x Cable Ties Pack 1 x ROG Theme Label 1 x 12-in-1 ROG Cable Label 1 x RC Bluetooth cardBluetooth Module Accessory Card - Bluetooth V2.0/V2.1+EDR - RC Bluetooth On/Off Switch |
| Support Disc | Drivers Kaspersky® Anti-Virus ASUS AI Suite II 3DMark Vantage |
| Form Factor | Extended ATX Form Factor 12 inch x 10.6 inch ( 30.5 cm x 26.9 cm ) |
from:tbreak.com
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