ASRock Z77 OC Formula LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Extended ATX Intel Motherboard

Pros: - Bios is rock solid with so many features and complexity
- Overclocked i5 IB 3570k to 4.8 stable and pushed 5.0 (liquid)
- Overclocked samsung green memory very well to 2400
- dual bios
- list goes on
- nick shih OC presets provided good reference points
- there is a forum thread dedicated to this board where Nick Shih himself will answer questions if he has time.

Cons: - none

Other Thoughts: This is not a motherboard for a novice user. It was built for the experienced and lends a hand to a beginner.
Once you open the box to the Formula you will see you have a beautiful product. Once you hold it in your hands you know it is of quality. It doesn't flex it's the pcb is so thick.

If you don't know what you're doing you can definitely cause system issues.
- If you take the time to learn and understand all of the intricate details of the bios settings you will be able to have a great enthusiast rig cheaper than most of the more expensive boards.
- The voltages on the presets need to be tuned to your cpu, mem, etc. I found on the presets some of the voltages were too high.

Pros: The layout and aesthetics of this board is something I really liked from the very start and looks very smart with the yellow accents.
The bios is very easy to understand and overclocking is very simple. I was running a I7 3770K @ 4.2 very stable.

Cons: All was great for 3 months and then I lost the audio. So I bought a dicreet sound card and ran that for a while, but, being a brand new board it just didn't sit right with me knowing that the board had become faulty albeit the audio.
I decided to RMA the board back to PC Case Gear, but before doing so I inspected the CPU Socket to make sure there was no bent or damaged pins. Once I was happy the board was physically in perfect condition I RA'd the board back to PCCG. I received an email from PCCG letting me know the board was sent back to the distributors for repair.
I phoned PCCG and was told that they had indeed discovered the audio was faulty therefore the reason the send off to the distributor. Well that was a month ago, so I sent off a question to PCCG to ask what was happening yada yada.........I got a reply saying that the distributor had discovered bent pins and needed to have to have the socket (cpu) replaced. Ok so apparently I won't have to pick up the tab for that, but I know for a fact that the cpu socket was in perfect condition. I wish I had the foresight to take some macro shots of the socket with a dated piece of paper.
Now I will have to wait yet another two weeks for the distributor to send the board back 'repaired'.

I Have to say this is the first and LAST time I will ever buy another Asrock board.

Other Thoughts: I looked at all the specs on this board and did my research reading reviews etc and was sold on all of the packed features this board had to offer and it was something I wanted to be the backbone of my gaming rig.

I am not happy with the turn around time with this RMA process. I am certainly not happy with the lies told to me about the condition of the board. It is obvious that the damaged pins were caused by who ever tested the board to check the audio fault.

I have since bought another motherboard because of the *4 weeks so far, told another 2 weeks* RMA process was killing me as I run my own gaming clan and having a fully functioning system is important to me and I can't have that much down time.

The motherboard I bought from *flea bay* is a MSI MPOWER Z77 and so far running faultless and the onboard audio is far superior to the Asrock IMO.
So when my Asrock OC Formula board comes back I will be putting straight onto flea bay and be rid of it once and for all!

Final thought....

The board did perform very well and I understand that things can go wrong, however the turn around time for repair for something that is less than 6 months old is unacceptable to me, even if it does have to go back to Taiwan.
No more Asrock for me!

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Sorry to hear the onboard sound has malfunctioned after 3 months, due to nature of electronic product, it can happen.
The CPU socket on the mainboard has been covered with the protection CAP to avoid damage the pins during the shipping and should not be removed unless intend to install a CPU. In addition, the CPU socket pins on the mainboard are fragile and need to be handling with careful to avoid physical damage.
For more information about return policy, Please visit our RMA link at " http://www.asrock.com/support/index.asp?cat=Policy ".
If you have any technical questions or warranty issues please contact our Tech Support at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: was good while it lasted

Cons: it went bad immediately after a windows update. Took my computer to geek squad for a diagnostics told me it was killed by my cpu cooler. Asrocks rma service is going to charge me almost the same amount of a new one to return it.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. We will not charge for RMA mainboards with under warranty unless mainboard has physically damage, please refer to RMA policy at " "http://www.ASRock.com/support/index.asp?cat=Policy". As always, we appreciate your purchase and constructive reviews are welcome. If you have any technical questions or warranty issues please contact our Tech Support at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: Pretty motherboard... The OC Formula does not OC all that well.

Cons: Very bad bios coding, unstable dram volts (higher than bios setting) glitchy vcore settings with offset, very poor LLC implementation... Yeah, the v-probe read point accurately shows the poor voltage and current management by bios. Asrock should hire professionals/engineers for quality craftsmanship.
Why would anyone buy a signature z87 after this sloppy work?

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize that you having difficulty with BIOS. Would you please tell us more detail about BIOS issues and other related setting? Please contact us with detail problem description at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: Easy overclocking, looks great

Cons: Completely dead after 4 months! Mobo was working great this morning. Went to turn it on in the afternoon and nothing...no power at all! Replaced the PSU and still nothing at all. I called Newegg, they said to go to the ASrock website. Looked at the ASrock website and it says to go through the retailer....this is frustrating. This board costs way too much for it to die out of no where.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. Sorry to hear the mainboard has malfunctioned.
Please trouble shooting the mainboard for below steps with known good components;
Remove the mainboard from inside computer to outside. Place the mainboard on top of the empty mainboard’s box
Clear the CMOS
Reseat the CPU and heatsink fan as well
Test with 1 memory module (non-ECC, un-buffered), try with another known good memory if its same issue.
Using onboard Video (CPU with iGPU supported or test with VGA card)
Power supply with connecting 24 pins + 8 or 4 pins ATX power to the mainboard
Plug the computer case’s power switch to mainboard's front panel power header and try again
If you have any technical questions please contact us at 909-590-8308 or http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.


Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: This board can really dish out some heavy overclocks.

One place it excels is in memory overclocking, the options included int he boards DIMM's are phenomenal.

Having pushed upwards of 1.7v and seeing the pwoer delivery on the reading points be dead on is surprising given the track record of other ASRock boards.

This board is so far above the level of any other ASRock board I have used in any builds that I decided to use it in my personal build.

Cons: The little VRM fan I think is useless. The VRM's stay cool and sturdy under some heavy OCing conditions without the fan or even water.

The Barbs for water are 3/8" or 10mm and are fixed, The freedom to use my own barbs would have been a huge plus and I wouldn't have opted for the MIPS block instead.

The VRM heatsink still does it job VERY well.

Other Thoughts: I have no real qualms with the board or services.

The great thing about this board is near direct access to Nick Shih himself. After e-mailing with questions many of my answers came from the board designer himself. He is also active on some popular overclocking forums.

Thanks for a great board Nick shih.

Pros: Installed a 3770K and 8G 2133 HyperX, Plextor SSD, WD raptor 600G. Board posted first shot, set ram to 2133 XMP. loaded windows 7/64 (115 updates). cool. back to bios set a quick 45 multiplier 5mV offset, 20mV turbo - with the stock intel cooler - runs great, p95 2h blend. temps too hot (duh). Delidded, temps down to 80s... waiting for rest of WC loop to arrive and switch to water. this should easily do 48+ on water and thru the VRMs! rock solid, not one issue so far.

Cons: absolutely none!

Other Thoughts: If you are looking for a super 1155 board, this is it.

Pros: Nice packaging
Good manual
Nice looking board
EUFI Bios is nice and smooth
Preset OC profiles (a lot of them)

Cons: The power connector on the MD is a bit meh, tried 2 different power supplies and both have issues making a firm connection to the board

a1/b1 mem slots did not work out of the box, checked CPU pins to make sure none were bent (None are) checked mem in another system it works fine, checked other mem in this system. same issue post code 55 (no memory installed)

I ended up just putting the memory in a2/b2 and running in single channel mode.

This seems to be an issue with Asrock boards from what I've seen on various tech forums

Other Thoughts: Great board, wish QC was a bit better at Asrock, not sure if I'll get another one.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
For the code 55 issue without bent pins, please turn the power off.
Clear the CMOS.
Reseat the CPU and cooler.
Test with 1 stick memory on A1 slot, then B1 slot one at the time to eliminate the problem.
If you have any technical questions please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We can assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com

Pros: Meant to say that is was not a problem with this motherboard to easily overclock my i7 3770K to 4.6GHz.

Cons: NONE

Other Thoughts: Correction to previous review.

Pros: Great motherboard that is built very solidly, and performs like a champ. Easily overclocked my i7 3770K to 3.6 without any hiccups or heat issues. Also, I love the new UEFI bios, as it make overclocking with this board a breeze.

Cons: No cons.

Other Thoughts: This is my third purchase of ASRock motherboards, and as long as they keep producing motherboards of this quality, I will continue to purchase exclusively from them.