ASRock 970 EXTREME3 AM3+ AMD 970 + SB950 USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard

Pros: Sale price was good,though a few days later was lower still. Board layout is good. Plenty of room around the CPU for large fan without getting close to the memory sockets. Supports up to 32GB of ram. Has plenty of fan connections. USB ports are plentiful, and USB 3.0 is a definite plus. Has nice placement of the SATA III ports and an eSATA III port is great. Onboard sound is fantastic. Quality of components used on the board is above average and right along with the two "big" companies. BIOS is great to work with.

Cons: As others have stated, the motherboard is a little more flexible that it should be. Taking a measurement on the board, it's about 1 mil thinner than the two other major brands. This is a definite issue that ASRock needs to address as it wouldn't cost that much to fix, and would probably stop a lot of the no boot out of the box failures. Some solder points on the bottom of the board need to be smaller. These "sloppy" solder points along with the board flex can cause ground outs if you are not careful in installing the board and components. Anyone putting this board should realize that you have to install the CPU and Fan before you put it into the case. This is something that most people who overclock do anyway. Why take a risk in damaging your board?

Overall Review: I needed to upgrade one of my builds and I was looking at this motheboard when it came on sale. Despite the people griping about certain things, I figured it couldn't be any worse than some other motherboards I have used over the many years I've been doing this, and I was right. The first thing I noticed in the box was that the protective anti static bag is much to thin and not padded. The motherboard needs to have more padding around it in the box to keep it from moving around so much. When I took this motherboard out of the bad, I noticed a definite slight warp on the board around the VGA slot. This was due to the lack of padding/support in the box and the thinner than normal motherboard itself. With a few of those "sloppy" type solder joints on the bottom of the board, this flex is probably causing some of these boards to ground out in the cases they are being installed in. As per my usual customer, I did a test assembling the board on an antistatic mat, witht processor, fan, and memory installed along with a video card. Everything booted and worked fine. Leaving the memory and CPU and it's cooler installed on the motherboard, I then put it in the case and did the full assembly. When done it fired up just fine and has been running ever since. For those complaining about the board being shorter than an ATX board, you better think again. This board has the same footprint as my two other ATX machines and has the same overhang in the back behind the memory slots and SATA connectors. If everyone would notice that at those corners of this motherboard, there are two holes. These do not match up with holes in an ATX case, BUT if you can find a supplier of case mounting parts, there is a small plastic mounting pin that is available to use in these holes. The mounting pin I am thinking about has a spike that fits up through these holes, and has a threaded shank on the bottom which will screw into a hole in the case. Since there is no case hole, use a knife and cut the threaded shank off. The base of this mounting pin will support the board on the corners without flexing the board. I have had to do this for years on ATX motherboard builds, so this ain't nothing new. You can use your fingers to support under the 24 pin ATX power connector when you install it..NOT a big deal. All in all, this board has been solid. It runs cool. The BIOS is great. It overclocks well, and has been rock solid. A definite 4 Egger, only taking off for the board being a little on the thin side.

This Build:
ASRock 970 Extreme 3
AMD Phenom II X 4 BE 965 @ 3.6Ghz on air
G-Skill Ares DDR3-1600 16GB
Corsair 240GB SSD boot drive
Samsung SATA III 2TB backup drive
MSI Radeon HD7770 GHZ Edition video card
MassCool 120mm Fans X 3
Lite On iHBS112-04 BluRay Burners X 2
Nippon Laps card reader with USB and eSATA port
Apex Vortex Case
hec X-Power Pro 650Watt PSU

Pros: Motherboard works fine if you use a currently-supported CPU.

Cons: This motherboard about a year ago had advertised support from ASRock for high-end FX CPUs, including the FX-8350. Support was later (sneakily) removed by ASRock.

Overall Review: It's obvious ASRock doesn't test their motherboards properly. Don't even think about trying to have a smooth RMA process with them either; expect long delays, and even expect them to waste your time by shipping you the wrong motherboard.

So on-top of falsely-claiming hardware support, ASRock won't (easily, if at all) replace your hardware either. Almost feel bad for people who initially bought this board and paired it with a high-end FX CPU expecting it to work right.

This motherboard is discontinued, so buying it isn't an issue anymore, but I would recommend staying away from ASRock entirely. Either that, or hope you never have to take advantage of their RMA.