ASRock A75 Extreme6 Review and Desktop Llano Overclocking
by Ian Cutress on June 30, 2011 12:05 AM ESTOver the past few iterations of ASRock motherboard that have passed through my fingers this year, a couple of things have usually stood out - simplicity, software, aggressive pricing and the box bundle. Unfortunately, the Extreme6 is lacking in at least two of those areas.
In terms of simplicity, I'm speaking about the BIOS overclocking here - it's a veritable minefield of issues and uncertainties. You have two safe choices: either leave it alone (and hope a future BIOS update makes it easier to use and understand), or stick to the predefined overclock options. With the memory issues I found, regarding the kit and setting XMP profiles, then perhaps try and get a DDR3-2000 kit if you can. If you're using the iGPU as your main video output device, then it will come in handy.
For the software side, it's got the XFast USB we know (and I like, but from some comments on previous reviews others have had 'issues'), and the addition of XFast LAN is just another step in the right direction. The software itself is very well laid out, and has a bundle of options for almost everyone wanting it. If it isn't available on your driver CD, then try ASRock's website or here - ASRock as far as I understand are trying to get it on all their products, but may have been a little late with the first A75 batches for retail.
For the aggressive pricing, it's hard to tell where $150 lies in A75 country. Our nearest speculation would be the 890 series AMD boards that hold Phenom II X4 processors, which perform similar to Desktop Llano. They're between $100 and $145 for the most part, so we have to determine where the $150 comes from. Some of that will be licensing fees from the company making XFast LAN, but this package doesn't contain a USB 3.0 front bracket and SSD holder like the cheap P67 ASRock packages. There's not too many controllers or extras on the board itself that would warrant any extras, but we'll have to see how the other companies play out with prices.
To sum up - this board has teething issues associated with the BIOS being in its infancy. It needs a little overhaul so the consumer knows what they are playing with. Some memory compatibility issues also need fixing, and the consumer needs to decide if they need two PCIe x16 ports at x8/x8 with GPUs if you're buying an APU anyway. My comparison next to a comparable Sandy Bridge product says more about Llano than this ASRock board, but I hope to get more A75 boards in to see what the market has around for comparison.
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jjj - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
no desktop Llano review or there will be one soon?ganeshts - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
Coming soon.. We are working on it right now, getting pictures in the engine.FragKrag - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
On your conclusion you compared a relatively high end $150 board with budget H67 boards when earlier on in your article you said that the lower end A75 boards would cost around $100.Wouldn't it make more sense to compare a high end A75 board to a higher end H67/Z68 board and a lower end A75 board with the lower end H67? If you did it that way, you would be paying only $25-40 more for Llano over Sandy Bridge.
I do realize you haven't tested one of the $100 A75 boards, but your conclusion seems to be a bit questionable nonetheless.
L. - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
Motherboards are going to be much cheaper on the AMD side, as usual.Comparing mobo prices now, and taking a high-end cheap-brand on one side against a cheap board on the other does indeed not make sense.
If it's any indication, my NAS mobo (gigabyte am3) cost like 35 euros. Quite likely that there will be Llano boards around 50 euros before long.
cknobman - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
Agreed this article's conclusion is not based off an apples to apples comparison and is really misleading.To the reviewer - please do a better job of trying to compare similar products next time.
qu3ry - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
Agreed, and also:"Desktop Llano certainly isn't a low power system - the A8-3850 is rated at 100W, so if you want something to word process, look at emails and play flash games, an AMD Fusion board for $150 will do all that quite easily for all under 60W. "
Alternative: Wait for A8-3800 instead; same IGP but slower clocks (while still faster than say an E-350) @ 65 watts TDP.
Xbitlabs managed to get their hands on A8-3800 silicon which might also be worth reading (no idea what the sites reputation is like so take it with a grain of salt)
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/print/amd-a8-...
ganteng3005 - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
What about having a Core i3 2100 + H61 motherboard + Dedicated Radeon HD 6570?It runs faster on both processor and graphics, and the price is equal to the Llano combo.
Other than that --
I love the conclusion part of this article. The cheapest available FM1 A75 motherboard at google shop is currently $103 (if that is true). With the A8-3850, that will end up at $250.
Is Llano a good choice to pick over the i3 2100 for an $25 premium?
Well, it all depends on the user. And the points I would like to make are:
-If you only play flash games, browse the web, type, watch Full HD movies, and use the computer for productivity reasons, pick the Core i3 2100 - the Intel HD graphics will suffice for those flash games - with similar or even better power consumption.
-If you want to do some gaming, then A8-3850 might be the better choice.
Overall, I agree with Anand. I would personally choose the i3 2100 due to its beastial dual-core performance and being able to do anything except heavy GPU stuff - which can be solved by adding a single HD 6570 - and it runs faster than the APU, with the price being similar to the Llano.
TBH, i3 2100 and H61 without any additional GPU will run fine for office desktops. Except if the employees are allowed to play Metro 2033 in office.
AnandThenMan - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
What a load of PR rubbish.Exodite - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
How so?For mainstream users, which Llano is presumably aimed at, the i3 2100 ends up the better deal as it'll offer better performance in all common tasks.
Llano does have a better native graphics solution, though still not good enough to actually allow for gaming. And if you skip gaming both Llano and the i3 2100 are good enough to handle all other graphics tasks like video and 2D acceleration.
It makes sense to me.
L. - Thursday, June 30, 2011 - link
Stop this please.THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A COMMON TASK THAT REQUIRES AN i3 2100 !!!
Why do you people keep on throwing that idea around, when it's clear that any basic user (you know, e-mail,facebook,youtube @ home, same @ work + excel, word, stuff) DOES NOT need an i3 (or a Llano for that matter) at all.
Llano has a much much much better graphics solution, which is completely hidden in this biased review as the gpu benchmarks w/ decent RAM are NOT SHOWN (and yes, 2ghz ram is CHEAP today, so anyone buying a Llano should not go for anything lower).
Llano does actually Allow for gaming, the titles tested here only show how with an integrated gpu, you'll be very limited in DEMANDING titles, as Crysis, Metro, ... while NOT demanding titles, like dirt 2 and pretty much everything else, will be fine without _ANY_DEDICATED_GPU_
This will of course not be at maximum settings, but come on, people play on CONSOLES every day, hasn't killed them yet.
I demand a real benchmark, with decent RAMsticks !