’S
EDITOR
CHOICE
AWARD
ASUS Rampage IV Extreme
W
hen we received
this board we were
expecting the Rampage III
Extreme in essence, except
with a new socket and a few
others changes that were
relevant for the different
chipset. However, we were
immensely mistaken,
pleasantly surprised and
most importantly blown away.
This may be the first board
we tested, but in a way it set
the tone for the rest of the
competitors. In some way’s
it’s what all vendors should
be shooting for as there’s
simply nothing out on the
market that puts together
such a compelling package
both in what it can do and
what it features. The space
we have here is too small
to delve into every single
feature and nuance, but
suffice to say, options like
VGA Hotwire are not only a
first but an easy sell. It makes
mods on graphics cards a
breeze and it’s unlikely to
ever get easier than this.
You’ll get the new OC-Key
as well which sits between
your DVI connector on your
graphics card and your
screen feeding your display
an overlay of information
about your system on the fly.
You can also stop using your
dedicated digital thermometer
and just plug your K-probes
directly into the boards
Sub-Zero Sense connectors
right on the board so you can
read both GPU and CPU Pot
temperatures easily via the
OSD provided by the OC-Key.
There are many other
features that we have not
gone into but worth a special
mention is the most detailed
and fully featured BIOS on
any X79, no scratch that, on
any motherboard to date.
Everything you could think of
tweaking is there and best of
all the options are explained in
a succinct and simple manner
most people will understand.
Overclocking this board is a
breeze and should you find
yourself with a particularly
tricky CPU, this is the board
you’ll want to use for it. The
built in profiles actually work
and will take your CPU or
memory to much higher speed
than any other board can or at
least quicker than any other.
The only downside we could
find was the first PCI-Express
slot is located far too close to
the Heatsink south of the CPU
socket. This made it rather
inconvenient to remove a GPU
once installed. Other than that,
there’s really nothing else we
can point to that we had issues
with. The Rampage IV Extreme
is simply incredible.
Verdict: [LEGENDARY]
2012 | Issue 18 The OverClocker 33