ASRock Fatal1ty B85 (LGA 1150) Killer Motherboard Review

A Closer Look

The motherboard uses a red and black design which is typical of all ASRock’s Fatal1ty series products.

The heatsink is relatively small in size but still adds a nice stylish touch. Nothing large is needed anyway as Haswell CPUs are relatively power efficient. This board boasts a 6 phase CPU VRM design.

Four DIMMs are located in the usual location supporting 32GB of 1600MHz or less RAM. The 1600MHz limitation is set by the B85 chipset not the ASRock board.

The CPU 8 pin is tucked away behind the CPU heatsink. There are two CPU fan headers by the CPU socket, one 3 pin and one 4 pin – both support full voltage control set from within the BIOS.

This motherboard has six SATA ports (four SATA III and two SATA II) all provided by the B85 chipset.

The bottom of the board has a HD Audio FP connector, clear CMOS jumper, two USB 2.0 headers, a chassis fan header and all your front panel connectors as well as the previously mentioned six SATA ports.

The PCIe layout is from top to bottom PCIe 2.0 X1, PCIe 3.0 X16, PCIe 2.0 X1, PCI, PCIe 2.0 X16 (x4 electrical), PCI and PCI. An ASMedia chip provides the legacy PCI slots.

The Purity Sound section is placed directly next to the audio jack output rear I/O block on a separated PCB to minimise interference.

The Killer E2200 networking NIC is also tucked away neatly behind the audio jacks and comes with similar EMI shielding as the Purity Sound module.

As mentioned earlier the rear I/O consists of:

• 1 x PS/2 Mouse/Keyboard Port
• 1 x D-Sub Port
• 1 x DVI-D Port
• 1 x HDMI Port
• 1 x Optical SPDIF Out Port
• 3 x USB 2.0 Ports
• 1 x Fatal1ty Mouse Port (USB 2.0)
• 2 x USB 3.0 Ports
• 1 x RJ-45 LAN Port with LED (ACT/LINK LED and SPEED LED)
• 5 x HD Audio Jacks: Rear Speaker / Central / Bass / Line in / Front Speaker / Microphone