ASRock FM2A85X Extreme6 (A85X) Motherboard Review

ASRock have really put together a nice board here that offers a variety of aspects that any user would be screaming out for. The style is something that some manufacturers can only wish to have and we’ve made it extremely clear that it’s a sexy looking thing, and has developed from the design that other ASRock boards have included, and continuity is a great thing to have, especially if it works well and in our opinion it definitely does.

Performance wise, we saw some really strong numbers today across a handful of the tests we ran and while the board does warrant using a bit more power than the other boards, you do get slightly better performance and that’s a sacrifice that i’d quite happily make if I know I can get the very best speed and numbers out of my other hardware including the A10-5800k. While keeping with performance, it was great to see this board so easy to overclock and that was all thanks to the wonderful BIOS that ASRock have implemented which is simple, effective and as you can see from our overclock; very powerful. The overclock was something that really stood out for us as well as the performance, and we’d quite happily take our hat off to the BIOS designers who made it all possible.

For enthusiasts, it’s nice to see other subtle features added to the board, including the debug LED panel and quick function power and reset buttons. For someone who tests motherboards on open testlab benches, it’s refreshing to see, as these are normally reserved for higher-end socket motherboards such as AM3+ and X79 so for something aimed at a cost-effective market, this are very much welcomed with open arms.

Speaking of cost-effectiveness, you’ll find this board hitting store shelves very soon and retailing at an attractive price at around the £90 mark and for that kind of money, we do feel that it’s extreme bang for buck as you can pair up an APU from a full stack release from AMD and with the integrated graphics offering some key features that Intel and the original FM1 platform couldn’t offer, it makes a very simple solution for those on a budget.

Overall, ASRock seemed to have ticked most of the boxes again with the main one being price which actually undercuts the competition by around £20-£30, which in this climate, is a key thing that can bring in a lot of sales for a company, and somehow ASRock always seem to offer the value for money side of things, but while still offering fantastic performance when looking at comparisons with competitor products. This board is truly worthy of our Bang For Buck Award and we’d be happy to recommend it to those looking at the A85X FM2 range of products.