X-bit labs

Surprises from ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+: Good and Bad

Category: Mainboards

by Doors4ever

[ 05/01/2008 | 08:13 PM ]

We are going to talk about a new ASRock mainboard that supports DDR2 and DDR3 memory, new 45nm processors including quad-core ones, 1600MHz FSB, WiFi, FireWire, eSATA. All these are indisputable advantages, but there are also a few serious drawbacks…

Table of contents:

• Package and Accessories
  
• PCB Design and Functionality
  
• Specifications
  
• BIOS Setup
  
• CPU Overclocking
  
• Conclusion
  

I doubt that this summer we will be celebrating a one-year anniversary of the Intel P35 Express core logic launch. And not because it is a bad chipset, but because all our thoughts will be with the fourth generation of Intel chipsets, such as Intel P45 Express. Having turned to mainboards on Intel X38/X48 Express chipsets we failed to see that they have any significant advantages over their predecessors.

Moreover, it turned out that some flagship mainboards often yield to the best solutions on Intel P35 Express in terms of overclocking friendly features and overall work experience. And although we have already checked out numerous solutions on P35 from abit to MSI (in alphabetical order), there are some manufacturers, whose mainboards we didn’t yet have a chance to check out. One of them is ASRock, for example.

So, today we are going to make up for this omission and introduce to you ASRock’s solution on Intel P35 Express.

Package and Accessories

ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ mainboard comes in a box that is of the same length and width as the others, but is in fact almost half the height than the boxes of other contemporary mainboards:

We even doubted for a second that a mainboard may in fact fit inside a thin box like that. However, the board was there, assembled and ready to use, so we didn’t have to deal with a compactly packed pile of components and “make your own mainboard” guide. :)

Moreover, even the accessories bundle was not scarce, as you may have thought at first. ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ mainboard comes with FDD and IDE cables, four Serial ATA cables with locking clips on the connectors and a SATA HDD power adapter, a big booklet with installation instructions in multiple languages, a CD disk with software, I/O Shield for the case rear panel. There is even one nice bonus such as HDMI SPDIF Cable to get sound to the graphics card.

But this is also not all yet! ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ mainboard has “WiFi” abbreviation standing for “Wireless Fidelity” for a reason: it comes bundled with ASRock WiFi-802.11g Module, and antenna, a brief user’s manual and a bracket with special holes cut out for the antenna and for the modules status indicator.

This is a surprisingly rich accessories bundle, I should say – the first of a few pleasant surprises ASRock 4Core1600P35-WiFi+ prepared for us today.