ASRock FM2A85X Extreme6 (A85X) Motherboard Review

When we caught wind of AMD releasing the new FM2 range of products, we were quick to contact every partner that we work with to obtain their FM2 samples for us to look at and within this range of brands, we were extremely keen to see what ASRock had to offer as we consider them a bit of an unsung hero when it comes to the motherboard market.

The last board we had from ASRock was their Z77 Pro 4 which walked away with our Editor’s Choice Award as it impressed us in a variety of areas including the style, performance, overclockability and of course price, so when they offered us a chance to look at their A85X based board, we jumped at the chance, especially if it had the same design features as the Z77 Pro 4, as it was one amazing looking board.

Since the FM2 launch, we’ve been going through the range of boards we had from various brands and now sees us putting the FM2A85X Extreme 6 under some serious pressure of our benchmark suite as well as seeing how far we can push the board and APU combination in terms of overclocking.

Before we get underway, we’re always eager to see what motherboard manufacturers bundle in with their boards and what the packaging says about the product in terms of features and specifications. Once this is out of the way, we can take a closer look at the board to see what it has going for it and then put it under our rigourous testing procedure before overclocking the board to see what performance gains can be had from the Extreme 6.