P67 platform with support for LGA 1155 central processing units

Jun 1, 2010 13:20 GMT  ·  By

This year's Computex has already seen the advent of a variety of tablets, 3D notebooks and other product prototypes, but few, if any, can truly boast of having appeared out of the blue. The many leaks and reports that popped before the show hinted at the existence of most devices so far uncovered. On the other hand, there is a certain product that has a high chance of taking users by surprise, namely the P67 motherboard from ASRock.

The folks over at Bit-tech were on site early yesterday and, whether consumers believe it or not, got a few close-up shots of a desktop motherboard built around a chipset that wouldn't be commercially available before Q1 2011. Said product bears the label of P67 Extreme 3 and, as its name implies, is a board that will support the first generation of 32nm Sandy bridge central processing units.

The platform has four memory slots with support for DDR3 memory of 2,600MHz and above, in dual-channel mode. This seems to hint at the possibility of achieving new overclocking records. The expansion capabilities are also significant, though perhaps not as high-level as some may expect. There are only three PCI Express slots, one of which has a bandwidth of x16, while the other two x8 and x4. Tri-SLI and CrossFireX multi-GPU setups, as well as quad-crossfire/SLI with dual-GPU cards, will be possible.

It should probably be noted that the P67 Extreme 3 features a 12+2 “advanced” power phase design with ASRock DuraCap high-quality conductive polymer capacitors. They should let the motherboard survive for about 2.5 times longer than otherwise possible. Other specifications include 7.1 channel audio and Power, Reset and Clear CMOS buttons. As for storage, two USB 3.0 ports are present, (though the chipset itself does not natively support the standard) as are a pair of SATA III (SATA 6.0GBps) connectors.

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ASRock P67 Extreme 3 motherboard on site at Computex
ASRock P67 Extreme 3 motherboard on site at Computex
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