14 DAY TRIAL // ASRock, like pretty much every other motherboard brand with a global presence, will release an X99 chipset-based motherboard in the near future, within the next month and a half or so. Now we know something about it: the platform has been certified for use with Windows 8.1.
Unfortunately, that's it. That's all we know about it, which could just as well be equated to “we know nothing at all” because it's not like there can even be a new motherboard without Windows 8.1 certification now.
Fortunately, we have a basis for speculation in the MSI X99S SLI Plus, which just got detailed.
Since ASRock's X99 Extreme4 mainboard will need to directly compete against it, we can only assume that the eight memory slots in the picture are DDR4-ready (Intel Haswell-E LGA 2011-3 CPUs support it after all).
We can also argue that those four PCI Express slots are full PCI Express 3.0 x16 ones, for quad-SLI/CrossFire multi-graphics card setups. Also, there seem to be 8 or 10 SATA ports near the right edge of the motherboard.
ASRock did not say exactly when the X99 Extreme4 would debut, saying only “real soon.” We'll assume August 29, since that's MSI's chosen date. No word on the price either.
