ASRock Fatal1ty Z77 Professional Review - IDE and Floppy on Z77
by Ian Cutress on May 20, 2012 1:30 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- ASRock
- Fatal1ty
- Z77
3D Movement Algorithm Test
The algorithms in 3DPM employ both uniform random number generation or normal distribution random number generation, and vary in various amounts of trigonometric operations, conditional statements, generation and rejection, fused operations, etc. The benchmark runs through six algorithms for a specified number of particles and steps, and calculates the speed of each algorithm, then sums them all for a final score. This is an example of a real world situation that a computational scientist may find themselves in, rather than a pure synthetic benchmark. The benchmark is also parallel between particles simulated, and we test the single thread performance as well as the multi-threaded performance.
Due to the default overclock enabled option of ASUS and Gigabyte boards, the ASRock unfortunately lags behind noticeably in multithreaded testing. The ASRock should have average single thread performance in comparison, but in our 3DPM test, the Professional comes in with the lowest score.
WinRAR x64 3.93 - link
With 64-bit WinRAR, we compress the set of files used in the USB speed tests. WinRAR x64 3.93 attempts to use multithreading when possible.
As a test that utilizes multithreading where possible, WinRAR exposes how the motherboards react to changes in load and application of turbo modes. The ASRock Fatal1ty Z77 Professional does well here, edging out the ASUS Pro and coming streaks ahead of the Extreme4.
FastStone Image Viewer 4.2 - link
FastStone Image Viewer is a free piece of software I have been using for quite a few years now. It allows quick viewing of flat images, as well as resizing, changing color depth, adding simple text or simple filters. It also has a bulk image conversion tool, which we use here. The software currently operates only in single-thread mode, which should change in later versions of the software. For this test, we convert a series of 170 files, of various resolutions, dimensions and types (of a total size of 163MB), all to the .gif format of 640x480 dimensions.
Focusing purely on single threaded performance, the Fatal1ty does not perform too well. With the ASUS Deluxe somehow blitzing the field, nothing is coming close.
Xilisoft Video Converter
With XVC, users can convert any type of normal video to any compatible format for smartphones, tablets and other devices. By default, it uses all available threads on the system, and in the presence of appropriate graphics cards, can utilize CUDA for NVIDIA GPUs as well as AMD APP for AMD GPUs. For this test, we use a set of 32 HD videos, each lasting 30 seconds, and convert them from 1080p to an iPod H.264 video format using just the CPU. The time taken to convert these videos gives us our result.
As Xilisoft stresses all cores all of the time, the ASUS and Gigabyte boards have the advantage with that default overclock in multithreaded load. As a result, the Professional lags behind a touch.
x264 HD Benchmark
The x264 HD Benchmark uses a common HD encoding tool to process an HD MPEG2 source at 1280x720 at 3963 Kbps. This test represents a standardized result which can be compared across other reviews, and is dependant on both CPU power and memory speed. The benchmark performs a 2-pass encode, and the results shown are the average of each pass performed four times.
In yet another multithreaded test, the Professional does not break into the top half of the motherboard testing due to that speed deficit.
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Matt355 - Monday, May 21, 2012 - link
I hear you, I have a full size ATX case but have started buying Micro ATX Motherboards to avoid junk I don't want. If your running a SSD and a 3TB drive drive as a gamer your not looking for 10 SATA ports, your not running your video card off PCI slot or your hard drives off IDE. you probably don't even need an optical drive so why would you want a Floppy drive.fausto412 - Sunday, May 20, 2012 - link
I met the guy last year at an event, he was there to support ASRock. To start off a review of a product by being a hater is just sad. I have own Fatal!ty branded sound cards and Headsets. Never once did it bother me. Fatal!ty was the guy living the dream, no different than playing basketball...you still wish you was MJ for just a second. Don't hate congratulate!madmanjasper - Sunday, May 20, 2012 - link
In fairness he seemed to be using his experience to draw a comparison between marketing in different regions. Not blind hate.shin0bi272 - Sunday, May 20, 2012 - link
he's living the dream of dropping out of college and living in his parents basement and being one of the only people to win prize money while they were still paying people to compete. When they tried to make competitive video game playing a "sport" no one wanted to watch and it floundered.Please also note all the games he played (after practicing 8-12hrs a day mind you) had no recoil in the weapons. Games like pain killer and UT3 which are fun but have relatively low skill involved in racking up kills... you just spray and pray... and for a short time in the early to mid 2000's youd get paid.
Now he spends his entire day running around getting companies to put his face on their hardware and add useless features (anyone remember the 64mb of audio ram on his version of the first x-fi?) to them and jack up the price so he can make millions. And you compare him to MJ? Not to mention the horrible use of the english language in doing so. A kid who sits on their butt playing video games is not an athlete they are an occupy wall street member.
atticus14 - Monday, May 21, 2012 - link
lol @ games that lack recoil involve less skillso i suppose you would be a complete boss at a game like Q3 then since its so easy with no recoil. I guess you fail to realize that games like UT and Q3 faded from the spotlight because they were too damn hard for the majority of people as veterans constantly wiped the floor with them as noobs barely managed to put a point on the bored if not go into the negatives (UT was not AS harsh but you failed to mention Q3 which made Fat's name). They made it a hair easier with Quake Live's matchmaking but being "too hard" is still the reason why it has a small community; feel free to try, just dont get over confident in the noob tier quakelive.com
Lord 666 - Sunday, May 20, 2012 - link
Just like the Fatl1ty name was an albatross for Abit, ASRock has lost touch its roots and more importantly relevant features.shin0bi272 - Sunday, May 20, 2012 - link
When are people going to stop giving this dbag money to put his ugly face and retarded gamer tag on their hardware? No one gives a damn about this guy and yet people keep paying him to put his name on their stuff and overcharging us for it.kevith - Monday, May 21, 2012 - link
Not his biggest fan, are you?prophet001 - Monday, May 21, 2012 - link
^^ Creepers gonna creepjabber - Monday, May 21, 2012 - link
....was take a full featured ATX board and then they put a custom heatsink on it and some custom decals.Job done.
Should have taken maybe two weeks to sort out. No real product plans went into this product.
What's the non Wendelised SKU for this board?