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Benchmark Results & Final Analysis

Synthetic benchmarks are a great way to look for configuration problems. We shouldn’t need to watch out for secretive overclocks on this non-overclockable platform.

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The B360 Gaming K4 draws slightly more power than average at full load, placing it behind the scale in our efficiency chart. Fortunately, that lower efficiency was not reflected in higher temperatures. Our percent-based charts are based on our entire H370/B360 review series, including a product that wasn’t quite up to speed, making the average for today’s group around half a percent better-performing than our average for the series.

Performance per dollar makes the most sense when comparing boards with identical features, and the competing H370 boards offer that chipset’s integrated advantages for a few dollars more. The H370 Performance uses the same PCB design to host the same slots and controllers as the B360 Gaming K4, but for $5 more includes the H370’s extra PCIe/HSIO pathways and Intel RST with RAID. Since two of the H370’s extra lanes are fed to the second M.2 slot, people who want to mount a pair of fast NVMe drives should take note of that difference regardless of whether RAID is a factor in their buying decision.

ASRock’s implementation of the same supporting hardware for both its H370 and B360 motherboards leaves little question about the minuscule price difference between these models. On the other hand, if we look a little farther afield, we find MSI's same-chipset B360M Mortar for $20 less than ASRock's offering. The Mortar has a cheaper audio codec, and while MSI figured out a way to make its second M.2 slot PCIe x4-capable, it did so by making its use an either/or choice against the board’s second x16-length slot. Whether the competing board is a better bargain depends on whether you need two M.2 storage slots and an x16/x4 PCIe slot configuration active simultaneously. Those are the kinds of questions that, well, shouldn’t keep us up at night given the small difference in price. If you need a feature, there's no reason not to throw a few dollars at it.