ASRock P67 Extreme6
Those less interested in Fatal1ty branding might prefer ASRock’s P67 Extreme6, a design that includes many of the features from its gamer-centric counterpart, yet strangely uses a completely different circuit board.
Extreme6 buyers still get four external and eight internal USB 2.0 ports, four external and two internal USB 3.0 ports, four SATA 3Gb/s, six SATA 6Gb/, and dual gigabit network ports. One of the internal SATA 6Gb/s ports is still shared with eSATA, and even the x16-length graphics card slots are carried over with x16-x0-x4 and x8-x8-x4 transfer capabilities.
The P67 Extreme6 is similarly blessed with an eighteen-phase voltage regulator and similarly cursed with front-panel audio and front-panel USB 3.0 connectors placed far too distant from the ports of most enthusiast-oriented cases. So, aside from the price, what’s different?
The P67 Extreme6 eliminates the added-cost Ultra ATA controller, but keeps the cable connector for the ubiquitous floppy controller. The Extreme6 also uses a less expensive and far lighter heatpipe, covers the PLX PCIe 2.0 bridge with a die-cast shell that appears to be magnesium, and employs two-sided (rather than single-sided) clips on its memory slots.
A few other things that both boards have in common are onboard power and reset buttons, a port address 80 diagnostics display, rear-panel CLR_CMOS buttons, and a single, socketed BIOS. The lack of that last feature will come back to hurt one of ASRock’s competitors in this very review.
The P67 Extreme6 lacks only the Ultra ATA cable compared to the P67 Professional, since this particular motherboard doesn't include that controller anyway. Builders must still purchase their SATA cables separately if they want to use more than three drives.
