Struggling with motherboard features

[gimmethedonut]

So I have to make a decision to buy a motherboard today and I have narrowed it down to two:

Asus ROG Ranger VIII Z170

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132586

Asrock extreme 6 Z170

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157631&cm_re=asrock_extreme6-_-13-157-631-_-Product

I just want a rundown of the motherboards, their features and advantages and disadvantages, which is the better quality (if that's possible to tell ) and better for overclocking and the reasons why. The Asrock seems to have a heat pipe connecting the heat sinks, which leads me to believe it might be of better quality but I'm really not sure. Any help is much appreciated, thanks.

 

[DonkeyOatie]

The Ranger is the bottom, budget, end of the ROG list and has ten power phases, probably four doubled, plus two for RAM. The Extreme 6 has twelve phases, probably six doubled and two RAM as well. Both have heatpipes.

These are comparatively new boards, so all the votes are not in yet. I would expect the ASRock board to be better for overclocking because of it's better power phases, but that may not mean so much with Skylake as it did with Haswell. Only time will tell.

With the Ranger you are paying something for the ROG look. I have used a lot of Haswell H97 and Z97 ASRock boards and their price/performance has been good. I expect the same here. I am yet to do a Skylake build so this is my opinion based on specifications and limited experience.

 

[faalin]

Asus's ROG line is known to be very good for overclocking, Ive used 5 ROG boards over the past 6 years without any issues from the boards. Ive also have used 2 Asrock boards, one for a friend and another Mitx and both are plagued with issues.

 

[gimmethedonut]

The Ranger is the bottom, budget, end of the ROG list and has ten power phases, probably four doubled, plus two for RAM. The Extreme 6 has twelve phases, probably six doubled and two RAM as well. Both have heatpipes.

These are comparatively new boards, so all the votes are not in yet. I would expect the ASRock board to be better for overclocking because of it's better power phases, but that may not mean so much with Skylake as it did with Haswell. Only time will tell.

With the Ranger you are paying something for the ROG look. I have used a lot of Haswell H97 and Z97 ASRock boards and their price/performance has been good. I expect the same here. I am yet to do a Skylake build so this is my opinion based on specifications and limited experience.

If you could get the asus around 30 dollars cheaper would you or would you go with the Asrock?

 

[gimmethedonut]

Asus's ROG line is known to be very good for overclocking, Ive used 5 ROG boards over the past 6 years without any issues from the boards. Ive also have used 2 Asrock boards, one for a friend and another Mitx and both are plagued with issues.

Are the issues software related or to do with the design of the mobos, like poor quality components and stuff like that?

 

[DonkeyOatie]

The Ranger is the bottom, budget, end of the ROG list and has ten power phases, probably four doubled, plus two for RAM. The Extreme 6 has twelve phases, probably six doubled and two RAM as well. Both have heatpipes.

These are comparatively new boards, so all the votes are not in yet. I would expect the ASRock board to be better for overclocking because of it's better power phases, but that may not mean so much with Skylake as it did with Haswell. Only time will tell.

With the Ranger you are paying something for the ROG look. I have used a lot of Haswell H97 and Z97 ASRock boards and their price/performance has been good. I expect the same here. I am yet to do a Skylake build so this is my opinion based on specifications and limited experience.

If you could get the asus around 30 dollars cheaper would you or would you go with the Asrock?

Easy question.. Get the ASUS. (and hope it was the right decision). In the early days of a new generation, you have to take some chances. ASUS makes a good product, but usually more expensive than what I want to pay for, for what I get. At $160 vs $190 I'd go with the ASUS. I have a student who is thinking of a Skylake build for Xmas, so I may get some real experience soon.

 

[gimmethedonut]

And one more question, sorry to keep this thread going but I'm pretty clueless with mobos: how much does the difference between the two in the number of power phases they have matter? 10 phases on the asus vs 12 on the asrock

 

[DonkeyOatie]

Not much if it were that simple.

To know the truth, I'd have to take a motherboard apart. The Ranger VII Z97 had ten phases too. It had four 'real' power phases for the CPU and doublers that split them. It also has two separate phases for the RAM. The ASRock Extreme 6 Z97 has six 'real' phases, also doubled and two more RAM phases.

Many CPU chips are either too bad or so good that the difference in power phases won't matter, but with Haswell chips, sometimes, it did matter.

Skylake is a new beast and I have no clue what effect this will have. I do a bunch of simple overclocking at school as I teach my Middle School students and I use a good ASRock Z97 four phases doubled to eight board and have gotten to 4.8Ghz with a good i5 4690K.

In your original post, you asked specifically about power phases and I'm telling you what I both know and guess and, hopefully, making the difference between know and guess to be clear.

I'm guessing that you do not plan to do extreme overclocking or else you would be looking at different motherboards. Most of the advice I give is based on what I would do myself, as you asked.

At the moment we really don't know enough to make anything more than general statements. Both the choices are good boards from good manufacturers (ASRock put out some crud a couple of generations ago) and the luck of the 'silicon lottery' is far more important than a couple of power phases.

Whatever you choose, if it works, you will be happy, and if it needed to be different, you will wish you had done something else, even though there may be no evidence that the other choice would have been better.