Z170 Extreme 7 first time asrock user questions

apachehavok wrote: So small update. The 2x 16gb kits I received from newegg had 4x serials in a row!! one kit had xxx-xxxxxxxx1119 and xxx-xxxxxxxx1120 and the other had  xxx-xxxxxxxx1121 and xxx-xxxxxxxx1122 so that's a good sign haha

That's a good sign?   I'd say it's a great sign!

If those two kits don't work together, then IMO the kits are tweaked so they don't work together.

One more bit of information for that G.SKILL representative, about ASRock boards not supporting memory above 2800 speed. Send him this link:

http://www.asrock.com/news/index.asp?id=3287

parsec you are a rockstar!

I will report all my findings here once I get the thing together this weekend.

If it doesn't work then I will probably just return them and get the 32gb kit.  If it does then sweet!


Again I will report back here with everything!

Thanks again!

Awesome thanks for all the info!

I did contact Gskill and they said that its better to get a single 32gb set (4x 8gb) then the 2x 16gb but it does have a chance of working.  Ill report back here and see what it does.

One thing they did mention is that this motherboard is only rated for up to DDR4 2800.  I thought it could go might higher then that?

Am I wrong in thinking that it can do 32gb of DDR4 3200?

Thanks!

UEFI firmware has been in use for several years now, at least five years really. No PC mother board manufacture would use BIOS firmware at this time.

You can navigate the UEFI GUI type interface with just the arrow keys/cursor movement keys if you like. UEFI firmware simply allows the GUI type interface to be used, it is actually independent of UEFI firmware.

I began writing a long description of UEFI firmware, and how to actually use some of its features, but I realized you may not need those at all. It depends upon what you are using as your OS drive, what type of drive. I have no idea what that will be.

Since you are building a PC after not doing so for a while, you don't need added complications that may be unnecessary for the hardware you'll be using. We can tell you how to enable the UEFI features you need, IF you need them, in a few sentences, rather than paragraphs of explanations.

My thoughts on Secure Boot are irrelevant to you, if you know you need it and why. I don't use it now, but I could enable it in a few minutes because my OS installations are configured in the manner that Secure Boot requires.

You can use the drivers from the included disk just fine. Your potential need for the latest version of a particular driver depends upon the hardware you are using with the board. The drive or drives for the OS again are an example of that.

Either network port will be faster than any Internet provider's service will be able to provide. Speed wise they are rated the same. One is a standalone network chip, the other is just the PHY interface to the networking capabilities included in the Z170 chipset.

You can try the built in OC settings, but they tend to use higher than necessary voltages so they will work with a wide range of processor OC capabilities. Those settings can be good examples of what you need to do, but not as voltage limits.

apachehavok wrote: Awesome thanks everyone!! YES I just read that if you download the windows 10 media creation kit and use your windows 7 key it *should* install.  Next week when the parts come in I will try it and report back here. The ram I will be using is this.  I purchased 2 of these kits: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231902 ^Hopefully they will work. Also have any of you used the in BIOS update utility?  Its the first thing I plan on doing once it boots for the first time.  If this board has 2 lan ports, which one do you use or do both work? Thanks all!!

Regarding the function of your memory, check this review of your memory at a well known e-Tailer... it's not so much the review I want you to see, but the response to it from a G.SKILL representative. It's the review dated 2/25/2016, as of today the second review on the first page:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231902

There are other comments from G.SKILL rep's in other reviews you may also find useful (I don't recall a memory manufacture being this honest about their products.)

One very important thing to take from the rep's comments, when mixing two (or more) different kits of memory, don't mix DIMMs from different kits in a single channel. The comment states use one kit only in the same color slots, which means one channel. That will increase the chances the two kits will work in your board.

That makes sense, particularly given another part of the comment that surprised me. That is, "... the XMP profile is programmed for each kit, so it will not work with multiple kits installed.".

This comment may be a generalization about all the kits of a specific model during its production lifetime. As I've read, the memory chips in a specific model of memory can be different at the beginning and end of its production cycle. That would clearly make it possible for some of the XMP profile data to be different.

What might happen is for each DIMM that is built, it is tested, and its XMP data programmed to match its capabilities. Kits of multiple DIMMs are then created out of DIMMs with matching XMP profiles/capabilities.

I've noticed in the UEFI/BIOS of several of my ASRock boards, that the DRAM Tweaker feature that allows you to manually populate multiple memory options using XMP data, allows you to choose which slot/DIMM to take the XMP data from. The reason for letting you choose which slot/DIMM to use, I've never understood, until (possibly) now.

Since all the memory settings are the same for every DIMM in the board, the DRAM Tweaker option apparently will let us see if (some) of the XMP data is the same or different for each DIMM in the board. An interesting part of this feature, if that is one of its intents.

You may have trouble trying to start/POST if you put both kits in the board at the same time. I would certainly never attempt to use them the first time with the XMP profile enabled. Whatever you do, be sure you somehow identify which DIMMs belong to each kit, don't mix them up.

When trying to use both kits, use one in one channel, and the other kit in the other channel.

I've used the Internet Flash option a few times, it works fine. If you use it, you should put a USB flash drive in one the the USB ports on the board's IO panel. Internet Flash will copy the UEFI update file to the flash drive for use if the update fails for some reason, once the PC is started again.

Both network ports work, both are Intel so only one driver installation program to run. Win 10 has given the Intel networking driver some problems, the teaming feature is broken and still not fixed after five releases of the Intel networking driver.   Either port can be used, I actually have both active.