ASRock&#039;s Motherboards Are Windows® 10 Compatible

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Posted: 29 Jul 2015 at 9:52am

I am using Windows 8.1 PRO and do all the updates. I enjoy playing games like RIFT and Warcraft so I have a once decent video card (NVidia GTX 680) so I want to leverage the gaming advantages of the new Windows. I do not overclock my memory or motherboard. I believe my bios is P3.90 if I looked in the right spot.

Edited by funpilot - 29 Jul 2015 at 10:01am

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Posted: 29 Jul 2015 at 2:26pm

Yes you checked correctly it seems, UEFI version 3.90 exists and there is a newer version, 4.00 available now.

A few reasons I asked about the UEFI version. First is to know if you were passed the "Sandy Bridge to Ivy Bridge processor compatibility update", which is version 3.60. That version, when not applied correctly, can cause problems which would be obvious to you, so you did it right, great!

Next I was trying to see if you had a UEFI version beyond any that included changes for Windows 8. That is also fine for you, even though we cannot see the UEFI/BIOS updates that existed before version 3.60, dated 8/2/2013. UEFI updates for Windows 8 were released in the second half of 2012, so you are good I'm sure.

I'm not a big gamer at all, so cannot get into the DX12 discussion much, which I imagine you are referring to.

In your case as a gamer, I would check for the Windows 10 driver for your card. Windows update would likely find and update it for you, but you might want to do that yourself, or specifically choose which driver you want to use.

Nvidia has Windows 10 64bit drivers available now for download for your card here:

http://www.geforce.com/drivers

If you fill in the manual driver search info, you'll get the driver you need. I'm sure a Windows 8.1 driver from Nvidia would work too, as well as the generic Windows 10 video driver, but I'm sure you don't want to use that one.

Otherwise if you want to install your own drivers, watch the download pages of the X79 boards still sold by ASRock, on their mother board series page:

http://www.asrock.com/mb/index.asp?s=Current

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Posted: 29 Jul 2015 at 9:09pm

Thanks. I will wait a few weeks to see if players complain about any gaming issues, and when they are worked out, I will upgrade.

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Posted: 29 Jul 2015 at 10:15pm

Just a question... I own a Asrock z77 extreme 4 Mainboard, but sadly yet there's no Win10 driver, especially for the INF Drivers..

So my question is general:

Will the older mainboards (Intel Chipset below 8) get Win10 certificated drivers at all? Not asking for specific mainboards, but for the overall update tendency :)

As long as the Win 8.1 drivers causes no crashes, I should be good to go..

Edited by Imago - 29 Jul 2015 at 10:22pm

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Posted: 29 Jul 2015 at 11:45pm

I own two Z77 Extreme4 boards, so of course I am interested about this myself.

Your post is hardly "just a question", it is an important question that many others are wondering about as well. Thumbs Up

A little research into the situation can provide answers. Intel provides the same INF file installation program on their download pages that we can find on the ASRock download pages for their newer boards, the 10.0.27 Intel Chipset Device Software, the INF file installer.

The following is from the the Release Notes for the 10.0.27 Intel Chipset Device Software installer:

The Intel® Chipset Device Software contains support for the following:

§ Intel® Atom/Celeron®/Pentium® Processor

§ 6th Generation Intel® Core processor family

§ Intel® Core M processor family

§ 5th Generation Intel® Core processor family

§ 4th Generation Intel® Core processor family

§ 3rd Generation Intel® Core processor family

§ 2nd Generation Intel® Core processor family

§ Intel® 100 Series chipset

§ Intel® 9 series chipset

§ Intel® C610 series chipset

§ Intel® C600 series chipset

§ Intel® Communications Chipset 8900 series

§ Intel® Atom Processor C2000 product family

§ Intel® Atom Processor S1200 product family

§ Intel® Xeon® Processor D-1500 product family

The good news is 10.0.27 supports chipsets back to the Sandy Bridge 6 series, also known as the 2nd Generation Intel Core processor family. We can see 15 different Intel products supported by this INF installation program.

Your Z77 chipset is a 3rd Generation processor chipset (Ivy Bridge), and is listed as supported by this INF installer.

I have not yet personally tested this installer on my Z77 Extreme4 PC, but in the past the information provided by Intel about their drivers and software has been accurate in my experience.

Since the chipset device installation software provides support as far back as Sandy Bridge/6 Series processors and chipsets, it is likely that most if not all the Intel drivers provided for Windows 10 will also support the Intel products in this list. There may be exceptions due to new features not supported on previous models, but I'm not at all worried about finding drivers for Windows 10.

When we find that an older mother board we have does not have the drivers for a new OS provided for us on the board's download page, we can take matters into our own hands.

As we can see above, the software and driver installers, are provided by the processor and chipset manufacture (AMD, Intel), not the mother board manufacture.

Creating software and driver installation programs specifically for one model of processor and chipset would not an efficient way to distribute and support them. So one type of installation package is designed to work with as many products as possible.

This is the "secret" that allows us to take driver and software installation programs from wherever we can find them, and use them with our hardware that seems to be left out. At some point older hardware may be left behind, but a Z77/Ivy Bridge processor system is not that old.

Does this make sense to you? Once we take responsibility for the drivers and software for our PCs, we have freed ourselves from always depending upon someone else to provide them for us.

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Posted: 30 Jul 2015 at 12:21am

Thanks for the info Parsec, I hadn't thought to check the supported chipsets on the new intel inf utility.

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Posted: 30 Jul 2015 at 12:57am

Not to worry, you would have remembered at some point. Wink

Another example of driver fishing, Intel has posted the IRST 14.0.0.1143 Windows driver package.

Alas, this driver is not listed to support Windows 10... officially. I've used various IRST version 13.x drivers with Windows 10, with RAID arrays, and it worked fine.

Note that Intel has not posted the IRST version 14.5.0.1081 for Win 10 that ASRock is providing for Win 10. I haven't checked that version for chipset compatibility yet, but the 14.0.0.1143 version includes official support for the following:

**************************************************************************
* 1.  OVERVIEW
**************************************************************************
Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology Release is designed to provide 
functionality for the following Storage Controllers:
    - Intel(R) 9 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
    - Intel(R) 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
    - Intel(R) 7 Series/C216 Series Chipset Family SATA AHCI/RAID Controller
    - Intel(R) C600 Series Chipset SATA AHCI Controller

    
**************************************************************************
* 2.  SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
**************************************************************************

1.  The system must contain one of the Intel controllers listed in 
    section 1 above and one of the following processors**:
    - Intel(R) vPro
    - Intel(R) Celeron
    - Intel(R) Pentium    
    - Intel(R) Core??i3, i5, or i7 
    - Intel(R) Xeon(R) processor family

***Note:There are certain Intel(R) Rapid Storage Technology features that
    are only enabled based upon the system's processor
    
    

2.  The system must be running on one of the following
    operating systems (no other Windows OS versions are supported):
    - Microsoft Windows* 7
    - Microsoft Windows* 7 x64-bit Edition** 
    - Microsoft Windows* 8
    - Microsoft Windows* 8 x64-bit Edition** 
    - Microsoft Windows* 8.1
    - Microsoft Windows* 8.1 x64-bit Edition**
    - Microsoft Windows* Server 2008 R2 x64-bit Edition**
    - Microsoft Windows* Server 2012 x64-bit Edition**	
    - Microsoft Windows* Server 2012 R2 x64-bit Edition**
    - Microsoft Windows* MultiPoint Server 2011 x64-bit Edition**

3.  The following operating systems are not supported:

    Any version of the following operating systems:
    - Linux*
    - UNIX*
    - BeOS*
    - MacOS*
    - OS/2*

While it may not appear to be as inclusive as the INF installer, it includes the same basic compatibility information in an abbreviated way.

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Posted: 30 Jul 2015 at 2:13am

parsec, thanks for your thoroughly researched post! Ive been too conservative and did only download drivers available at asrock support homepage.

I downloaded the INF (10.0.27) from the Intel homepage and though it doesn't list win10 officially, it seems to work perfectly.

In my case the z77 extreme 4 download area of asrock support only provides the INF(v9.4.0.1027). I think the listing of drivers for win 10 on asrock will be only a matter of time.

Edited by Imago - 30 Jul 2015 at 2:19am

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Posted: 30 Jul 2015 at 4:11am

What about for those of us on Z68? What should we be doing?

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