Z170M Extreme4 vs Z170 Extreme4

matth wrote: Hello, the Z170 Extreme4 gets good performance reviews. To be honest, I mostly mistook it for the Z170m. Do they have different performance? Aside from size, they are not quite the same. For example, the Z170m has only 6 CPU-phases, the Z170 has 10. Then there's also the Z170 Extreme4 +, but I know nothing about that, and it is not my priority... Asrock, please make Mainboard performance more transparent. You heard it first from me. PC world, you're welcome... (But maybe AMD will be taking care of that some time, I have no idea.)

I'm sorry, but I don't understand what you mean by making mother board performance more transparent?

Performance could mean any number of things for a mother board, and the components used with the board. You really need to be more specific.

Your use of transparent implies that something is not being revealed or documented. Apparently, your example of a six and ten phase CPU VRM design has not been documented by ASRock anywhere?

The Specifications section of each of these boards includes the number of CPU power phases, in the CPU section. The number of CPU power phases is also shown in each board's manual, in their Specifications section.

http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z170M%20Extreme4/?cat=Specifications

http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z170%20Extreme4/?cat=Specifications

Different mother board models are... different. These two have different colored heatsinks for the CPU VRMs and the Z170 chipset. They also have the model name visible on the board. If you are having trouble telling them apart visually, I can't understand why.