ASRock Z87 PRO3 LGA 1150 Intel Z87 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard ASRock Z87 PRO3 LGA 1150 Intel Z87 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

Pros: No Pros

Cons: My Monitor is not coming up. I wish i had bought this at best buy, it would have been easier to return.. If i have to return all these stuff i bought here it would cost me more.. Bad first time experience

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. We will be more than happy to assist you.

Please trouble shoot the mainboard whether the issue is resolved.
Clear the CMOS.
Reseat the CPU and heatsink fan.
Test with single memory module (non-ECC, un-buffered).
Test with onboard VGA.
Plug the 24 + 8 or 4 pins ATX power.
Plug the chassis power switch to mainboard, and try again.

If you have any technical support inquiry, please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp

Pros: Using for 6mo now w/out any issues. Installed and setup easy. No drive loading issues. Core i5 4570, so no over clocking. Boots fast from SSD running Win 7 Home 64bit. Decided to get this over the H87 due to good price and reviews.

Cons: No issues to report. Haven't attempted a FW upgrade. No reason to chance it, if one is available. Current features work fine for me and very stable.

Pros: Good mobo, easy to install, good layout.
BIOS is really nice to use and the self-update could not be any easier.

Cons: No matter what I try, I can't make that motherboard stay in Sleep or Hibernate mode under Windows 8.1.
First this is with a fresh Windows 8.1 install on top of a brand new ASRock motherboard.
Second what does Microsoft have to do with it? You know fairly well they will tell me to contact the motherboard manufacturer.

I have tried several options:
- Windows > Hibernate
- Windows > Sleep mode without the Intel RapidStart
- Windows > Sleep mode with the Intel RapidStart
- I have disabled the Windows options to wake up to do maintenance. I never installed the Remote Wake or Smart Connect software since it's the reverse of what I want.
- I have tried disabling *ALL* the options to wake from USB or RTC or interrupts in the BIOS.
- Updated to latest BIOS.

No matter what, the PC randomly comes wakes up within 1 minute or 5 minutes or 30 minutes. It varies.
It basically means all the fancy sleep/hibernates options promised by the motherboard are totally useless.

ASRock support has been very disappointing and unhelpful on the subject.

Other Thoughts: The Remote Wake or Smart Connect software seem of dubious utility. If you want a NAS, get a NAS.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Please turn the power off, clear the CMOS.
Set the UEFI BIOS default.
Try uncheck "Allow the device to wake the computer" for Keyboard and Mouse at Device Manager, Keyboard, Power Management under Windows 8.1.
If you have any technical issues please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp

Pros: Worked out of box & packaged well. Features & price are great.

Cons: Raid drivers are a nightmare. I gave up trying to get the RAID to work during Windows 8.1 install. The drivers disk says that it has RAID drivers, but they're packaged in an executable that isn't accessible from the install. Also the utility in the bios to download drivers works - except for RAID drivers. I tried the native Intel drivers too - to no avail.

Other Thoughts: The RAID drivers first seemed like a killer for me, and then I found a drive pooling kernel software package that seems to be much better than RAID for my needs. It may not work for everyone, but at least I can be happy now with the motherboard I have (StableBit DrivePool is the software).

Newegg with shipper saver got the motherboard here fast - I ordered Saturday night and it arrived Wednesday. Other retailers' parts arrived Saturday - good job Newegg!

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Windows 8.1 has built-in RAID driver which's not required driver during installing.
However, please visit the link below for RAID Installation Guide
ftp://66.226.78.21/manual/raid/Z87%20Pro3/English.pdf
If you have any technical issues please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp

Pros: Slick BIOS interface

Cons: PCIE2 won't recognize graphics card. Tried the other card from a working system, no dice. Tried clearing CMOS (see that being suggested), no dice. Tried slowing the interface to Gen1 (also seen here), no dice.

Nice motherboard so long as you don't want high end graphics.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Please set the UEFI BIOS default.
Reinstall the CPU and cooler to test if its resolved.
If you have any technical issues please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp

Pros: The OC profiles are nice.

Cons: The implementation of CSM is confusing; as is how it deals with video cards over the PCIe and the whole UEFI / legacy BIOS, use-cases.

I purchased two Z87 Pro3's and neither would detect my video cards, so a defective mainboard is ruled out. I tried 3 different brands and styles of video cards, one even had the newer UEFI "hybrid BIOS" switch. No amount trying every possible configuration, even with EVGA tech support (for two of the three cards I tested), would even get Z87's "Status Browser" thing to show the seated video cards were even in the PCIe.

It's as if the PCIe doesn't exist.

Again, tested two Z87 Pro3's with same result -- both being defective seems improbable. The mainboards work in every other way with the onboard video.

If there is some magic incantation that breaths life into the PCIe's, once Asrock responds to my support submission, it will not get back the time I've wasted on something that should have worked out of the box.

And yes, I've updated to the latest UEFI (both were 2.40 that upgrade to 2.50), as well as resetting the CMOS on one of my Z87's -- seem to be ASRock's fix du jour.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Jalcide,

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
For the issue, please turn the power off.
Clear the CMOS.
Reseat the VGA card firmly with is PCIE power (if applied).
Set the PCIE link speed to Gen1 at UEFI, Advanced, Chipset Configuration.
If you have any technical issues please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp

Pros: Inexpensive; plentiful features; PCIE 3.0 x16 slot; flexible overclocking support and fan control.

Cons: Relatively minor -- mounting screws have spines that can chew ground etching on the motherboard (don't over-torque!); USB 3.0 connector was a bit flimsy.

Other Thoughts: I bought this motherboard as initial foray into the world of overclocking on a budget. The board is well labeled so the build was straightforward without any problems. The UEFI provided was quite flexible and allowed a lot of tweaks, some of which I used.

A great buy for the money. It's been in operation for a few months and I have no complaints.

Build:
ASRock Z87 PRO3
Intel i7-4770K @ 4.4 GHz, 1.25v
G.SKILL Ripjaws 2 x 8GB SDRAM DDR3 2400
EVGA GeForce GTX 770
CORSAIR HX750 750W

(Note: this board only has one PCIE 3.0 x16 slot, so if you're thinking about SLI or similar, keep looking.)

Pros: Paired with an i5-4670k and 8 gb HyperX blu, it is great. I had a few issues that were entirely my fault and I'll explain in the Other section. It accepted all my parts and the Bios is great. Very User Friendly.

Cons: The manual needed more detail; several times it was plugging random pins in and praying for no errors. The only issue I had was the Ram configuration, but it isnt too bad.

Pros: Cheap, full of features, UEFI Bios

Cons: It is very flimsy, and my board had a moderate warp coming right out of the box.
My GTX 770 was sagging very low upon first installing, first mobo I had to actually brace a large video card in.

Other Thoughts: It works exactly how it should, its Z87, and its cheap, but its so flimsy I am afraid its going to fail and take out other components with it.

Im probably going to replace it with a high quality board when I can afford it.

Pros: Nice for the price, if it works. Newegg is always the best part of buying PC hardware. They seem to actually care, and work with you.

Cons: DDR channel B dead out of the box. I am not the only one to have this issue. Where is the support phone number? You have the sales number. You can email support.
Guess what, 1 day later, nothing back from them, other than the confirmation that they got my email.

Other Thoughts: My build went well. Got Gskil ram that is supposed to work with the board as per Asrock compatibility chart. Installed as per usual slot arrangement A1-B1. Get a message, channel B ram failed, re-seat, try again. Hmm. Swapped them around, same thing. Did A2-B2, Same. Installed both chips into A1-A2, works single channel. Tried a single chip in either of the B slots, completely dead. Just for giggles, updated bios to latest version. Same thing. Even more giggles tried 2 chips in channel B, same thing. Finally tried other known working ram, same story This is the first time, in 14 years of building computers, that I have had dead dimms. So now, I have to RMA the board. Which will take 5 days minimum. And while this happens, I get to tell my customer to go beat sand while all this happens.

Oh, lets not forget that I just assembled this all for free, and get to do it again when the new board arrives. How about the home user that gets to go out and buy more thermal paste. And in the process hopes not to break everything that was assembled while removing, and installing again.

Either way, the biggest pain, is they do not have any support that you can just call. Or, if this is a known issue, maybe pull the boards back, and stop giving us all these headaches. I don't know if I would try this brand ever again. I have never had an issue with Asus, figured all the great reviews were worth a try. Just my luck.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear ASRock Customer

We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you.
Please trouble shoot the mainboard whether the issue is resolved;
Unplug the ATX power.
Clear the CMOS.
Reseat the CPU and heatsink fan as well.
Test with single memory on each memory slot one by one to isolate the issue.
If you have any technical questions please contact us at http://www.ASRock.com/support/tsd.asp. We will assist you shortly.

Thank you

ASRock SUPPORT
Tech Support Email: user@ASRockamerica.com