Intel lga1155 motherboard review: ASRock Z68 Pro3 Intel LGA 1155 Motherboard Review

This ensures high performance of both the built-in video and the processor itself. The memory controller and graphics core use the processor bandwidth, which greatly improves the performance of the PC.

Innovative Sandy Bridge architecture makes the shared cache faster and improves the responsiveness of the RAM access mechanism.

The HD Graphics 2000 graphics core is significantly faster than previous generation cores.

Integrated Sandy Bridge graphics for excellent color reproduction.

This model has proven itself in 2022-2023.

Specifications :

• form factor — Micro-ATX;
• chipset — Intel Q67;
• memory — 32 GB;
• SATA Ports — SATA 3Gb/s (x2), 1x SATA 6Gb/s (x2).

Pros

• stable operation;
• high performance;
• long warranty period;
• has noise suppression technology;
• quality build.

Cons

• no PS\2 connector.

ASRock H61M-DGS R2.

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Model supporting 2nd and 3rd generation Intel® processors . Reliability

The

device is provided with several levels of protection — control of energy consumption, fan speed, temperature and many others.

Solid capacitors greatly increase the life of the board.

The innovative PCI-E 3.0 interface greatly improves the performance of the computer.

The ability to install next-generation PCI Express 3.0 graphics cards makes graphics performance unbelievable.

Specifications :

• form factor — Micro-ATX;
• chipset — Intel H61;
• memory — 16 GB;
• SATA ports — 4x SATA 3Gb/s.

Pros

• has noise suppression;
• high degree of protection against overheating and breakdowns;
• excellent performance;
• compact dimensions;
• large memory.

Cons

• not found.

ASUS H61M-K

The budget model has an improved BIOS interface in Russian, which makes installation simple and quick, and operation as convenient as possible .

Compact dimensions allow this card to be installed even in small computers and laptops. The Intel H61 chipset greatly improves PC performance.

Eight USB ports allow you to connect any device, making your PC almost limitless .

The installation disk with proprietary software in the kit allows you to use the device without using additional programs.

Specifications :

• form factor -DIMM;
• chipset — Intel H61;
• memory — 16 GB;
• SATA ports — 4x SATA 3Gb/s.

Pros

• low cost;
• high performance;
• quality assembly;
• easy installation and configuration;
• has all the required ports.

Cons

• inconvenient location of USB ports.

ASRock H61M-IDE

Supports the latest generation of PCI-E 3.0 interface to ensure the stable performance of the system.

Thanks to this, the device can be used in both office and home computers. The presence of dual-channel DDR3 RAM allows two memory modules to work simultaneously.

The Intel H61 chipset provides full functionality for the 2nd and 3rd generation Intel processors.

Realtek ALC662 audio code provides support for 5.1 HD audio. Several different ports allow you to connect old and new SATA drives.

Specifications :

• form factor — Micro-ATX;
• chipset — Intel H61;
• memory — 16 GB;
• SATA ports — 4x SATA 3Gb/s.

Pros

• compact size;
• graphic bios;
• quick setting;
• stable operation;
• excellent performance.

Cons

• not found.

Customer Reviews

Artem.

I bought a GIGABYTE GA-H61M-S2PV (rev. 2.3) motherboard to replace a broken one. Pleased with the presence of the good old PCI. PC performance has improved significantly. Among the shortcomings, I can name the lack of support for SATA3 and USB 3.0.

Marina.

I recently purchased an AFOX IH61-MA motherboard to install on my home computer. Installation went quickly and without any problems thanks to the understandable BIOS interface in Russian. Haven’t found any shortcomings yet.

Useful video

From the video you will learn how to choose a motherboard for socket LGA 1155:

Intel H61 Express logic set.

ASRock H61M-U3S3

Intel H61 Express chipset

The H61 Express chipset, like the H67 Express, is positioned by Intel as an inexpensive mass product and is aimed at the consumer who is looking for a platform for solving everyday problems. The chipset, like the older models represented by Intel P67 Express and Intel H67, is designed to work with Sandy Bridge processors.

Yes

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The H61 Express is based on the well-known Intel H67, a number of functions of which have been disabled. So, Intel H61 Express lost 2 PCI Express lanes and 4 USB 2.0 ports. Separately, I would like to note a serious reduction in the capabilities of the disk subsystem. The H61 Express lacks support for SATA 3.0 drives and the ability to build RAID arrays. How critical is this in the budget segment? In our opinion, the remaining 6 PCI Express lanes and 10 USB 2.0 ports will be enough for most consumers. And no one bothers to implement SATA 3.0 through a third-party controller (although in this case the interface speed may suffer). The memory subsystem has also been trimmed down a bit, supporting one DIMM per DDR3 channel. Thus, the maximum possible amount of memory is 8 GB. The memory frequency in normal mode cannot exceed 1333 MHz.

Maternal board ASROCK H61M-U3S3

Name	ASROCK H61M -U3S3
Processor connector, stake of POS POSS POS.	Intel LGA 1155
Chipset	Intel H61 Express
Supported memory	Dual channel. 2 slots, up to 8 GB memory, DDR3 1333 MHz supported
Expansion card slots	1 x PCIE 2.0 X16 1 x PCIE X1 2 x PCI
Plant	2 x PS/2 4x USB 2.0/1.1 2 x USB 3.0 1 x RJ45 LAN 9027 1 x D-Sub 1 x DVI-D 1 x HDMI
Internal I/O connectors. System buttons.	24-pin ATX 8-pin ATX 12V power connector 2 x SATA 6Gb/s 4 x SATA 3Gb/s 2 x USB 2.0/1.1 1 x COM 1 x IR 1 x CIR 1 x LPT 3 fan headers (CPU, 2 * system) Front audio header (audio out, audio in) Front panel header (Power and Reset buttons; power and HDD activity indicators)
Controllers used	Audio — Realtek ALC662 (6CH HDA codec) Network — 1 x Atheros AR8151 USB 3.0 — ASMedia ASM1042 SATA 6 Gb/s — ASMedia ASM1061 PCI — ASMedia ASM1085
902.5 size Form factor	microATX (244 x 218 mm)

The ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard comes in a standard size box. The packaging does not differ in any design frills and corresponds to the positioning of the product.

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard packaging

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard packaging strap on the back of the case. As we can see, ASRock put the bare minimum in the box with the H61M-U3S3. On the whole, such a modest set of accessories corresponds to the positioning of the product, but still I would like to see at least two Serial ATA cables in the kit.

Despite the whole budget nature of the solution, the motherboard does not look like a gray mouse. There are no designer excesses in the H61M-U3S3, but the black textolite, coupled with blue and white expansion slots, looks good. Adds attractiveness is a small radiator, which is covered with a decorative cover with the vendor’s logo. ASRock’s desire to use such a modest cooling system is justified: the Intel H61 Express chipset has a fairly low heat dissipation, and the use of heat pipes is simply useless here. The batteries are not cooled.

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard overview

ASRock engineers applied 3+1+1 power subsystem. Three phases power the CPU cores directly, while the memory subsystem and the integrated graphics core each use one phase. The power supply system of the motherboard in question uses solid capacitors.

Let’s take a closer look at how conveniently the elements are located on the motherboard. Power connectors are in standard places: ATX 2.3 on the right behind the memory slots, and 8-pin processor — on top, in the left corner of the board. The use of a low-profile heatsink on the chipset allows you to install long expansion cards without any hint of inconvenience. This decision cannot but rejoice, given the mATX form factor.

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard, top view

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard, bottom view

Pay attention to the space around the processor socket. It’s easy to see that the H61M-U3S3 has two holes on each corner of the CPU socket. The fact is that ASRock engineers implemented the ability to install coolers for LGA775, LGA1155 / LGA1156 on the motherboard, which was called C.C.O. (Combo Cooler Option). This option is a real godsend for a budget board, because many users will switch to LGA1155 from LGA775.

Ports, connectors and features

The set of ASRock H61M-U3S3 slots was apparently also chosen with migration in mind. Two PCI slots will come in handy for those who have expansion cards for this interface. If you plan to install a dual-slot video card, then one PCI will have to be sacrificed. Two DIMM slots can accommodate up to 8 GB of DDR3 RAM in dual-channel mode, operating at frequencies up to 1333 MHz.

Rear panel on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

The rear panel of ASRock H61M-U3S3 is equipped with the following set of ports and connectors: D-Sub, DVI-D, HDMI, two PS/2, three audio jacks, an Ethernet connector and 6 USB ports, two of which are USB 3. 0 compliant and painted in Blue colour. USB ports have an increased power supply and are designed to charge various devices, including when the computer is turned off.

ASRock has enhanced the H61 Express with third-party controllers.

Chips on the motherboard ASRock H61M-U3S3

So, the sound is implemented using the Realtek ALC662 chip — not the most advanced solution in the company’s portfolio. ASRock engineers did not supplement the audio capabilities with S/PDIF output, limiting themselves to standard minijack connectors, which are brought to the rear panel of the board. The network capabilities of the novelty are represented by the Atheros AR8151 gigabit controller.

We have already mentioned above that the Intel H61 Express lacks SATA 3.0, USB 3.0 and PCI interfaces. ASRock engineers solved the lack of a PCI interface by using the Asmedia ASM1085 controller, which supports two PCI slots. To implement USB 3.0, an ASMedia ASM1042 chip was used, which supports two corresponding ports. Thus, including the standard features of the chipset, the ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard supports 8 USB ports, six of which are brought to the back panel of the motherboard, and four are available as two internal connectors on the motherboard. In addition to the usual USB, the manufacturer added a number of connectors to the motherboard: CIR, IR, COM and LPT.

Disk capabilities have been expanded with the ASMedia ASM1061 controller, which allows you to connect two SATA 3.0 devices. Thus, the considered motherboard allows using six Serial ATA devices.

BIOS and board settings

There is a clear CMOS jumper on the board. The BIOS is based on the AMI BIOS code. ASRock used the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) firmware in the H61M-U3S3 with its proprietary interface, which is generally intuitive and convenient.

It is pointless to consider the standard settings — they practically do not change from board to board — so let’s pay attention to the UEFI section that interests us the most. In the OC — Tweaker section, the vendor has collected all the basic settings that relate directly to overclocking and memory settings.

For convenience, we provide our traditional table with available settings.

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The memory subsystem settings are collected in the OC — Tweaker section. You have the option to set the timings to Auto mode, or fine-tune each parameter manually. Memory timings are enough, especially considering the fact that we have a budget motherboard. It also contains settings related to the central processor: processor multiplier, individual multipliers for cores in Turbo Boost mode (the restrictions are the same as for H67).

The voltage settings are not as extensive as the memory timings. Nevertheless, the ASRock H61M-U3S3’s set of parameters is still quite good. The novelty also supports saving settings profiles, which is really useful.

In the H/W Monitor section, you can view CPU and system temperatures, CPU and memory voltage, and fan speeds. At the same time, automatic control of the rotational speed of the processor and system fans is provided here, which will undoubtedly please lovers of silence.

Overclocking Test

The ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard was tested with an unlocked Intel Core i5-2500K processor and two Transcend aXeRam DDR3-2000 2GB memory sticks. Other components used in the test bench: MSI N470 GTX video card, Hitachi HTS543232A7A hard drive and Thermaltake Toughpower XT 650W power supply. The test PC was running Windows 7 x64, each test was run five times in a row, after which the last 3 results were averaged.

We start by overclocking the graphics core. Despite the fact that the ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard is extremely difficult to call an overlocker product, we are still interested in what we can do with integrated graphics in the Intel Core i5-2500K on a budget platform. We raised the voltage on the processor by 0.15 V and, accordingly, the frequency of the graphics core to 2100 MHz.

Sandy Bridge integrated graphics are known to be sensitive to the amount and speed of RAM. Therefore, before testing the performance gain from overclocking graphics, we decided to experiment with memory. It is not possible to set the memory frequency higher than 1333 MHz, which is not surprising — after all, the Intel H61 Express chipset itself is limited to this value. We began to adjust the memory timings. As a result, we managed to achieve stable operation at 6-6-6-18 — this is a standard result for our Transcend aXeRam DDR3-2000 memory modules.

As a result, with these parameters, our system worked stably, and we conducted a 3D Mark Vantage test in Performance mode. It turned out 2898 points for the overclocked system against 1791 for the standard one — a very impressive 60% increase in performance.

Additionally, we decided to undervolt our processor. The voltage adjustment range is limited here, so I didn’t have to experiment for a long time: Vcore -100 mV, GPU -100 mV, PLL 1.548, VTT 0.908. As a result, under maximum load in the LinX stress test, we managed to win back 20 watts.

Separately, I would like to tell you about the Power Saving mode, which is available in the BIOS Setup of the ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard, but is not activated with standard settings. Turning it on manually, we saw that in the LinX stress test, the system automatically reduces the CPU voltage by 0.1 V, which is quite close to our undervolting result. However, in simple power consumption when Power Saving was turned on, it was even higher than the standard.

Let’s talk a little about the bundled software. The name ASRock Extreme Tuning Utility speaks for itself. This software informs us about the status of various system indicators: temperature, frequency, overclocking settings, allows you to change the fan speed, save and load settings profiles.

ASRock Extreme Tuning Utility on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

Also included is the XFast USB utility, which we will cover in the next section.

Test results

The performance of modern Intel processors is practically independent of the chipset used. The choice of motherboard affects the implementation of the Turbo Boost mechanism and the performance of the memory subsystem.

MaxxPI benchmark results on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

We traditionally start with MaxxPI. This test originates from the famous SuperPi benchmark. The diagrams clearly show that the ASRock H61M-U3S3 is somewhat inferior to the Biostar TP67XE and Biostar TH67XE motherboards. The results differ slightly, and yet this picture is observed both for a single-threaded test and for a multi-threaded one.

Sandra 2011 benchmark results on ASRock H61M-U3S3 9 motherboard0003

Testing in Sandra 2011 does not change the overall picture: ASRock H61M-U3S3 is somewhat behind its competitors in the face of Biostar motherboards. However, the difference between the results is very small and amounts to about 2.5%. Such results are more than expected, Sandra 2011 is extremely processor dependent, and we use the same processor.

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard audio encoding

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard video encoding

Audio and video encoding are highly parallelizable tasks, and also highly dependent on the performance of the central processor, which in our case is the same for all motherboards. Accordingly, we observe absolute parity between test participants in video encoding tests — the results differ by 0.75%. But when encoding audio in Lame, Biostar TP67XE and Biostar TH67XE are ahead of ASRock H61M-U3S3 by 8%.

Imaging on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

Despite the different algorithms for interacting with the system and the absence of a constant 100% CPU load, the test results differ by 2% in Photoshop, and in Paint the test results are completely identical.

ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard calculations

ASRock H61M-U3S3 is somewhat inferior to Biostar TP67XE and Biostar TH67XE in calculation testing. This is especially evident in the Mathematica 8 test, where the latter outperform the motherboard in question by 5%. Well, the Fritz results differ by only 1%.

Rendering on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

Despite the similar tasks performed by rendering programs, there are still some features, and they affect the balance of power between the systems under test. For POV-Ray and Cinebench, the difference between the Biostar and ASRock boards is negligible — 0.3%. At the same time, 3ds Max says that Biostar products are somewhat ahead of ASRock. But this difference, again, is about 3%.

Memory tests on ASRock H61M-U3S3 9 motherboard0003

The memory tests show a serious advantage on the part of Biostar motherboards. ASRock H61M-U3S3 shows a significant lag of about 15-20%. The fact is that in automatic mode the board launched our modules at 1066 MHz with timings of 8-8-8-20, while most boards select the 1333 MHz mode. Hence the difference in previous tests.

Tests in gaming applications using integrated video on an ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

As you can see, when working with an integrated graphics core, the performance of the memory subsystem greatly affects the result. In most gaming applications, the ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard loses Biostar TH67XE by an average of 5-10%.

In addition to testing PC games using integrated graphics, we also tested systems with the MSI N470 GTX discrete graphics card.

Tests in gaming applications using discrete video on the motherboard ASRock H61M-U3S3

The overall level of fps has increased significantly, but the picture has not changed dramatically. ASRock H61M-U3S3 still lags behind in a number of applications. It should be noted that the gap has not only narrowed, but in some cases evened out. Indeed, in this case, the video card has its own GDDR memory and there is no need to go into the operational memory.

Let’s look at the power consumption of the tested boards. The values ​​were measured in idle, under single-threaded load (MaxxPI) and during the LinX stress test. The two values ​​in each column correspond to power consumption in normal mode and undervolting. The measurements were carried out for the entire system as a whole, that is, when considering the results, the efficiency of the power supply must also be taken into account.

Power consumption measurement on an ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

The results are quite interesting. At idle, the ASRock H61M-U3S3 based system consumes less power than the Biostar TP67XE both in normal mode and undervolting. The graph clearly shows the dependence of the results on the load on the central processor, which changes dramatically with the growth of the latter. In MaxxPI2, the gap between test participants is seriously reduced. ASRock is in the lead, but only 2.4W in normal mode and 4W in undervolting. Well, in full-fledged stress testing, the H61M-U3S3 motherboard loses to the Biostar product in both modes. The reason for this, most likely, lies in the more efficient power supply subsystem of the Biostar TP67XE motherboard.

Finally, we decided to test the work of proprietary XFast technology in practice. The latter increases the speed of interaction between USB drives and a PC due to some kind of software optimization. The official website of the manufacturer shows very optimistic performance graphs, which attracted our attention. For tests, the INASPT software package and a 500 GB Seagate GoFlex drive were used.

XFast technology on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

USB 2.0 speed measurement on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

USB 3. 0 speed measurement on ASRock H61M-U3S3 motherboard

increase in speed. The throughput of the USB 2.0 interface has not changed in any way, but it turns out that this interface can work faster than we are used to. At the same time, when using USB 3.0, we could not find any gain from using XFast. However, this interface is already quite fast.

Pins

The Intel H61 Express logic set is a good budget product. The manufacturer removed from it some of the features that demanding users need, and due to this, slightly reduced the final cost of the solution.

At the same time, the motherboard manufacturer is free to add all the features that, in his opinion, the H61 Express lacks. The ASRock H61M-U3S3 has high-speed USB 3.0 and SATA 6 Gb / s interface controllers, so that the buyer does not have to think about their availability for future upgrades. At the same time, the board is also equipped with several old interfaces: PCI, COM, LPT. In combination with a double set of mounting holes, this makes the new product an interesting solution for those who want to move from LGA 775 to LGA 1155 as painlessly as possible.