After both models have been spotted at the Computex 2011 fair which closed its gates just the last week, ASRock went ahead and officially announced the 990FX Extreme4 and 970 Extreme4 AM3+ motherboards for AMD's upcoming Bulldozer CPUs.
Both of these models support quad, six and eight-core AMD FX-Series processors, feature four DDR3 memory slots that are compatible with 2100MHz (and higher) memory modules and also include three PCI Express x16 slots.Their configuration, however, differs according to the motherboard model chosen, as the 990FX Extreme4 runs the three slots in an x16/x16/x4 mode, while the 970 Extreme4 in an x8/x8/x4 mode.The rest of the expansion options include a pair of PCI Express x1 slots, two 32-bit legacy PCI slots and eight SATA 6Gbps ports on the 990FX Extreme4, while the 970-based ASRock model includes the same number of slots but only five eSATA 6Gbps storage connectors.Both of these solutions include a series of overclocking friendly features such as on-board Power and Reset buttons, a BIOS debug display as well as a rear I/O Clear CMOS button.Also on the back of the boards, users will find two PS/2 ports, a pair of USB 3.0 ports, four or six USB 2.0 ports, a FireWire connector, an eSATA port, Gigabit LAN connectivity and 7.1-channel audio with coaxial and optical S/PDIF out.Two more USB 3.0 ports are available through an on-board pin header and the 990FX Extreme4 also comes bundled with a front USB 3.0 panel, which also has room for installing a 2.5-inch storage drive.The 990FX Extreme4 includes an 8+2 power phase design, while the 970 Extreme4 has a much simpler 5-phase construction, but both boards can take processors with a TDP as high as 140W.No details regarding pricing or availability were provided by the company, but the two motherboards have been already listed on its website.
