ASUS Rampage II Extreme will be one of the hotter alternatives for overclockers and enthusiasts wanting to hit Intel's Nehalem architecture and the Core i7 series. We've posted some information on a couple of Intel X58-based motherboards from various manufacturers in the past, among others we broke the story of ASUS P6T Deluxe. We've received some information on yet another ASUS-based X58 motherboard and this time it is from the enthusiast series Republic Of Gamers, also known as R.O.G..
Rampage II Extreme is the name of the board that is very much alike the previously unveiled P6T Deluxe, which may not be that odd since they use the exact same chipset. There are some very distinct differences though, features that the overclockers will appreciate.
ASUS has, as usual, gone all the way and then some when it comes to the power supply of the board. It comes with 16 individual phases for the CPU, 3 phases for the QPI/VTT bus (which is done through an extra plug-in module to fit all of the phases), 3 phases for the DDR3 memory and 3 phases for the PCIe x16 slots. Power should not be an issue with this board.
Power phases for the QPI/VTT bus on the plug-in module
Speaking of PCI Express slots, this is one of the things separating this board from P6T Deluxe. P6T offers 2 graphics card slots, while Rampage II Extreme goes further and offers three slots supporting all forms of SLI and CrossFire setups. The PCI Express lanes are split up to 16/8/8 when all three slots are occupied.
When it comes to the specific overclocking features we find the from Rampage Extreme inherited, TweakIT that enables the user to switch settings directly on the board through the integrated switches, but what is even more interesting is ASUS' new ProbeIT technology. Users will be able to connect small probes (comes with the board) to ProbeIT and measure voltages on the board through a multimeter. This should simplify things for all serious overclockers that wants to be dead certain about the voltages flowing through the board.
TweakIT
The pictures here does not show the final cooling, but we have been told that the board will get passive cooling, which we're certain that you will appreciate. Tougher cooling will be left up to the user to install.
We have no detailed information regarding price and availability since it still a long time to go before we will actually see the board in stores. We would guess the price will be around the same as for Rampage Extreme, which should land us somewhere north of $300. If you want to stay at the top of the charts you are going to have to pay up.
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