ASUS Rampage IV Gene Detailed

Nearly a month after going all guns blazing into the Sandy Bridge-E LGA2011 market with the Rampage IV Extreme, ASUS is close to launching its premium Republic of Gamers motherboard in the micro-ATX form-factor, the ROG Rampage IV Gene. News of this board surfaced in mid-November along with details of Rampage IV Formula, but with close to no details, not even a picture to go on. Sweclockers scored an internal presentation by ASUS that details this new kid on the block.

The Rampage IV Gene could very well be the first micro-ATX motherboard that's designed to be 3-way SLI/CrossFire capable, with PCIe slots wired to the system's main root complex. Its top-half layout is similar to that of every other X79 motherboard, with the LGA2011 processor socket sitting between two sets of DDR3 DIMM slots. In this board, each set has just two slots, each with its own 64-bit wide memory path (channel) to the processor IMC. The processor is powered by an 8-phase Digi+ II VRM. The VRM makes use of compact DrMOS chips, that are cooled by two sets of heatsinks connected by a heat pipe.

Expansion slots include three PCI-Express 3.0 x16, which are configured as x16/x16/x8, and an open-ended PCI-Express 2.0 x4, wired to the X79 PCH. Storage connectivity includes four SATA 6 Gb/s (red, from which two are wired to the X79 PCH, two to an ASMedia-made third-party controller); and three SATA 3 Gb/s ports (black, all wired to the PCH). The fourth SATA 3 Gb/s port from the PCH is assigned as eSATA. General connectivity includes SupremeFX III 8-channel audio backed by X-Fi MB software, one gigabit Ethernet connection driven by an Intel-made controller, four USB 3.0 ports (from which two are via header), USB 2.0, and PS/2 combo. There are several ASUS ROG-exclusive features, including ROG Connect, ROG GameFirst, USB BIOS Flashback, ASUS UEFI BIOS with ROG-exclusive features. We still don't have a clear release date.

Source: SweClockers