ASRock P55 Extreme4 Motherboard

Memory Support

Socket LGA1156 CPUs, like socket LGA1366 and AMD processors, have an embedded memory controller. All other Intel CPUs use an external memory controller, which is located on the north bridge chip (a.k.a. MCH or Memory Controller Hub) of the chipset. This means that with other Intel CPUs, the chipset (and thus the motherboard) is the component that says what memory technologies and maximum amount of memory you can have on your PC.

Since now the memory controller is inside the CPU, it is the processor – and not the chipset – that defines what memory technologies and maximum amount of memory you can have. The motherboard, however, may have a limitation as to how much memory can be installed.

At the moment the integrated memory controller in socket LGA1156 processors supports only DDR3 memories up to 1,333 MHz in a dual-channel architecture, however, ASRock says the P55 Extreme4 supports DDR3 memories up to 2600 MHz through overclocking. The P55 Extreme4 has four DDR3 sockets and since at the moment, each DDR3 memory module can have up to 4 GB, you can have up to 16 GB with this motherboard.

The first and third sockets are white, while the second and fourth are blue. In order to achieve the maximum performance you should install two or four memory modules in order to enable dual-channel architecture. When only two modules are used, make sure to install them in the white sockets. If you install them in the white ones, the computer won’t turn on.

Figure 3: Memory sockets; install two or four modules for the best performance