Asus Maximus Extreme VIII is after several years next extreme versions of the series Maximus. The last one was Maximus VI Extreme in 2013 at chipset Intel Z87 (Maximus Extreme is primary for extreme OC and extreme clock and there was no reason for Z97 Extreme board. The sixth one got BIOS support for Haswell refresh). That's about 2 years since. VIII Maximus Extreme proved in the summer of 2015, but sales fell in the autumn of the same year.
http://www.czc.cz/asus-maximus-viii-extreme-intel-z170/178524/produkt

We will not linger here and go straight to the description of the boards on the theoretical side. 1.THeory


The board is based on the new Intel Z170 chipset series. It is very modern and brings major changes particularly strong increase in the number of PCIe lines in the south bridge and then associated communication DMI3.0 bus. Plus we can also call it practical use PCIe 3.0 links for M.2 SSDs or incorporation USB3.1 + Intel Thunderbolt port into one, but here we find a version USB3.1 compatible with other USB standards. Maximal possible transfer speeds you can see in the picture plate. In terms of the proposal CPU biggest change is the BCLK communication separate CPU cores and then separately with PCIe, SATA, USB, etc. This means the possibility of full BCLK clock! Another change is the socket with 1151 pins and processors that support DDR4 memory (DDR3 but even if the motherboard has slots for them). Maximus Extreme VIII make progress on the actual power controll for the CPU, iGPU, memory, and has also been fairly improved sound, LAN itself. And there is also better WiFi 802.11ac. Some of the things we look slightly in more detail ...

Digitally controlled management supply itself is at very high level. Conventional power control goes from the PSU source through the rails to supply the CPU (8pin) and then to the main control of the PWM controller and then further transformed into the power cascade (phases). It has MOSFETs chokes and capacitors for charging. The change here is motherboard for better precision has two digitall controllers for power supply of the CPU. One is purely for iGPU voltage control and second one for the CPU voltage. Mosfets are type of optiMOS as the highed suits and coils have a great opportunity optical density of energy and contain small ferite granules for improved electromagnetic properties (named Microfine Alloy chokes).

However overclocking has undergone further refinement. It was the first higher number of pins, but the practical measurements showed no effect on OC such as 2011v3 with the „Asus OC socket“.... Asus Pro Clock technology, the opportunity to reach 400MHz BCLK OC!

With overclocking is also related to this thing. The actual OC Panel II, an improved version of the original. It includes features retry and safe button (attempt failed post again, no one would have to hard shut down PC and then something to reconfigure, safe = returns the following post straight into the BIOS with the original values and we may change it. Post gone by default values of BIOS) More about the OC panel II in queries.

This motherboard has an unbelievable number of fan connectors and one for water pump and also for extra temperature sensoring. The control is possible of course PWM (or DC).


The new audio part is called SupremeFX 2015 and consists of more electronics parts than previous generations. Of course there is the famous audio shield, a separate part of the PCB, a separate left and right channel audio links, headphone amplifiers, as well as audio switching relays, ESS audio converter and a separate audio clock generator.

This is related to sound like Sonic Studio II

Again the software - perfect package called AI Suite 3 allows great tuning unit after the performance, power management and digi controll, fan control (even to zero level of silence! There is a PWM controller for water pump, etc.) and prioritize network settings. And, or course, the option to manually tune everything possible...

BIOS is setup so that this would be a chapter itself. Not worth it to elaborate in depth, lots of preset profiles, mainly numbers of OC memory profiling according memory chips (Hynix, Samsungs etc), but even a noob in the basic display confess and BIOS guide help in a few steps to set acceptable overclocking or simply set the RAID drives. Items in BIOS, you can also add to your favorites.



Intel networking chips are the best. It's simple, Intel is a giant in itself and knows how to make the best combo chipset, CPU and reticule make it among themselves to work with the lowest delays ... Here's the latest Intel LAN chipset I219-V. The LAN connector also includes enhanced protection against electrostatic discharge and antisurge. Software for LAN also does not hurt 🙂

Connectivity of Maximus VIII Extreme is the best level. M.2 PCIe can reach up to 32 Gbit / s, then we have several USB 3.1 with a theoretical transfer of up to 10 Gb / s and sata Express. I think M.2 completely overrides the SATA Express in the future ....

About Intel Thunderbolt I have already spoken, even more interesting may be the server PCIe standard U.2 for highend NVMe discs. Wifi is dualband with 2.4GHz and 5GHz band.

Part of a new generation of motherboards is also popular RGB lighting. This is optional and in several modes. Some probably comforted when I say that it can be completely shut down. I have set it according to the CPU temperature.


Keybot II also undergone minor changes (it create macros on nonmacro keyboards and sometimes very helpful for some RPG games). Overwolf's another application for the passionate gamer ... And generally you would find other applications such as ROG Ramcache, RAM disk, and many more on the DVD ...