A Closer Look
This is a very impressive motherboard, but it should be, given that it’s one of the most high-end enthusiast gaming motherboards in the ASUS range right now, short of going up to the flagship Crosshair and MAXIMUS, which are prohibitively expensive
When it comes to overclocking and boost clock performance, you shouldn’t have any issues thanks to the massive VRM heatsinks, easily some of the biggest of any X870 motherboard, so keeping things cool will be pretty easy for those long gaming sessions.
The VRM is in an 18+2+2 configuration with 110A Power Stages, again, that’s far above the more common 80-90A stages, and there are premium chokes and capacitors throughout the motherboard’s construction too.
On the lower half, there are multiple large heat sinks, all finished in that stealthy black with grey highlights. These will provide ample cooling for all five of the on-board M.2 drive mounts.
There are three PCIe 5.0 x4 drive mounts, as well as an additional two PCIe 4.0 x4 mounts, allowing you to get extreme read/write performance; even more so if you’re using a RAID configuration. There’s also a fully armoured PCIe 5.0 x16, as well as a PCIe 4.0 x16 (@x4).
As you would expect, the rear I/O is extremely well equipped, offering up a pair of the super-fast USB4 40Gbps Type-C, as well as 20Gbps USB Type-C with 30W PD Fast Charging, and if that’s not enough there’s yet another 9 USB A 10Gbps and 1 Type-C 10Gbps ports. For networking, you get a 5Gbps LAN as well as the latest WiFi 7.
- 2 x USB4 (40Gbps) ports (2 x USB Type-C)
- 1 x USB 20Gbps port (1 x USB Type-C with up to 30W PD Fast-charge)
- 10 x USB 10Gbps ports (9 x Type-A + 1 x USB Type-C)
- 1 x HDMI port
- 1 x Wi-Fi Module
- 1 x Realtek 5Gb Ethernet
- 2 x Gold-plated audio jacks
- 1 x Optical S/PDIF out port
- 1 x BIOS FlashBack button
- 1 x Clear CMOS button
