ASUS TUF Gaming X570-Plus WiFi Motherboard Preview

Peter Donnell / 5 years ago

TUF Gaming

We’ve already taken a look at the Aorus X570 Master, Aorus X570 I Pro, and the MSI MEG X570 ACE and motherboards. Of course, we also had our first ASUS board today, the ROG STRIX X570-E Gaming, and now another with their TUF Gaming series X570-Plus WiFi model. Wow, what a busy day, week, month! The TUF series of motherboards was designed originally to be “tough” and featured all kinds of hard-wearing hardware. However, it’s now become much more than that. It’s as much a design choice as STRIX has become, while often not being quite as expensive as STRIX too; a very tempting option for many system builders then.

Features

AMD AM4 Socket: Ready for 2nd and 3rd Gen AMD Ryzen™ processors
Enhanced Power Solution: 12+2 Dr. MOS power stages, 6-layer PCB, ProCool sockets, military-grade TUF components, and Digi+ VRM for maximum durability
Comprehensive Cooling: Active chipset heatsink, VRM heatsink, M.2 heatsink, hybrid fan headers and Fan Xpert 4
Next-Gen Connectivity: Dual PCIe 4.0 M.2, USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports, exclusive Realtek® L8200A Gigabit Ethernet, TUF LANGuard and TurboLAN technology
Realtek S1200A Codec: Pristine audio quality with unprecedented 108dB signal-to-noise ratio for stereo line-out and 103dB SNR for line-in
Aura Sync RGB: Synchronize LED lighting with a vast portfolio of compatible PC gear, including addressable RGB strips
TUF Gaming Alliance: ASUS hardware ecosystem ensures the best compatibility and complementary aesthetics from components to case

3rd Gen Ryzen Support

This is an AM4 socket motherboard, so pretty much any Ryzen CPU will fit. However, you’ll only get life out of 2nd and 3rd Gen Ryzen CPUs. Unfortunately, X570 has no 1st Gen Ryzen support, as we covered in our X570 Buying Guide here. Of course, there are benefits to 3rd Gen that you can only get on X570, such as PCIe 4.0 functionality.

TUF

There’s no mistaking this for anything other than a TUF product. Their design team has been doing a fantastic job this last few years. Of course, you have their TUF durable products, but you also have the TUF Gaming Alliance that ensures multiple brands hardware are all compatible with each other right out of the box; coolers, PSUs, motherboards, RAM and much more. They all have this same digital camo grey and yellow design too, so you know they’ll look fantastic together too. Either way, the ASUS TUF X570-Plus WiFi looks superb.

Active Cooling

As with virtually all of the X570 motherboards hitting the market, the X570-Plus also features that active cooling fan on the chipset. PCIe 4.0 and X570 in general is a very powerful bit of kit, so it needs to be kept cool. The fan actually works in terms of design here though, matching up with the somewhat robotic/digital theme they’ve got going on. Of course, there’s passive cooling here too, on the lower M.2 PCIe 4.0 mount. There’s another, just above the top PCIe lane, but this one does not feature an M.2 cooler.

PCIe 4.0

Hitting that one again, PCIe 4.0 is a big feature for X570. You’ll find two full PCIe lanes and 2 x 4x lanes on the X570-Plus. This is more than enough for a gaming build, with some to spare for PCIe NVMe cards should you need them. Additional storage can be put into the 8 x SATA ports, and there’s plenty of USB options on here too.

RGB and Beyond

The X570-Plus motherboard isn’t plastered with RGB, but there are some AURA Sync lights built into the PCB down here. However, you will find a Gen 2 Addressable RGB header further up the board, so you can expand on that and pair up peripheral hardware.

There’s no built-in I/O cover like you get on the STRIX models. Of course, there’s one still included in the box. You do get some perks though, such as the fantastic Realtek L8200A LAN, as well as WiFi 6 MU-MIMO for ultra-fast wireless connectivity. There’s HDMI, Display Port, USB Gen 2 Type-C And 3.2 Gen 1 and Gen 2 ports.

Power

The motherboard features an impressive 12+2 VRM design with Dr. MOS power stages. That includes high-side and low-side MOSFETs for improved efficiency and stability. With 8+4 PSU headers, the AM4 socket has more than enough power for overclocking; even on the flagship Ryzen 9 CPUs.

Performance

Unfortunately, there are no figures we can show you at this time. We’re allowed to test them on our test bench, but you will have to wait for the NDA to pass before we can share those figures. Of course, we’ll have a review for you soon enough. For now, though, you can check out our X570 Buying Guide, Ryzen 3rd Gen Buying Guide and why not also check our Radeon RX 5700 and 5700 XT Buying Guide while you’re at it!