How Much Does it Cost?
The Gigabyte Z490 AORUS PRO AX Motherboard is availble right now from Amazon in the UK for £299.99, making it a somewhat mid-to-high budget board. That’s about what we expected, but still looks like great value given the amount of premium features on offer.
Overview
This board fits so snug between the affordable models and the XTREME edition flagship board. It’s got a heck of a lot of features that are sure to appeal to a huge number of gamers and PC enthusiasts in general, but it’s still less than half the price of the flagship models. Like most of the others, it is more expensive than it’s Z390 counterpart was at launch.
Build Quality & Design
AORUS has really put in the effort to make a great looking board here. For Gigabyte fans, the design is familiar, it’s a steady evolution of the same design, but it has certainly gotten better with age. It looks more professional and refined now, because it is. They’ve upgrade the hardware too, better VRM heatsinks and more fins means much improved cooling performance for the VRM. Plus, there’s larger heatsinks on the M.2 covers, chipset, and all important hardware is armoured/shielded too.
Performance
While the performance difference between all the new Z490 motherboard is marginal, it’s still pretty fantastic overall. We’re really impressed with the i9-10900K and the AX has proven to be a fantastic motherboard for it too. There’s a 12+2 Power Phase design which is plenty for any of the new Intel CPUs, it’ll drive that through 55A Power Stages from the 8+4 Solid Pin Connectors. The addition of direct-touch heat pipes connecting both the VRM cooling fins all help to ensure you can max that CPU all day long.
Added Value
With support for 128GB of DDR4 5000MHz, 3 x 16 PCIe slots, USB 3.2 Gen2 Type C, and Gen 1, Thunderbolt, and 3 x M.2 mounts on offer, you’ll not be left wanting for more when you build your new PC. Of course, it also comes with the fantastic ALC1220-VB audio, Intel WiFi 6, and Intel 2.5GbE LAN, giving you a fantastic suite of connectivity.
Should I Buy One?
This mother really is in the sweetspot for most consumers. For a high-end gaming PC, workstation, rendering rig, whatever, it has a little bit of something for everyone. Furthermore, it does it with a great design, fantastic build quality and a well balanced price tag.
