NZXT N7 Z590 Motherboard Review

How Much Does it Cost?

With an MSRP of $279.99 in the US and £239.99 in the UK, the NZXT N7 Z590 falls right where we would hope to see it in terms of pricing. It is a great way into the Z590 chipset and has a good feature set to make sure you are getting the most of the platform. While we have seen some boards that are a bit cheaper, they also look a lot cheaper as well. This pricing should make the N7 Z590 a much more viable option when it comes to looking into Z590 motherboards.

Overview

Keeping with the overall aesthetic NZXT is known for, they are looking to make the most of Intel’s latest CPUs on their N7 Z590 motherboard. Coming with the latest features we have seen such as PCIe Gen4 and WiFi 6e the N7 Z590 is a good all-round motherboard. It has more USB connectors and headers, both internal and external, than hopefully anyone would need. The motherboard also has a metal cover that adds a bit of protection, and aesthetic appeal to things as NZXT are the only ones to have such a cover on their motherboards. Also, while cheaper than a lot of Z590 boards, it does still offer some good performance.

Build Quality & Design

The overall build quality and design aren’t terrible, but it lacks a few things. The first thing I would mention is the 50A Power Phases. While these did the job in our testing, it is hard not to notice that other manufacturers went with 60, 75 or even 90A phases, some even on similarly priced boards. The next thing that really let me down is that there are no actual M.2 heatsinks, as we have seen on every other Z590 board we have tested. The option is just about there, NZXT just need to capitalize on the M.2 covers they have and at least make the ones covering PCIe Gen4 drives into heatsinks. This is a very standard feature, especially on Z590 boards, and hopefully, one NZXT can look into for future boards. Aside from this, we still have a 6-layer PCB, and we can see NZXT listened to their users by adding additional USB support over that of their previous Z490 motherboard.

Performance

In all our testing, the N7 Z590 faired very well and found itself in the middle of our charts. Considering this is only NZXT’s 5th motherboard and most other manufacturers make more than five motherboards per new CPU release, this is quite impressive. However, all that’s good is that the N7 Z590 is not short of having a couple of minor downsides. First of the RAM is only stated to run up to 4600MHz. This is a real shame as every other motherboard we have seen has been over 5,000MHz, but on the flip side, how many of us actually have RAM faster than 4600MHz? Not many, I would guess. For me, the real killer is that it only allows for two M.2, whereas almost every other Z590 board supports three. Now, the N7 Z590 still has a PCIe Gen 4 slot, but it would be nice to have a couple of the Gen3 SATA slots as well and not just the one. This may not be a big deal to some as they may not have more than two M.2 drives, but I feel NZXT really missed an opportunity to be on par with everyone else.

Added Value

The extra USB ports and the metal cover will be two of the main things that add value to the N7 Z590 motherboard. The extra USB ports are quite important as this has been implemented from customer feedback on their Z490 board, which shows NZXT really are listening. Then you have the metal cover, which also adds a nice stealthy look to the board that could make for some amazing builds. Aside from these features, the board does offer some pretty impressive performance, especially when considering it is likely to be one of the cheaper Z590 boards available.

Should I Buy One?

If you are not looking to go all out balls to the wall, the N7 Z590 is a great board. While it may be lacking in some areas, these likely can be overlooked by most users who wouldn’t be able to use these extra features anyways. However, it has the main features we need to see from a Z590 board, and it offers some pretty impressive performance for its price range. Also, to mention one last time, that metal cover will allow users to make some pretty amazing looking builds, especially if you’re going for a black stealth build! So, I personally have no issues recommending this board as long as you can get past the few minor things it is missing.