GIGABYTE Announces AORUS Z790 X Gen Motherboards for Next-Gen Intel Processors

Tsing

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GIGABYTE has announced that it will be ushering in the arrival of 14th Gen Intel Core "Raptor Lake-S Refresh" processors with a brand-new lineup of motherboards in the AORUS Z790 X Gen series. There appears to be six models in total, headlined by the Z790 AORUS XTREME X, a flagship option that counts a 24+1+2 Twin Digital VRM Design, 5x M.2 slots, and support for up to 8,266 MT/s DDR5 memory among its feature set. The Z790 AORUS PRO X will be available for those seeking a motherboard in white.

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I really want to see a real life comparison in use of one of these uber boards, and a more standard board of the same chipset.

I'll be the first to admit some of these uber boards have a build and ease of use designed for people that build systems. Others generally less expensive are designed to be built and left the eff alone.

If you're doing a test bench you want the uber board due to their normal ease of use. But if you're a individual user doing a DIY build... I'm not seeing the value... though part of me is tempted to go for it regardles.
 
Grimlakin said:
I'll be the first to admit some of these uber boards have a build and ease of use designed for people that build systems. Others generally less expensive are designed to be built and left the eff alone.
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So, Gamer's Nexus had a segment where they complained about motherboard features, and how much it cost to get a post-code display and power and reset buttons on a board.

It's about US$600.

Mainly because post code readers are typically limited to the top of manufacturer's 'middle' tier, boards like MSI's Carbons and ASUS' Strix -E. And then to get power and reset buttons? Gotta step up to the premium tier, for an MSI Unify or ASUS Hero. And since MSI didn't build a Unify board for Z790 / B650 / X670, that means you have to shell out more for their Ace board. ASRock's equivalent in their Taichi lineup, and I really couldn't tell you about Gigabyte's lineup because their naming makes very little sense to me. Finally, this is the only tier that EVGA plays in, and they tend to be a good value once MSRPs settle, though there is that worry about longevity.

Meanwhile, both Intel and AMD have more or less ensured that boards featuring their top-end chipsets can absolutely power their top-end CPUs. So that means that the 'Pro' boards that sit around US$200 can power top-end CPUs without a problem. As long as you ensure that the BIOS settings between a US$200 board and a US$600 board are the same - and this can be tricky, if you've ever looked at how complicated DDR5 is - you'll get the same results. The lower-end board could even score higher just from having less stuff going on, though this would hopefully be negligible.
 
LazyGamer said:
As long as you ensure that the BIOS settings between a US$200 board and a US$600 board are the same - and this can be tricky, if you've ever looked at how complicated DDR5 is - you'll get the same results.
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This isn't necessarily going to be the case. The voltage controllers, VRM hardware and external clock generators all have to be the same to make giving them all the same BIOS settings viable.

Grimlakin said:
If you're doing a test bench you want the uber board due to their normal ease of use. But if you're a individual user doing a DIY build... I'm not seeing the value... though part of me is tempted to go for it regardles.
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Going for top end motherboards has never been about value.
 
Grimlakin said:
But if you're a individual user doing a DIY build... I'm not seeing the value... though part of me is tempted to go for it regardles.
Click to expand...
I've never been one to be shelling out my money for the higher end boards, but this past build I decided "why not" and got the Asus Maximus Formula board. The build quality over my past boards is above and beyond what I've used. I planned on keeping this board for a while so I guess the value for me is there.
 
Grimlakin said:
Easier to have a button and less likely to jump the wrong contacts on a poorly designed layout.
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I'm comfortable doing it with a screwdriver - but on one of the TUF boards I have, the clear CMOS jumper is right there, and I managed to hit it accidentally.

What you can do though, is get a $10 device that has the buttons and lights and plugs directly into that section of the board, so I've started using one of those instead.

No replacement for the lack of a post-code reader though, unfortunately.
 
Niner51 said:
Asus Maximus Formula board
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Make sure to watch out for corrosion, apparently ASUS had EK make the block for that board out of Aluminum and it was corroding with custom loops, that are mostly copper...
 
LazyGamer said:
Make sure to watch out for corrosion, apparently ASUS had EK make the block for that board out of Aluminum and it was corroding with custom loops, that are mostly copper...
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Thanks, but I don't water cool with this board beyond a normal AIO.
 
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