LABS TEST / Z490 MOTHERBOARDS
ASUS ROG STRIX Z490E
GAMING/£300 inc VAT
SUPPLIER overclockers.co.uk
SPEC
ChipsetIntelZ490
CPUsocketIntelLGA1200
Memorysupport4 slots:max128GB
DDR4(upto4800MHz)
ExpansionslotsTwo16xPCI-E3,
one4xPCI-E3,three1xPCI-E 3
Sound8-channelRealtekALC1220
Networking1 x Intel2.5Gigabit
LAN,802.11axWi-Fi
Overclocking Base clock 98-538MHz,
CPU multiplier 8-120x; max
voltages, CPU 1.7V, RAM 2V
Ports 6 x SATA 6Gbps 2 x M.2 PCI-E 3, 4
x USB 3.1 Type-A, 1 x USB 3.1 Type-C, 2 x
USB 3, 4 x USB 2, 3 x surround audio out
Dimensions (mm) 305 x 244VERDICT
Cheaperthanthecompetitionwithgood
cooling, although overclocking is a little tricky.
THE MATRIX
+ Good features for the
money
+ Top-notch aesthetics
+ Good stock speed
performanceDOT MATRIX- Tricky overclocking
- Limited onboard
overclocking features - High overclocked
power consumption
PERFORMANCE
31 / 35FEATURES
30 / 35
VALUE
26 / 30OVERALLSCORE
87 %
T
he award for snazziest board this
month undoubtedly goes to the
Asus ROG Strix Z490-E Gaming,
with its funky mirrored panels illuminated
from beneath with RGB lighting. Its U-shaped
heatpipe winds its way around half of the
board, and Asus includes a VRM fan you can
attach manually for more cooling. However,
with the VRMs sitting below 60°C anyway,
you’ll only need it in extreme situations.
There are no power or reset buttons,
nor a clear-CMOS switch, although you do
get USB BIOS Flashback. That’s all a little
disappointing for the price, although it’s far
from the most expensive board on test. The
M.2 ports are strictly PCI-E 3-only as well,
with the lower port being the most easily
accessible. Sadly, the top port sits under a
plastic shroud, so you need to remove it and
your graphics card to access the SSD.
TheM.2heatsinkisquitesmall,andthe
M2 SSDtemperaturewasthehigheston
test at 51°C, although that’s
only a degree or two warmer
than the competition and
still much cooler than not using
one. One issue we did spot with
M.2 SSDs using the supplied
0509 BIOS is that you need to
manually set the PCI-E speed
to 4x mode in the EFI. Out of the
box, our 3,000MB/sec SSD only
ran at half that speed.
Around the back of the I/O
panel, you’ll find connectors for
the 802.11ax Wi-Fi, 2.5 Gigabit
Ethernet, display outputs, nine Type-A USB
ports (five of which are USB 3 or faster),
and a USB 3.1 Type-C port, all sitting in an
integrated I/O shield.
Meanwhile, Asus allows you to plug a
thermal probe or coolant temperature probe
intothe motherboard, and set the probe to
dictate fan speed too. However, unlike with
Gigabyte’s boards, this doesn’t all happen
fromthe flick of an option in the EFI’s fan
control suite; you have to delve deeper into
heEFI menus to switch the temperature
nputfirst.
Aswith the ROG Strix Z490-E Gaming,
pressing F3 when entering the BIOS
instead of F1 enables you to remove certain
power limits, so the Core i9-10900K can
stretch its boosting legs while remaining
in specification. This seemed to work, with
the board hitting a massive 545 points in
Cinebench’s single-threaded test.
Overclocking was a challenge to say the
least, though, with the board apparently
suffering from huge vdroop and needinga voltage of 1.475V to remain at 1.3V
under load. However, the power draw was
reasonable for the CPU, sitting at 302W at
stock speed, and a slightly eyebrow-raising
388W overclocked, but it was stable at
5.1GHz. The Z490-E was the fastest board in
numerous tests at stock speed, and held on
to a lead again at 5.1GHz, with the best audio
on test too.Conclusion
Despite some tricky overclocking that may
well be fixed with a future BIOS, the Asus ROG
Strix Z490-E Gaming is a solid £300 board.
It has plenty of features, it looks fantastic,
and costs significantly less than the Gigabyte
Z490 Aorus Master and MSI MEG Z490 Ace.
Those boards do sport far more features
and are less troublesome to overclock, but
the ROG Strix Z490-E Gaming is a decent
contender if you don’t have big bucks
to spend.M. 2 SSDtemperaturewasthehigheston d
G
f
c
t
in
cc
uu
sstommPP
CCA
P
PR
OVE
D