Gigabyte Z390 UD (Socket 1151/Z390 Express/DDR4/S-ATA 600/ATX)

Product Information

The Asus board does ensure better stability and is fine for affordable builds – but its rivals are often faster, cheaper and include similar features. The Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Pro is a better option for speed, while the MSI MAG Z390 Tomahawk is better value. Read the full review Intel Z390 Ultra Durable motherboard with 12+1 Phases Digital VRM, Direct Touch Heatpipe, Thunderbolt™ 3, CPU attached RAID, 802.11ac Wireless, Dual M.2 with Thermal Guards, Dual Intel ® GbE LAN with cFosSpeed, Front & Rear USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C The MSI MAG Z390 Tomahawk is the cheapest board in this Z390 group, and it has a specification that’s capable of handling decent single-GPU gaming rigs – but not much more than that. The Asus TUF Z390-Plus Gaming motherboard is quite literally a solid entry level board. TUF-branded motherboards have durable components, which should improve this board’s lifespan compared to rivals.

Intel Z390 AORUS Motherboard with 6 Phases Digital VRM solutions, Extended Heatsink, HDMI 2.0 & DisplayPort onboard, 802.11ac Wireless, RGB Fusion 2.0, Dual M.2 with Single Thermal Guard, Front USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-C, Intel ® GbE LAN with cFosSpeed Synchronized RGB lighting technology: Works with a vast portfolio of Aura Sync-capable PC gear and includes support for Philips Hue.The Gigabyte is an expensive board for enthusiastic gamers and tweakers, and it delivered with reasonable gaming pace and loads of relevant features. The MSI board is better for work and creative tasks, though, and you need to make sure you’re going to actually use these features before you buy. Read the full review It’s a better specification than the Asus ROG Maximus XI Hero (Wi-Fi) – that board is more expensive, and it has fine hardware, but it isn’t quite as well-equipped when it comes to storage or rear I/O.

The board is almost all-metal, although it’s dark and brooding – nothing like the competing Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Xtreme. This board is louder and has more lights, and its features are skewed more towards gaming and tweaking than work and creativity. It also means that Intel Z390 motherboards support both the 8th generation and 9th generation Coffee Lake CPUs – such as the Core i5-8600K, the Core i7-8700K, and the Core i7-9700K.

Z390 maintains native support for six SATA 3 ports and 14 USB 2 ports, and its PCI lane and bandwidth support levels remain unchanged. In short, you won’t have any issues running a couple of graphics cards on any board as long as it supports the relevant AMD CrossFire or Nvidia SLI protocols. SATA RAID and Intel Optane memory support remains unchanged. ROG DIMM.2: Vertically-installed dual-M.2 expansion card with heatsink for maximum cooling and performance. It’s worth thinking about the chipset when buying a new motherboard, but it isn’t the only area that needs important consideration. SNR AMP-UP Audio with High-End ESS SABRE 9018K2M DAC, LME 49720 and OPA1622 OP-AMP, WIMA audio capacitors