Intel Z390 Motherboard Overview: 50+ Motherboards Analyzed
by Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on October 8, 2018 10:53 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Intel
- MSI
- Gigabyte
- ASRock
- EVGA
- Asus
- NZXT
- Supermicro
- Z390
The ASUS ROG Strix range of motherboards slot right in between the Maximus XI and TUF Gaming ranges but with a mixture of features and traits from both ranges to keep pricing competitive with other vendors mid-range offerings. These affordable models do have a good range of overclocking, but without the extreme components and more importantly, without the larger price tags associated with the higher echelon of Maximus XI models.
ASUS ROG Strix Z390-E Gaming
The ASUS ROG Strix Z390-E is another Z370 model to get an overhaul of sorts ready for the new 9th generation Intel processors. The newer Strix Z390-E looks relatively similar in terms of PCB space. The main differences come visually with the new Z390-E having primarily black themed heatsinks with a customizable RGB ROG logo with ROG Edge holographic branding towards the bottom of the rear panel cover. The chipset heatsink features the Strix branding and has a metallic grey and black monotone design.
Across the center of the board are three full-length PCIe 3.0 slots which run at x16, x8 and x4 which means two-way SLI and up to three-way CrossFire multi-graphics card configurations are supported. The Z390-E also has three PCIe 3.0 x1 slots which give users one less than the previous Z370-E. Storage wise the Z390-E has two M.2 slots with one dedicated to just PCIe 3.0 x4 drives and the second allowing for both PCIe 3.0 x4 and SATA drives to be used; both M.2 slots have inclusive heatsinks. The board also has a total of six SATA ports with support for RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10 arrays. There are four RAM slots with official support for up to DDR4-4266 with a total capacity of up to 64 GB.
On the rear panel of the mid-ranged Strix Z390-E Gaming is a varied selection of input and outputs. USB support consists of three USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A, one USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C, two USB 3.0 Type-A and two USB 2.0 ports. A pair of video outputs consisting of a DisplayPort and HDMI are featured, along with a PS/2 combo port, an Intel I219V Gigabit controlled LAN port and connectors for the 2T2R 802.11ac Intel 9560 Wi-Fi adapter. Finishing off the rear panel is five 3.5 mm audio jacks and a single S/PDIF optical output powered by the ROG SupremeFX S1220A HD audio codec.
The ASUS ROG Strix Z390-E Gaming pricing is unknown at present and represents the most feature-rich of the Strix branded gaming motherboards. The main difference between the Z390-E Gaming and the other ATX sized Z390 Strix based models are the inclusion of the 1.73 Gbps capable Wi-Fi adapter with Bluetooth 5 connectivity support; this is one of the main reasons for the increase in price too.
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pawinda8 - Monday, October 15, 2018 - link
Still no mention of any Z390 boards with native Thunderbolt 3 (not AIC)! Has Intel given up on Thunderbolt for the PC world?gavbon - Monday, October 15, 2018 - link
If it's not integrated into the chipset, it's not really native as such. The ASRock Z390 Phantom Gaming-ITX/ac has a Thunderbolt 3 port on the rear panel, but that's the only one I'm afraidHikariWS - Monday, October 15, 2018 - link
Oculus Rift requires 3 USB3 ports and doesn't accept any of them being connected to a hub, they all need to be connected directly into a raw port. I had to buy a dedicated 3GIO USB 3 board that added 6 useful extra ports. In my (yes, old) Gigabyte z87 mobo I also had issues using keyboard and mouse on USB 3 ports inside UEFI and some recovery softwares, so I had to buy a USB 2 mirror to connect them.Because of that, having USB 2 ports on front panel and nice quantity of USB 3 is what most differs mobos for me, given that all other features are nearly the same.
ASUS Z390-A seems to be the best option. It has the important double USB2 ports, 5 USB3 ports and still has HDMI and DP for emergencies.
just4U - Monday, October 15, 2018 - link
I wish MSI had released a "godlike" board for the Ryzen series.ThugEsquire - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
You list the ASRock Z390 Phantom Gaming-ITX/ac above as an ATX board, but it's actually mITX. FYIgavbon - Friday, October 19, 2018 - link
I have gone through every page where the Phantom Gaming-ITX/ac is listed, but I can't see where it says it's an ATX board? Could you please be more specific? Are you viewing on mobile or desktop?Galcobar - Tuesday, October 16, 2018 - link
It would be really helpful to break out one more criteria into a table: Type-C header for case-front ports.Helping a friend put together an i5 system and, knowing he'll keep it for a long time, am trying to get even with peripheral connectors (already has a monitor, so no using that as a hub). It's relatively easy to identify cases with a Type-C port, but that's pointless without a motherboard header. Having to go into each board's page to check is time-consuming.
jjnam - Thursday, April 18, 2019 - link
6 months later and I'm here for EXACTLY this reason. I've gone through probably 50 manuals over the past few days squinting to find this information. What a pain.Synomenon - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link
So on the ASRock Z390 Phantom Gaming-ITX/ac, is the TB3 port on the rear using up lanes from CPU (making the only 16x slot, 8x only)?If it's not using lanes from the CPU, how will using that TB3 port (say with a USB3.1 Gen2 hub OR TB3 hub) affect all the other ports / IO on the board?
repoman27 - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link
Going off of what TweakTown published, it's a single-port Intel JHL6240 "Alpine Ridge" controller with a PCI 3.0 x2 connection to the PCH. So it won't affect the PEG lanes from the CPU. I'm amazed it's not Titan Ridge at this point though.