ASUS ROG Maximus XIII Hero Review: Everything for Rocket Lake
by Gavin Bonshor on July 9, 2021 9:00 AM ESTBoard Features
The ASUS ROG Maximus XIII Hero is a premium ATX motherboard that sits as the entry point to the premium Republic of Gamers options series. Designed primarily for gamers, content creators, and all-round users, it includes plenty of premium specifications, including four memory slots with support for up to 128 GB of DDR4-5333 memory, as well as a premium audio solution consisting of a Supreme (Realtek) ALC4082 HD audio codec and ESS Sabre ESS9018Q2C DAC.
ASUS includes plenty of PCIe 4.0 support in conjunction with Rocket Lake, including two full-length PCIe 4.0 slots operating at x16 and x8/x8, with a third full-length slot electronically locked down to PCIe 3.0 x4 and one smaller PCIe 3.0 x1 slot. For storage, there's a total of four M.2 slots, including one PCIe 4.0 x4, one PCIe 3.0 x4, and two PCIe 3.0 x4/SATA M.2 slots. Looking at SATA support, ASUS includes six SATA ports which are all controlled by the chipset, and as such, include support for RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 arrays.
Cooling options consist of eight 4-pin headers, which include two for CPU fans, one for an AIO pump, one for a water pump, and three for chassis fans (all can be used for chassis fans, however).
| ASUS ROG Maximus XIII Hero ATX Motherboard | |||
| Warranty Period | 3 Years | ||
| Product Page | Link | ||
| Price | $500 ($470 at Amazon) | ||
| Size | ATX | ||
| CPU Interface | LGA1200 | ||
| Chipset | Intel Z590 | ||
| Memory Slots (DDR4) | Four DDR4 Supporting 128 GB Dual-Channel Up to DDR4-5333 |
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| Video Outputs | 1 x HDMI 2.0 | ||
| Network Connectivity | 2 x Intel I225-V 2.5 GbE Intel AX210 Wi-Fi 6E |
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| Onboard Audio | SupremeFX ALC4082 ESS Sabre 9018Q2C DAC |
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| PCIe Slots for Graphics (from CPU) | 2 x PCIe 4.0 (x16, x8/x8) | ||
| PCIe Slots for Other (from PCH) | 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 1 x PCIe 3.0 x1 |
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| Onboard SATA | Six, RAID 0/1/5/10 (Z590) | ||
| Onboard M.2 | 1 x PCIe 4.0 x4 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 2 x PCIe 3.0 x4/SATA |
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| Thunderbolt 4 (40 Gbps) | 2 x Type-C (Rear panel) | ||
| USB 3.2 (20 Gbps) | 1 x Type-C (One header) | ||
| USB 3.2 (10 Gbps) | 6 x USB Type-A (Rear panel) | ||
| USB 3.1 (5 Gbps) | 4 x USB Type-A (Two headers) | ||
| USB 2.0 | 2 x USB Type-A (Rear panel) 4 x USB Type-A (Two headers) |
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| Power Connectors | 1 x 24-pin Motherboard 2 x 8-pin CPU |
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| Fan Headers | 2 x 4-pin CPU 1 x 4-pin Water Pump/chassis 1 x 4-pin AIO Pump/chassis 1 x 4-pin High Amp Fan 3 x 4-pin Chassis |
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| IO Panel | 2 x Antenna Ports (Intel AX210) 1 x HDMI 2.0 output 2 x Thunderbolt 4 Type-C 6 x USB 3.2 G2 Type-A 2 x USB 2.0 Type-A 2 x RJ45 (Intel) 1 x BIOS Flashback button 1 x Clear CMOS button 5 x 3.5 mm audio jacks (SupremeFX) 1 x S/PDIF Optical output (SupremeFX) |
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Other inclusions include a pair of premium and high-spec Thunderbolt 4 Type-C ports on the rear panel, which support DisplayPort video input too for users with compatible monitors. ASUS also decks out the rear panel with six USB 3.2 G2 Type-A, and two USB 2.0 ports, with options for expanding on this with one USB 3.2 G2x2 Type-C (one port), two USB 3.2 G1 Type-A (four ports), and two USB 2.0 (four ports) front panel headers.
Networking options are also premium and consist of dual Intel I225-V 2.5 Gb Ethernet, as well as Intel's AX210 Wi-Fi 6E CNVi which also adds support for BT 5.2 connectivity. Users looking to use Intel's integrated UHD graphics can do so via a single HDMI 2.0 video output. There is also a pair of buttons, with one for clearing the CMOS, and one for using BIOS Flashback.
Test Bed
With some of the nuances with Intel's Rocket Lake processors, our policy is to see if the system gives an automatic option to increase the power limits of the processor. If it does, we select the liquid cooling option. If it does not, we do not change the defaults. Adaptive Boost Technology is disabled by default.
| Test Setup | |||
| Processor | Intel Core i9-11900K, 125 W, $374 8 Cores, 16 Threads 3.5 GHz (5.3 GHz Turbo) |
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| Motherboard | ASUS ROG Maximus XIII Hero (BIOS 0902) | ||
| Cooling | Corsair iCue H150i Elite Capellix 360 mm AIO | ||
| Power Supply | Corsair HX850 80Plus Platinum 850 W | ||
| Memory | G.Skill TridentZ DDR4-3200 CL 14-14-14-34 2T (2 x 8 GB) | ||
| Video Card | MSI GTX 1080 (1178/1279 Boost) | ||
| Hard Drive | Crucial MX300 1TB | ||
| Case | Corsair Crystal 680X | ||
| Operating System | Windows 10 Pro 64-bit: Build 20H2 | ||
We must also thank the following:
| Hardware Providers for CPU and Motherboard Reviews | |||
| Sapphire RX 460 Nitro | MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X OC | Crucial MX200 + MX500 SSDs |
Corsair AX860i + AX1200i PSUs |
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| G.Skill RipjawsV, SniperX, FlareX |
Crucial Ballistix DDR4 |
Silverstone Coolers |
Noctua Coolers |
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28 Comments
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Samus - Tuesday, July 13, 2021 - link
Seriously, and I thought AMD platforms were expensive (at least prior to the B550) but Intel is just ridiculous. It used to be their crutch was lower cost of entry, but now they have practically nothing. They are more power hungry, lower performance per watt, more expensive per MOp, and now the boards\chipsets cost more, too.timecop1818 - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
> There is a lot going on across the board, with multiple areas of integrated RGB LED lighting which includes the rear panel cover, and the rear panel cover.I'm happy to know RGB is limited to just the rear panel cover.
Threska - Saturday, July 10, 2021 - link
Of course so you can blind all the poor people following you with their cheaper boards. But seriously it looks like the big back shroud is the newest trend in motherboards. AMD or Intel, both have it.timecop1818 - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
> Other inclusions include a pair of premium and high-spec Thunderbolt 4 Type-C ports on the rear panel, which support DisplayPort video input too for users with compatible monitors.What does this mean? The more interesting part of thunderbolt is to be able to transmit DisplayPort video FROM the PC to monitor, so I'm expecting there to be a DisplayPort INPUT connector / header on the motherboard to loop into the external GPU video outputs. Can this board do that? Or is the TB output limited to whatever IGPU is on the processor?
Exotica - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
There is No dedicated GPU support via thunderbolt, just the igpu. One of the biggest limitations of this expensive $500 board. The z590 vision d has a DP-in foe this purpose.Exotica - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
for*Spunjji - Monday, July 12, 2021 - link
I'd argue that's not an especially interesting part of Thunderbolt from the perspective of a desktop PC. The high-bandwidth data connection is definitely more of a draw there than display output, given that the GPU already has those attached.weilin - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
I have this board, there's a few trade-offs this board has that been omitted from the review:1 of the M.2 slots is PCIe 4.0 and has dedicated lanes
1 of the M.2 slots is PCIe 3.0 and has dedicated lanes
1 of the M.2 slots is PCIe 4.0 but shares lanes with the second PCIe 16x slot. (8x,4x,4x setup if the M.2 is present)
1 of the M.2 slots shares HSIO with SATA ports 5-6 (populating this slot will disable those SATA ports)
The PCH PCIe 16x slot (that's electrically 4x) shares HSIO with SATA ports 1-4 (populating that slot with a 4x card will disable the first 4 SATA ports) If this slot runs at 2x then only SATA 3-4 are disabled.
Alistair - Friday, July 9, 2021 - link
Who in their right mind would buy this though? I just checked the local store and you can get the Asus X570 Tuf + Ryzen 12 core 5900X for just $700.lilkwarrior - Monday, July 12, 2021 - link
It's the Tuf series though which can't be compared; the CPU is fundamentally inferior to AMD's so that price isn't surprising.That Tuf motherboard has significant drawbacks when it comes to I/O, especially when it comes to Thunderbolt & etc.