The Intel Z690 Motherboard Overview (DDR5): Over 50+ New Models
by Gavin Bonshor on November 9, 2021 9:00 AM ESTASRock Z690 PG Velocita (DDR5)
Sitting below the Z690 Taichi in its product stack, ASRock also has a couple of Phantom Gaming series branded boards for Intel's Z690 and Alder Lake launch. The most apparent of the ATX sized versions is the ASRock Z690 PG Velocita, which was introduced back during the launch of Intel's 10th generation Z490 chipset. The ASRock Z690 PG Velocita has an interesting design layout, with elements of black, red, and purple within the rear panel cover, and integrated RGB LEDs built into both the rear panel cover and chipset heatsink.
Looking at the board's PCIe slot support. ASRock includes five PCIe slots in total, including one full-length PCIe 5.0 x16, one full-length PCIe 4.0 x4, one full-length PCIe 3.0 x4 slot, and two PCIe 3.0 x1 slots. For storage, there are four M.2 slots in total including one with support for PCIe 5.0 x4 drives when they eventually hit the market, two PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slots, and one PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 slot. ASRock also includes six SATA ports with support for RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10 arrays. Located in the top right-hand corner are four memory slots, which can support speeds of up to DDR5-6400, and a combined capacity of up to 128 GB.
On the rear panel of the ASRock Z690 PG Velocita is one USB 3.2 G2 Type-C, one USB 3.2 G2 Type-A, six USB 3.2 G1 Type-A, and two USB 2.0 ports. There's a pair of video outputs consisting of an HDMI and DisplayPort, while five 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output are powered by a Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec. The board includes two RJ45 ports, with one powered by a Killer E3100G 2.5 GbE controller, and the other by an Intel I219-V Gigabit controller, with wireless support coming from a Killer AX1675 Wi-Fi 6E CNVi. Finishing off the rear panel is a small BIOS Flashback button.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
126 Comments
View All Comments
Duwelon - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
Asus' prices are completely bananas. If I build a new rig with Z690 it'll probably be my first non-Asus build in a very long time.Sivar - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
That caught my eye, too. I bought an Asus Hero-branded board for my current system last year at approximately $200 USD.I suspect Asus is shifting their marketspeak because the word "Maximus" (used for the z690 board but not mine) usually applies to their most expensive boards.
blppt - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
This. $2000 for a consumer grade motherboard? WTF are they smoking?Also, I'm pretty sure ASUS will be releasing some TUF Z690s at some point, probably at a lower price point than the primes. My experience with the TUF series has been very positive for the price.
DigitalFreak - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
They know they're not going to sell many of those. Those boards are either for LN2 e-peen competitions or people with more money than sense.Wrs - Wednesday, November 10, 2021 - link
TUF is historically just a bit more expensive than Prime. They already have a TUF DDR4 version - ordered the Wifi one for $290 the other day. If worried about price DDR5 is the first mistake.blppt - Wednesday, November 10, 2021 - link
The X570 TUF was cheaper than the X570 Prime when I went shopping for an AMD board.COtech - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
Subtitle - "Intel Z690 Chipset: Like Z590, But Now With Native PCIe 4.0"I think "But Now With Native PCIe 5.0" is intended.
gavbon - Thursday, November 18, 2021 - link
The Z690 chipset doesn't have PCIe 5.0, this comes from the CPU. The Z690 chipset does, however, now include PCIe 4.0 lanes, whereas Z590 did not.Someguyperson - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
I don't get the "DP IN" ports on the ASUS ProArt Z690 Creator WIFI. I see the author just wrote what was on the ASUS website, but that doesn't really explain anything. Are they passthrough to the Thunderbolt out ports? Is there a capture card built into this motherboard? I'm very confused by the labeling here.uwsalt - Tuesday, November 9, 2021 - link
Those are passthrough to the Thunderbolt port. Add-in Thunderbolt cards work the same way. You slot in your discrete GPU, send the output from both DP ports to the Thunderbolt controller, and then use Thunderbolt to output to a Thunderbolt monitor or hub.