74c is well within safe limits for a PCB temp, ideally you'd want to keep it below 80c, once you get over 90c it starts to become an issue and over 100c is unsafe.
It’s a shame the manufacturers don’t include or share ALL offerings for testing. I use this channel’s testing results exclusively when choosing new hardware. When attempting to choose a new Z690 it’s no surprise which video/channel I click on. Thanks for the work done here 👌🏽
ASRock banned Hardware Unbox from samples? Wow that's a big no for me. I've been purchasing ASRock GPUs and motherboards all the time. No more ASRock products for me now! Let the ASRock team see this!
I think the difference this time is that 240W are the official requirement from Intel and all manufacturers are following it. On the other hand with Z590 and before it was always a 125W requirement with "can optionally support up to 300W" and board manufacturers did exactly that. Cheaper board had VRMs designed for 125W, better boards had VRMs for 200W+ From a product perspective the 240W requirements were definitely a good decision for the Z chipset and K CPUs. End users are free to choose a lower TDP, but if you buy any board you know the full TDP actually works. From a marketing perspective I think it was not such a good idea as everybody believes the 12900K draws 240W under all applications. Most average buyers dont know that real power consumption while gaming is much much less.
I love how you always talk about certain manufacturers making stuff difficult or trying to influence reviews and things like that. God how I love honesty and the guts to make such things known. Same respect for reviewers and channels who do sponsored reviews, but will still bury a product if it simply doesn't live up to the standards. Y'all do your little part in keeping some remnant of my faith in humanity. Yes, it's overly dramatic but I'm just in that type of mood right now. You get what I'm saying.
Does that stuff affect your buying decisions? I heard of people refusing to buy from certain brands because of some shady stuff like that. I don't really care about that tho and only buy what's the best performing at a certain price. Except when it comes to companies like Nestlé. Fuck Nestlé.
Nothing dramatic about you voicing your feelings about the sorry state of capitalism we live in. Corpos will do everything in their power to obscure facts and dillute proper discussion and criticism if their products are subpar in quality. Gamers Nexus is much the same in that they don't take any shit and review honestly and have burned plenty of bridges for that.
@@abhineetsingh12 their ethics are none existent. They are a very very greedy company and money comes before EVERYTHING. If they had a choice, money or death of half the world, they wouldn't blink twice.
Been using the mai z490 tomahawk but can’t update bios anymore due to a bad bios on msi website. Over 500 people have documented and reported the issue on forums. Want to know what Msi responds to it all is? “People are doing it wrong it’s not our fault 😑” I’ll probably never buy a msi product after that. Msi doesn’t care about it’s customers? That’s fine. I’ll take my money else where 💯
I cannot thank you enough guys for the efforts. You save is a lot of time, money and hussle. Monthly support is the least someone can do. I'm getting a raise soon so I'll be more than happy to donate. Thank you 🙏🏻
You can tell Steve was really proud of his pun at 13:51. xD Well, I gotta admit it did make me smirk and want to tell Steve to get out, so... well played, Steve!
Great overview - thanks for your great content. I was able to snag a 12600K for $200 USD and a MSI Z690-A Pro Wifi DDR4 for only $210 - and then the bundle saved another $20 so only $390 for this at Microcenter. Working great! I would suggest a great video would be guides to the different vendors Bios for over clocking. I’ve used ASUS for the last 7-8 years and the MSI bios is so bad. I’ve tried to do some basics and for whatever reason hasn’t been working. I gave up and went stock + XMP and haven’t seen much reason to mess with it. But would love a video guide to help down the line.
Even Buildzoid is swooning over the -A Pro and that guy can normally ramble for like 30 minutes about a single thing he doesn't like. For a 12600k it's practically overkill. Like you'll melt that thing out of the socket before the VRM throws in the towel.
Got the TUF D4 with the 12900k. Seemed like a well thought out board. A solid performer thus far. Hitting those C23 scores wit an adaptive undervolt, and sub 80 degrees on air.
Hi, I'm trying to decide which Z690 I should get to pair with a 12900k, and I think I'm going for the TUF D4, but I'm afraid of temps and OC capabilities. Could you tell me what kind of temps you reach while running some test like Cinebench and gaming? I can't seem to gather these infos anywhere :/
@@GloRupt Hi, I am using a Cooler Master Maker case with 3 fans at the front, and 2 up top, all blowing in at low fan speeds. No rear fan. The 12900k is cooled by a Noctua NH-d15. Running the CPU stock at nearly 250 Watts, e.g. in CB23, it reaches 93 deg Celsius in a room with 22 deg C ambient temperature. However, an adaptive undervolt of -0,1V brings the wattage down to some 210w, and the temps slightly below 80 deg C max. That is, without affecting the performance. I am still getting 27.4k multi core score in CB. How well each CPU undervolts depends though. Most are said to do -0.065 volts reliably. The mainboard keeps cool, as far as I can tell.
@@HeadPack most I could get gaming was Horizon Zero Dawn which utilizes 40%-50% of the CPU, the 2 hottest cores went to 89*C MAX on DH15. my ambient is 23*C 3 front 1 at back no tops and 3080Ti below :) @Giovanni .. basically for gaming you dont have to worry about temps, its pretty cool on almost all games
I love these MoBo comparison videos A LOT! You make very compareable testing, but also talk about the rest of the board, and give your humble opinion. But this time I missed the VRM Blockdiagrams a bit. They make the VRM explanation a lot more understandable
I recommend MSI z690 pro a if you dont want rgb fluff and just want a solid board with great overclocking features, if you truly compare it to others like asus tuf z690, MSI has same or more features for less. I was able to do 5.3mhz oc with 20 c idle and 77 full load on a 12900k, that being said, you do need a good cooler.
360 aio Cooler Master with noctua fans on both sides doing a push and pull cycle, also, i have my cpu undervolted to 1.25v which helps the temp, but surprisingly kept going 5.3mhz stable in all test i made!
Would a 12900k require liquid cooling on most motherboards? Or does the msi board not provide enough heat sinking? In the video seems hot compared to others
I just grabbed a Gigabyte z690 AORUS ULTRA for $199.99 on sale (antonline) - now THAT is some value! =-D (original MSRP 369.99, but usually it was sold for $400-ish just 6 months ago). I love waiting 6-12 months AND Black Friday season coming into effect.
I'm using a Z590 Asus board that helps my i7 put out some great numbers and beautiful graphics on my 3060ti. I have not been able to find a Z690 board. Ever since Frys went out of business finding parts at a great price has been difficult. Newegg has been caught selling Chinese rebranding or just not having availability.
Since all of these passed the VRM test I think you should start digging in a little more to see which VRM delivers voltage/current best. As well as looking at ripple. I know that’s much more in depth but those tests would really make the picture clearer and I know HUB could present the info in a consumable way
Bit late already got mine. Asus rog strix Z690-A gaming D4. No issues with my stock 12900k and 32gb ddr4 3600 cl 16,16,16,38. Great onboard sound which i need and looks and works without issue. Very nice looks to boot for my build and heatsinks everywhere for nvme ssds. It's the most expensive board i've bought and i've had Hero and Maximus boards all under £300 but this one cost £310. Either way it suits my needs and visual preferences.
Got the same board due to the cashback offer which made it acceptable. Hope you got the Asus cashback offer in time. For me it was £75 as I went with the 12700K and on the 12900K it is more...Board is great though...
That MSI Z690-A Pro board is the GOAT. Four M.2 slots, 6 SATA ports, WiFi, healthy amount of USB ports/headers, and easily runs a 12900K? Literally no functional reason to buy almost all of the Z690 motherboards more expensive than it.
It's pretty good if you have a separate dac and amp, for me gigabyte is the only option as the audio solution on it makes the most sense for me as I do not own a seprate dac/amp, I'm thinking of pairing i5 with the z690 gaming x. All the other board have really shitty audio.
@@sidd98110 nailed it. Gotta make sure the mobo sports a Realtek ALC4080 or ALC1220-VB, don't settle for less. Gigabyte Gaming X 60A & no wifi, bang for the buck. Or 70A +wifi on the MSI Tomahawk.
Its basically a tomahawk z60 wifi without the fancy looking, im grabbing that board too and a 12700kf. Sound is not important since I have a separate dac
@@sidd98110 If you care about audio quality that much, just buy the separate DAC. A good DAC will last you through multiple motherboards and will almost always be better than even the best built in motherboard stuff.
To me, the best board for people who aren’t planning on over liking really hard is the MSI PRO Z690-A. It has great VRM, great RAM overclocking capabilities and has the same PCB as the Tomahawk for ~100 bucks less. It’s the best « budget » board to me and is the one I’d buy.
@@adityadivine9750 Going with Asus tuf too. Card has all the features anyone really needs, has solid temps, quality components, and the Asus BIOS is one of the best in the industry imo. Just all in all a solid product at a reasonable price within its performance range.
I like the MSI PRO range too for other chipsets. It’s usually great value and does well with Steve. But for Intel 12th gen gaming, I’m predicting that B660 with the non-K chips will be the better value play next year for anyone not into overclocking.
Grabbed the MSI Z690-A Pro as it was the only available board in stock when I was ordering my 12900k. Unexpectedly it's actually great and I will probably end up keeping it instead of switching to a fancier board later like I was planning to.
MSI: "You can get everything good with the -A Pro series, except fancy looking and sounding. In return you promise not to brag about your board so others buy the expensive fancy looking ones. Deal?" Customer: "Yeah.. I can't really brag about this board.. it looks generic, has a generic name and there's not much bragging right in 'it works all the time' now is there?" MSI: "Ah, so you accept my terms and conditions! Shall we close this deal with a handshake?" Seriously, I've been building PCs for more than 20 years. People are getting ripped off left, right and center. Unless you intend on serious over clocking, or you're doing a type of build which is severely hampered on cooling or airflow due to the form factor, a good quality generic board should do just fine. It's atrocious how many boards out there are either hot garbage or a completely dolled up common Sue. Most of these brands should only have three lines: Budget: Does not support the xx900(k) SKUs, Realtek audio/LAN/Wifi. VRM enough to run the xx700k stock or the xx600k with a mild over clock. Names contain one letter and one number. Generic: Socket vendor spec VRM. Nothing more, nothing less. Several different I/O configurations available, but basically a copy-pasta of the same board over and over gain. Maybe a few different colour schemes. Names contain two letters and two numbers. Enthusiast: VRM enough drive a tea kettle. All the shit all the time with all the extras. Bluetooth connected smart phone app for extra over clocking monitoring and privacy invasion. Possibly even a dating app in the BIOS. More RGB. Monthly new shrouds/covers as a subscription feature for those who like to play dolls with their mobo. A bit more RGB. Gamercentric sounding names like "The Skull Crusher", "High Voltage Shock Zapper", "Extra Mega Super Awzum", etc, etc. Some more RGB.
@@DrMrPersonGuy Only turned on the automatic speed booster via XTU. It stays locked at 5.1GHz under load. Using the Arctic Liquid Freezer II 360mm AIO cooler.
I own a MSI Z690-A Pro Wifi DDR4 board. Love it to death. I own two previous series of this board, with the Z490 and Z390 mobos. Z390 is out of commission until I can fetch some spare ddr4 but she functions perfectly well. The Z490 is paired with an 11400, running a Minecraft server, serving me perfectly well. As long as MSI keeps up the good work, I'll keep buying their series. I might even splurge and buy the Z590, just to have it on hand and complete the collection, from Z390 - Z690. Also, forgot to mention, I have a 12600k paired with the Z690. I'm not rich man... so... the, uh, 12900k can just gracefully remain a pipe dream while I actually play my games and do my work.
@@BRCAMARONXX I went with i9 12900k, completely unnecessary for me but at least I’m future proofed for awhile. So far all good once I figured out how to set the bios to legacy mode and not uefi only.
@@BRCAMARONXX I got the new MSI S280 coreliquid. Admittedly idle temps are high, usually low to mid 40s although I’ve also never seen over 50 while gaming. I plan to take it off and apply fresh thermal paste and see if that makes a difference. Not convinced about these coolers and the thermal paste they come with but also the thermal plate coverage on these 12th gen cpus.
Tried out both Gigabyte z690 gaming x and MSI Z690-A Pro with my 12700k, 3080ti fe and Dark Rock Pro 4. The Gigabyte looked way fancier and was 30€ cheaper. However, I had to return it, not because of performance or temperatures, but because of 2 more annoying points (for me personally): 1) I am using 4x8GB GSkill Ripjaws V 3200. I was not able to activate XMP Profile - the PC won't boot anymore. I was able to manually OC to 3100 MHZ. With MSI, I had no problems using XMP Profile and it's running stable @3200 MHZ. 2) Tell me I'm crazy or stupid but the gigabyte MB caused really bad coil whine everytime I moved my mouse. This didn't occur using the MSI MB. I could live with that when only occuring while gaming when using the Headset - I wouldn't hear it then anyways. But it was so annoying when just being on desktop/in chrome in idle mode, turned me crazy... With the MSI, these problems don't exist. Moreover, I didn't really have an ASUS alternative, as the cheapest ASUS board for me was 250€+ which I do not want to pay for a DDR4 motherboard...
I had the same problem with a gigabyte z370 aurus when I bought my 8700k. Sent it back and got a ROG board, 4133 XMP no issues. Going to avoid gigabyte for next build
Sometimes companies may just not want to waste time and money to send UA-camrs free things or even loaners for reviews, but please understand that I love the videos, and they are very helpful, and your channel is amazing, but I like to see the other's side as well. I think when a company is releasing a new product and 1000s of UA-cam channels are asking for review products, of course they might just not want to send them out to so many people. It probably gets super expensive even for just the loaners. Some people think that since they are only loaning you the product that it cost them nothing, which is not true at all!! They have someone who is on the clock at work making $15-$25 an hour, taking time out of their work day so that they can go out package these products and then pay for shipping labels, input the shipping info to get picked up which maybe only takes 20 minutes to an hour but when It's for 100-1000s of UA-cam channels that want to do the reviews they have to do these 20-30 minute task 100s-1000s of times which cost a lot and if they are loaners they have to keep track and receive them back, clean and reship for new reviewers. Now if they are giving them to the reviewers to keep, then they are loosing even more money on the free products, but either way this all adds up to a lot of money. Now imagine that every tech UA-camr with 50k subs and more keeps reaching out to these companies asking for free things or to borrow something to test it, this is a lot to deal with. So, maybe just maybe instead of them not having faith in their own product because they don't want to send you and other channels a free or a loaner product, maybe they have a lot of faith in their own product that they don't mind making all the UA-camrs just buy the product to review, and they get to save loads of money. I'm not sure because like I said I love your channel and I love your reviewers and videos but when I hear every UA-cam complaining that a company wouldn't send them a free/loaner product to review it just comes off as a little not humble, that's the best way I can put it because I love your work, but I just wanted to let you know how it comes off when you and other channels say these things. Again I love your channel, no hate or anything, I just thought I would chime in on the topic that I hear on a lot of channels. Keep up the amazing reviews!!
With boards costing sub £200 vs others at £260+ and if money is tight the difference will get you genuine gains if the money is put towards other components. The z690 boards are very good across the board and are all capable of running AL CPUs.
the tldr for z690 is: just get a z690 UD if you want usb ports, or a z690-a if you value your sanity more than 2 usb ports (GB bios is still a bit... peculiar) EDIT: as far as ITX is concerned: MSI seems to be the go to for z690 as well, MSI seems to have a knack for ITX motherboards
@@rubenfasola5402 im gonna make a 12600k build but I couldn't decide between msi pro z690-a ddr4 and gigabyte ud z690 ddr4 :D Can u help me a little man ?
I like how in Western Europe almost all the DDR5 boards are in stock but the memory itself cannot be found literally anywhere. Not even if you were willing to pay crazy prices for it, I just can't find it anywhere. Every retailer site just lists it as "not available / cannot be purchased at this time".
@@nttea Servers, possibly. There's also a big shortage of the PMICs that DDR5 modules use, so it's hard to manufacture enough of them to meet demand (though apparently no shortage of VRMs for motherboards, so I guess that still raises similar questions).
I actually just built a system on an asus prime z690a, can confirm that vrm sits very solidly around 50 degrees with an i7 12700k, im my opinion, there isn't a better option for a budget build on ddr5
I got the TUF Gaming (non Wifi) for cheaper than any of the other boards. It was a black friday sale + ASUS cashback. Looks like I got a pretty good deal! Thank you for the video
On a whim i looked at the VRM configs, like 14+1 or 16+1+2 or 16+1 and there seems to be zero correlation between designs and temperature, which leads me to believe the difference in applied VCORE or chip manufacturer or board design, thermal paste blah blah blah is causing the difference in VRM temps ? However it is surely a trend to see Gigabyte on the bottom (thinking about my Gigabyte rtx 3080 with the absolutely trash pads on that) I would believe that a strategically placed 120 mm fan to have a larger impact on VRM temps than the change of motherboards, if the Vcore had been more even across the board (doh). A more reliable test would be to overclock the 12900 slightly on all boards, use the exact same VCORE on all boards, and run cinebench again to see VRM temperature. That could have given an idea about the cooling capability of the VRM heatsinks. _Then_ you could overclock it to maximum, to see which board was (presumably) providing the most stable power. It is hard to compare 1.291 volts VCORE vs 1.244 volts VCORE and decide which VRM is better, this can be turned around in next bios update by the manufacturer. It is meaningless. Package power doesnt really provide much sense either, unless the boards are identical in features. Another thing: Memory. I am not going to overclock my 12600 K much, since the gain from modern CPU OC is very small, but i would like to run my DDR4 at gear 1 and preferably at c14 3800 or higher. (planning to use 2 x G.Skill 4400 C16 DDR4 - F4-4400C16D-16GVK) The memory capability is not even mentioned. I would like to use 3x4 nvme drives, but sata ? dont care about sata. I care about ethernet, what chipset is it ? Number of USB 3 ports ? Wifi chipset/type is it wifi 6 ? Often realtek ethernet is useless, and then you will have to get a pcie card which adds 30-40 $. No mention of this either. Onboard sound ? i dont care much about it, but i know many people do care, since they have surround setup or good hifi speakers, while i use USB headset. I am not trying to trash your review, but i think there is a lot more to cover than this, basically all of it.
I have never bought a board based on the VRM. As long as it can power my CPU without throttling or overheating, I don't care. But I'm glad to see that doesn't seem to be an issue with any of these boards.
It doesn't seem to matter with high-end MBs, but it certainly matters when they tested those low-end MBs - I think it was B5xx MBs, and some were quite a bit slower -.
Which board should i pick (i7 12700k not planning to OC it) - MSI Pro Z690-A Wifi ddr4 - MSI MAG H670 Tomahawk WIFI DDR4 They are priced exactly the same in my country
Having gotten a MATX case for compactness ages ago and bought the 12th gen at launch day I only had two choice when it comes to mbs, Asus prime or AsRock, which didn't even have any usb c ports. So the choice was obvious and I'm glad I got the Asus prime z690m.
Great info! I am looking to air-cool a 13700k and want to get a good board to keep it cool. It seems to me that 10 degrees difference in VRM thermals (say between the z690 Asus tuff gaming and Gigabyte UD) should be a major thing for me to consider. Does this translate to CPU temps? Am I missing something?
Good. I can rest easy then. Waited till last Friday for VRM tests, but bought the Tomahawk in the end. It's a really nice board, but the drivers are a nightmare to setup on Linux. You can't read many sensor data, some USB ports crash, and the new Bluetooth, and WIfi messes up the Lan connectivity. Just as a heads up, it's not ideal for linux workstation use. At least at the moment, maybe after kernel 5.16+.
May I reccommend to check boards light load Effieciency as well? An optimized VRM should not only good at full load. Efficiency also matters on light loads (editing in a design/office app, or browsing the web). Thank you the hard work!
It doesnt matter. Vrm efficiency only scales to current draw and ambient temperature. So light loads draw so little current even the worst vrm will show like 99% efficiency. The efficiency difference between vrms only show when the load is high.
@Hardware Unboxed, perhaps you should read the Intel specs for the Z690 VRM, namely IMVP9.1. No more DrMOS can be used, so ... yeah, your info is 100% wrong when you say a certain motherboard uses DrMOS, they all use SPS.
I wanted the MSI Pro Z690 but it was out of stock locally and it was wait 2 weeks or get another MOBO so I got the Asus Prime Z690 Wifi D4, I would've gotten the TUF Z690 but it was 100$ more 😭 I hope it wasnt a bad choice in the long run at least I got a cashback
You can always change motherboards don’t worry too much about it. I know how it feels when you question your decision but there’s room for mistakes in builds just sell the parts you don’t want or make another budget build as a back up that’s what I have done
This just confirm my choise of getting the TUF D4(non wifi) model on sale doing black friday, + having a cashback in my region dropped the price way below that of the Tomahawk D4. I personally would have loved more usb and sata ports, But with these prices one has to find ways to settle.
Thanks for the very useful information. Standardised motherboard testing is rare. Considering your expertise in testing gaming performance, might be something you can look into ? How much fps changes between a cheap and the most expensive motherboards.
Love the great testing/content. I understand why you would go with extreme high end case, AIO and PSU to avoid the test system from being a limit on the new Intel CPU's. But, I am not sure how realistic it is for most people to spend around $800+ (USD) on just these three components? It would be interesting to see what happens to the 12900k when put in a case with components that an average DIY gamer would choose like a 850w gold psu, a $100-150 case (4000D, 5000D) and either a 280mm or 360mm AIO. That would shave about $350 to $400+ off the build price... But, could Intel's new CPU's survive in such an environment at a normal household temperature of say 25c or 26c or would it turn into a good imitation of an air fryer? Again, fully understand for testing why you chose to go high end... But still curious what would happen with more realistic conditions.
Gigabyte has released a new bios to address the calibration of the VRM for "better performance". Maybe a revisit of the these tests with a more mature bios is on order?
Choosing between z690-a and UD AX. Same price near me. I like the look of the gaming x the best, especially since it doesn't have the blue green pink audio connectors, but I can't seem to find it in stock anywhere except 3rd party sellers on amazon.
Could I suggest monitoring the wall-power of the system while doing this sort of testing? It would be kind of interesting to know if the boards differ in efficiency and, if so, by how much. I realize that that number would include PSU efficiency, but as long as it's the same PSU, it should still be a fair measure of relative efficiency, and if it differs by any significance, it would be an interesting factor by which to distinguish boards that are otherwise fine in terms of temperatures.
Mid-70s on the low-tier boards with 12900K is great and puts to shame boards twice as expensive. Note that MSI Pro-A achieved that at noticeably higher Vcore than others... Also, Gigabyte's DDR4 boards currently suffer from issues (most notably, with RAM) so it's best to skip them for a while, until they fix them.
@@stuartb3082 People have difficulty hitting 3600 Gear 1 on Gigabyte, while the same CPU+Memory boots 4266 Gear 1 on Asus/MSI and is stable at 4133 Gear 1...
@@MSJChem I also have Z690-UD DDR4. It can't run 4 sticks of 3200 CL14 (Samsung B-die) at CR 1T, same sticks taken from Z390-UD where it worked fine. Otherwise it had training issues with tighter timings which all used to work. Internet's current state of collective knowledge suggests that you need to manually raise voltage by 10 mV (for example, manually enter 1.36 instead of 1.35 it pulled from XMP) to actually get it to maintain the voltage and stability, but I'm not sure if it does anything or just the usual placebo/voodoo setting :)
Great review Steve, it's sad all the gigabyte boards were mediocre and that cheap Asus was surprising with how thin that heatsink is. My current PC has a z490 aorus elite based on your previous vrm comparison
9:56 you mixed them up. You are talking about z690-p but torpedo is marked. .. did you mix them up in the chart or in speech? You are praising it, but the chart shows it wasn't that good. So which one is it?
At 10:10 you are talking about the Asus Prime Z690, but the graph states MSI Torpedo, which one is correct?
The graph is correct. The audio is wrong.
Haha about to say the same thing
@@Hardwareunboxed so you think it's good 75c for asus prime d4? Isn't it a bit high?
@@AxCE12 They said in the video that 74c is fine, but just a bit disappointing for the price for the gigabyte boards.
74c is well within safe limits for a PCB temp, ideally you'd want to keep it below 80c, once you get over 90c it starts to become an issue and over 100c is unsafe.
Hardware Unboxed: *posts a budget motherboard benchmarks*
Shitty motherboard manufacturers: *nervously sweating*
As usual great work steve! 🙂
mostly asrock and Biostar
It’s a shame the manufacturers don’t include or share ALL offerings for testing. I use this channel’s testing results exclusively when choosing new hardware. When attempting to choose a new Z690 it’s no surprise which video/channel I click on. Thanks for the work done here 👌🏽
ASRock banned Hardware Unbox from samples? Wow that's a big no for me. I've been purchasing ASRock GPUs and motherboards all the time. No more ASRock products for me now! Let the ASRock team see this!
They also blacklisted Gamers Nexus. And everyone else who, rightfully, thrashed them for their outright faulty Z590 lineup.
@@andersjjensen so instead of rectifying they are blacklisting lol. I mean it only harms them on the long run. I'm getting Asus TUF this time.
@@oMeGa0122 Asrock's r&d is good just the marketing team is shitty.
They've basically banned anyone that makes reputable reviews. Besides their Taichi boards, they basically make trash.
As someone posted in another video with b660 - ASSROCK. And they have proven it!
Damn bro
I was constantly refreshing my youtube for your z690 mobo video.
Thanks a lot for your hard work.
The video I've been waiting for since alderlake released
Glad to see all boards performing well
I think the difference this time is that 240W are the official requirement from Intel and all manufacturers are following it.
On the other hand with Z590 and before it was always a 125W requirement with "can optionally support up to 300W" and board manufacturers did exactly that. Cheaper board had VRMs designed for 125W, better boards had VRMs for 200W+
From a product perspective the 240W requirements were definitely a good decision for the Z chipset and K CPUs. End users are free to choose a lower TDP, but if you buy any board you know the full TDP actually works.
From a marketing perspective I think it was not such a good idea as everybody believes the 12900K draws 240W under all applications. Most average buyers dont know that real power consumption while gaming is much much less.
I love how you always talk about certain manufacturers making stuff difficult or trying to influence reviews and things like that. God how I love honesty and the guts to make such things known. Same respect for reviewers and channels who do sponsored reviews, but will still bury a product if it simply doesn't live up to the standards. Y'all do your little part in keeping some remnant of my faith in humanity. Yes, it's overly dramatic but I'm just in that type of mood right now. You get what I'm saying.
Does that stuff affect your buying decisions? I heard of people refusing to buy from certain brands because of some shady stuff like that. I don't really care about that tho and only buy what's the best performing at a certain price. Except when it comes to companies like Nestlé. Fuck Nestlé.
@@achannelhasnoname5182 wait I'm not in the loop what's wrong with nestle?👀
I buy a lot of their products 😐
@@abhineetsingh12 I think a little research even on UA-cam will give u some great results...
It's just a hop to the search bar.
Nothing dramatic about you voicing your feelings about the sorry state of capitalism we live in. Corpos will do everything in their power to obscure facts and dillute proper discussion and criticism if their products are subpar in quality. Gamers Nexus is much the same in that they don't take any shit and review honestly and have burned plenty of bridges for that.
@@abhineetsingh12 their ethics are none existent. They are a very very greedy company and money comes before EVERYTHING. If they had a choice, money or death of half the world, they wouldn't blink twice.
I was waiting for this video!!! Amazing job like always!
Massive improvement over the last generation where you had to be carefull to get the right z490/z590 mobo or otherwise miss out on performance.
Essentially all the boards will run perfectly fine and you can buy based on price and what connections you need.
Been using the mai z490 tomahawk but can’t update bios anymore due to a bad bios on msi website. Over 500 people have documented and reported the issue on forums. Want to know what Msi responds to it all is? “People are doing it wrong it’s not our fault 😑” I’ll probably never buy a msi product after that. Msi doesn’t care about it’s customers? That’s fine. I’ll take my money else where 💯
@@SVT_LIGHTNING ummmm, ok? Hyperbole much? Just don't update the bios and wait for a fix 🙄
@@samgoff5289 it’s been about 8 months with no fix and none coming. How long should we wait for? Until z790 comes out??
@@SVT_LIGHTNING why do you need this update so bad? Is there somthing really bad about your current version or somthing?
I cannot thank you enough guys for the efforts. You save is a lot of time, money and hussle. Monthly support is the least someone can do. I'm getting a raise soon so I'll be more than happy to donate. Thank you 🙏🏻
I've often wondered about VRM differences, thanks for the info.
i purchased the Z690 TUF based on this review
thanks for the guide :)
same
You can tell Steve was really proud of his pun at 13:51. xD Well, I gotta admit it did make me smirk and want to tell Steve to get out, so... well played, Steve!
Hue hue hue! :P Didn't catch that one until you said it.
I bought the MSI Tomahawk and I am VERY happy with it. Worked PERFECT out of the box and my 12600K runs great!
I have the same board. It's a great board
@@SpartanG087 MSI MAG Z690 DDR 4 Wifi Tomahawk?
After watching your review I bought the MSI Tomahawk DDR4, works without problems so far.
Great overview - thanks for your great content. I was able to snag a 12600K for $200 USD and a MSI Z690-A Pro Wifi DDR4 for only $210 - and then the bundle saved another $20 so only $390 for this at Microcenter. Working great! I would suggest a great video would be guides to the different vendors Bios for over clocking. I’ve used ASUS for the last 7-8 years and the MSI bios is so bad. I’ve tried to do some basics and for whatever reason hasn’t been working. I gave up and went stock + XMP and haven’t seen much reason to mess with it. But would love a video guide to help down the line.
is 4.9ghz turbo boost on 12600k enabled in the bios by default or do you need to do it manually?
Thank you so much for this video. I was in the process of building a new PC and this is exactly what I needed to watch.
These are fantastic reasults!!! Well done for testing Steve.
You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this since z670 was released.
Hey, at least they did not crash in terms of VRM performance unlike their Z590 siblings.
Got the MSI Z690-A Pro + 12600K a week ago, this benchmark really assured me that I bought the right board. Top notch testing steve.
Even Buildzoid is swooning over the -A Pro and that guy can normally ramble for like 30 minutes about a single thing he doesn't like. For a 12600k it's practically overkill. Like you'll melt that thing out of the socket before the VRM throws in the towel.
@@andersjjensen that shows a lot
Got the TUF D4 with the 12900k. Seemed like a well thought out board. A solid performer thus far. Hitting those C23 scores wit an adaptive undervolt, and sub 80 degrees on air.
I got the same combo TUF D4, 12900k. What is the adaptive undervolt? I am also cooling with AIR NOCTUA DH-15 @HeadPack
Hi, I'm trying to decide which Z690 I should get to pair with a 12900k, and I think I'm going for the TUF D4, but I'm afraid of temps and OC capabilities. Could you tell me what kind of temps you reach while running some test like Cinebench and gaming? I can't seem to gather these infos anywhere :/
@@GloRupt Hi, I am using a Cooler Master Maker case with 3 fans at the front, and 2 up top, all blowing in at low fan speeds. No rear fan. The 12900k is cooled by a Noctua NH-d15. Running the CPU stock at nearly 250 Watts, e.g. in CB23, it reaches 93 deg Celsius in a room with 22 deg C ambient temperature. However, an adaptive undervolt of -0,1V brings the wattage down to some 210w, and the temps slightly below 80 deg C max. That is, without affecting the performance. I am still getting 27.4k multi core score in CB. How well each CPU undervolts depends though. Most are said to do -0.065 volts reliably. The mainboard keeps cool, as far as I can tell.
@@HeadPack most I could get gaming was Horizon Zero Dawn which utilizes 40%-50% of the CPU, the 2 hottest cores went to 89*C MAX on DH15. my ambient is 23*C 3 front 1 at back no tops and 3080Ti below :) @Giovanni .. basically for gaming you dont have to worry about temps, its pretty cool on almost all games
@@GloRupt see reply below
Massive props for the honest reporting
I love these MoBo comparison videos A LOT! You make very compareable testing, but also talk about the rest of the board, and give your humble opinion.
But this time I missed the VRM Blockdiagrams a bit. They make the VRM explanation a lot more understandable
I recommend MSI z690 pro a if you dont want rgb fluff and just want a solid board with great overclocking features, if you truly compare it to others like asus tuf z690, MSI has same or more features for less. I was able to do 5.3mhz oc with 20 c idle and 77 full load on a 12900k, that being said, you do need a good cooler.
That you need a good cooler is not the fault of MSI though! :P
Those are VERY good temps. Could I ask you which cooler you're using? Thanks!
360 aio Cooler Master with noctua fans on both sides doing a push and pull cycle, also, i have my cpu undervolted to 1.25v which helps the temp, but surprisingly kept going 5.3mhz stable in all test i made!
Which cooler do you use
Would a 12900k require liquid cooling on most motherboards? Or does the msi board not provide enough heat sinking? In the video seems hot compared to others
I just grabbed a Gigabyte z690 AORUS ULTRA for $199.99 on sale (antonline) - now THAT is some value! =-D (original MSRP 369.99, but usually it was sold for $400-ish just 6 months ago).
I love waiting 6-12 months AND Black Friday season coming into effect.
Thanks for this! Also, love the B-roll of the test PC
I always want this kind of video. VRAM temp is underrated
Please do a best value B660 video.
I'm using a Z590 Asus board that helps my i7 put out some great numbers and beautiful graphics on my 3060ti. I have not been able to find a Z690 board. Ever since Frys went out of business finding parts at a great price has been difficult. Newegg has been caught selling Chinese rebranding or just not having availability.
Since all of these passed the VRM test I think you should start digging in a little more to see which VRM delivers voltage/current best. As well as looking at ripple. I know that’s much more in depth but those tests would really make the picture clearer and I know HUB could present the info in a consumable way
If it wasn't because of Linus I would have never found this channel I'm glad they did because I love this channel!
Bit late already got mine. Asus rog strix Z690-A gaming D4. No issues with my stock 12900k and 32gb ddr4 3600 cl 16,16,16,38. Great onboard sound which i need and looks and works without issue. Very nice looks to boot for my build and heatsinks everywhere for nvme ssds. It's the most expensive board i've bought and i've had Hero and Maximus boards all under £300 but this one cost £310. Either way it suits my needs and visual preferences.
Got the same board due to the cashback offer which made it acceptable. Hope you got the Asus cashback offer in time. For me it was £75 as I went with the 12700K and on the 12900K it is more...Board is great though...
Let's gooo delivering as always thanks for the great content!
That MSI Z690-A Pro board is the GOAT. Four M.2 slots, 6 SATA ports, WiFi, healthy amount of USB ports/headers, and easily runs a 12900K? Literally no functional reason to buy almost all of the Z690 motherboards more expensive than it.
It's pretty good if you have a separate dac and amp, for me gigabyte is the only option as the audio solution on it makes the most sense for me as I do not own a seprate dac/amp, I'm thinking of pairing i5 with the z690 gaming x. All the other board have really shitty audio.
@@sidd98110 nailed it. Gotta make sure the mobo sports a Realtek ALC4080 or ALC1220-VB, don't settle for less. Gigabyte Gaming X 60A & no wifi, bang for the buck. Or 70A +wifi on the MSI Tomahawk.
Its basically a tomahawk z60 wifi without the fancy looking, im grabbing that board too and a 12700kf. Sound is not important since I have a separate dac
@@sidd98110 If you care about audio quality that much, just buy the separate DAC. A good DAC will last you through multiple motherboards and will almost always be better than even the best built in motherboard stuff.
@@BrianCroweAcolyte Or a soundcard, just got the SB AE7 its fantastic
To me, the best board for people who aren’t planning on over liking really hard is the MSI PRO Z690-A. It has great VRM, great RAM overclocking capabilities and has the same PCB as the Tomahawk for ~100 bucks less. It’s the best « budget » board to me and is the one I’d buy.
I'll buy the tuf.
They're almost same price in India
@@adityadivine9750 Timestamps in the comments: ua-cam.com/video/fEoNInG7cZQ/v-deo.html
@@adityadivine9750 don't think the Asus tuf has a no cpu bio flash option like the MSI board.
@@adityadivine9750 Going with Asus tuf too. Card has all the features anyone really needs, has solid temps, quality components, and the Asus BIOS is one of the best in the industry imo. Just all in all a solid product at a reasonable price within its performance range.
I like the MSI PRO range too for other chipsets. It’s usually great value and does well with Steve. But for Intel 12th gen gaming, I’m predicting that B660 with the non-K chips will be the better value play next year for anyone not into overclocking.
Great video and very thorough.
Grabbed the MSI Z690-A Pro as it was the only available board in stock when I was ordering my 12900k. Unexpectedly it's actually great and I will probably end up keeping it instead of switching to a fancier board later like I was planning to.
MSI: "You can get everything good with the -A Pro series, except fancy looking and sounding. In return you promise not to brag about your board so others buy the expensive fancy looking ones. Deal?"
Customer: "Yeah.. I can't really brag about this board.. it looks generic, has a generic name and there's not much bragging right in 'it works all the time' now is there?"
MSI: "Ah, so you accept my terms and conditions! Shall we close this deal with a handshake?"
Seriously, I've been building PCs for more than 20 years. People are getting ripped off left, right and center. Unless you intend on serious over clocking, or you're doing a type of build which is severely hampered on cooling or airflow due to the form factor, a good quality generic board should do just fine. It's atrocious how many boards out there are either hot garbage or a completely dolled up common Sue.
Most of these brands should only have three lines:
Budget: Does not support the xx900(k) SKUs, Realtek audio/LAN/Wifi. VRM enough to run the xx700k stock or the xx600k with a mild over clock. Names contain one letter and one number.
Generic: Socket vendor spec VRM. Nothing more, nothing less. Several different I/O configurations available, but basically a copy-pasta of the same board over and over gain. Maybe a few different colour schemes. Names contain two letters and two numbers.
Enthusiast: VRM enough drive a tea kettle. All the shit all the time with all the extras. Bluetooth connected smart phone app for extra over clocking monitoring and privacy invasion. Possibly even a dating app in the BIOS. More RGB. Monthly new shrouds/covers as a subscription feature for those who like to play dolls with their mobo. A bit more RGB. Gamercentric sounding names like "The Skull Crusher", "High Voltage Shock Zapper", "Extra Mega Super Awzum", etc, etc. Some more RGB.
@@andersjjensen I totally agree with u, the z490 Pro from msi is also generic as hell and still works perfect with a oc I5 10600k = 220 watts.
Have you tried overclocking the 12900k on it? Is water cooling a must for that?
@@DrMrPersonGuy Only turned on the automatic speed booster via XTU. It stays locked at 5.1GHz under load. Using the Arctic Liquid Freezer II 360mm AIO cooler.
@@Edvardas96 I see, ty
I own a MSI Z690-A Pro Wifi DDR4 board. Love it to death. I own two previous series of this board, with the Z490 and Z390 mobos. Z390 is out of commission until I can fetch some spare ddr4 but she functions perfectly well. The Z490 is paired with an 11400, running a Minecraft server, serving me perfectly well. As long as MSI keeps up the good work, I'll keep buying their series. I might even splurge and buy the Z590, just to have it on hand and complete the collection, from Z390 - Z690.
Also, forgot to mention, I have a 12600k paired with the Z690. I'm not rich man... so... the, uh, 12900k can just gracefully remain a pipe dream while I actually play my games and do my work.
Can you overclock your motherboard safely?
Wow how I was happy to get this information. I will buy board soon for i512600k
I just got the Asus TUF Gaming Z690-Plus glad I came a cross this review thank you.
I paid a bit for the MSI EDGE DDR4 board and no complaints. Looks great and supported 4400mhz CL 19 straight out of the box.
I'm thinking about purchasing this mobo. What are your thoughts so far? What cpu did you pair it with?
@@BRCAMARONXX I went with i9 12900k, completely unnecessary for me but at least I’m future proofed for awhile. So far all good once I figured out how to set the bios to legacy mode and not uefi only.
@@deadlyair what cooler did you paid it with and what temps are you seeing? Im leaning towards the i7 and my worry with the i9 were temps
@@BRCAMARONXX I got the new MSI S280 coreliquid. Admittedly idle temps are high, usually low to mid 40s although I’ve also never seen over 50 while gaming. I plan to take it off and apply fresh thermal paste and see if that makes a difference. Not convinced about these coolers and the thermal paste they come with but also the thermal plate coverage on these 12th gen cpus.
Thanks for the review, confirmed I was right to pick the Asus Prime-A D5 for my 12900k, oddly also got the same AIO you have on the test rig... :P
Thanks a lot for that review!
Thanks! Really insightful
Tried out both Gigabyte z690 gaming x and MSI Z690-A Pro with my 12700k, 3080ti fe and Dark Rock Pro 4. The Gigabyte looked way fancier and was 30€ cheaper. However, I had to return it, not because of performance or temperatures, but because of 2 more annoying points (for me personally):
1) I am using 4x8GB GSkill Ripjaws V 3200. I was not able to activate XMP Profile - the PC won't boot anymore. I was able to manually OC to 3100 MHZ. With MSI, I had no problems using XMP Profile and it's running stable @3200 MHZ.
2) Tell me I'm crazy or stupid but the gigabyte MB caused really bad coil whine everytime I moved my mouse. This didn't occur using the MSI MB. I could live with that when only occuring while gaming when using the Headset - I wouldn't hear it then anyways. But it was so annoying when just being on desktop/in chrome in idle mode, turned me crazy...
With the MSI, these problems don't exist. Moreover, I didn't really have an ASUS alternative, as the cheapest ASUS board for me was 250€+ which I do not want to pay for a DDR4 motherboard...
hey, whats ur cinebench r23 score like?
I had the same problem with a gigabyte z370 aurus when I bought my 8700k. Sent it back and got a ROG board, 4133 XMP no issues. Going to avoid gigabyte for next build
Sometimes companies may just not want to waste time and money to send UA-camrs free things or even loaners for reviews, but please understand that I love the videos, and they are very helpful, and your channel is amazing, but I like to see the other's side as well. I think when a company is releasing a new product and 1000s of UA-cam channels are asking for review products, of course they might just not want to send them out to so many people. It probably gets super expensive even for just the loaners. Some people think that since they are only loaning you the product that it cost them nothing, which is not true at all!! They have someone who is on the clock at work making $15-$25 an hour, taking time out of their work day so that they can go out package these products and then pay for shipping labels, input the shipping info to get picked up which maybe only takes 20 minutes to an hour but when It's for 100-1000s of UA-cam channels that want to do the reviews they have to do these 20-30 minute task 100s-1000s of times which cost a lot and if they are loaners they have to keep track and receive them back, clean and reship for new reviewers. Now if they are giving them to the reviewers to keep, then they are loosing even more money on the free products, but either way this all adds up to a lot of money.
Now imagine that every tech UA-camr with 50k subs and more keeps reaching out to these companies asking for free things or to borrow something to test it, this is a lot to deal with. So, maybe just maybe instead of them not having faith in their own product because they don't want to send you and other channels a free or a loaner product, maybe they have a lot of faith in their own product that they don't mind making all the UA-camrs just buy the product to review, and they get to save loads of money. I'm not sure because like I said I love your channel and I love your reviewers and videos but when I hear every UA-cam complaining that a company wouldn't send them a free/loaner product to review it just comes off as a little not humble, that's the best way I can put it because I love your work, but I just wanted to let you know how it comes off when you and other channels say these things.
Again I love your channel, no hate or anything, I just thought I would chime in on the topic that I hear on a lot of channels.
Keep up the amazing reviews!!
ASRock getting their own dedicated video... Love it already! lol
With boards costing sub £200 vs others at £260+ and if money is tight the difference will get you genuine gains if the money is put towards other components.
The z690 boards are very good across the board and are all capable of running AL CPUs.
the tldr for z690 is: just get a z690 UD if you want usb ports, or a z690-a if you value your sanity more than 2 usb ports (GB bios is still a bit... peculiar)
EDIT: as far as ITX is concerned: MSI seems to be the go to for z690 as well, MSI seems to have a knack for ITX motherboards
@@rubenfasola5402 im gonna make a 12600k build but I couldn't decide between msi pro z690-a ddr4 and gigabyte ud z690 ddr4 :D
Can u help me a little man ?
@@DePrEsSiOnHdq get msi, gigabyte software on bios is not worth the hassle
@@BodethIII I think I'm going with a 5800x and a b550 Aorus Pro v2 are they good ?
I still couldn't choose a cooler and case tho.
I like how in Western Europe almost all the DDR5 boards are in stock but the memory itself cannot be found literally anywhere. Not even if you were willing to pay crazy prices for it, I just can't find it anywhere. Every retailer site just lists it as "not available / cannot be purchased at this time".
Exactly the same over here in Brazil, the funniest thing is that the 12700k was sold for USD370 on black friday...
I had a chance to buy it when it first came out but it’s expensive
Who's buying all the ram but not the motherboards??
You can buy DDR5 in the UK... if you want crappy slow JEDEC RAM. Hell, you can't even get 4800 CL34, which is the best JEDEC spec.
@@nttea Servers, possibly.
There's also a big shortage of the PMICs that DDR5 modules use, so it's hard to manufacture enough of them to meet demand (though apparently no shortage of VRMs for motherboards, so I guess that still raises similar questions).
The biggest thing that confuses me about motherboards these days is "what the heck is with the dearth of USB ports?"
USB port is like the 3.5 headphone jack on phones.
Random hate on it for no good reason.
Thank you Bro
Nice Video and Information
MSI Z690-A is what most people should get.
This guy is legit thank you for your service
I actually just built a system on an asus prime z690a, can confirm that vrm sits very solidly around 50 degrees with an i7 12700k, im my opinion, there isn't a better option for a budget build on ddr5
I got the TUF Gaming (non Wifi) for cheaper than any of the other boards. It was a black friday sale + ASUS cashback. Looks like I got a pretty good deal! Thank you for the video
I always enjoy the depth of these reviews and comparisons. Great work as always!
On a whim i looked at the VRM configs, like 14+1 or 16+1+2 or 16+1 and there seems to be zero correlation between designs and temperature,
which leads me to believe the difference in applied VCORE or chip manufacturer or board design, thermal paste blah blah blah is causing the difference in VRM temps ?
However it is surely a trend to see Gigabyte on the bottom (thinking about my Gigabyte rtx 3080 with the absolutely trash pads on that)
I would believe that a strategically placed 120 mm fan to have a larger impact on VRM temps than the change of motherboards,
if the Vcore had been more even across the board (doh).
A more reliable test would be to overclock the 12900 slightly on all boards, use the exact same VCORE on all boards, and run cinebench again to see VRM temperature.
That could have given an idea about the cooling capability of the VRM heatsinks.
_Then_ you could overclock it to maximum, to see which board was (presumably) providing the most stable power.
It is hard to compare 1.291 volts VCORE vs 1.244 volts VCORE and decide which VRM is better, this can be turned around in next bios update by the manufacturer.
It is meaningless.
Package power doesnt really provide much sense either, unless the boards are identical in features.
Another thing: Memory. I am not going to overclock my 12600 K much, since the gain from modern CPU OC is very small,
but i would like to run my DDR4 at gear 1 and preferably at c14 3800 or higher. (planning to use 2 x G.Skill 4400 C16 DDR4 - F4-4400C16D-16GVK)
The memory capability is not even mentioned. I would like to use 3x4 nvme drives, but sata ? dont care about sata.
I care about ethernet, what chipset is it ? Number of USB 3 ports ? Wifi chipset/type is it wifi 6 ?
Often realtek ethernet is useless, and then you will have to get a pcie card which adds 30-40 $.
No mention of this either.
Onboard sound ? i dont care much about it, but i know many people do care, since they have surround setup or good hifi speakers, while i use USB headset.
I am not trying to trash your review, but i think there is a lot more to cover than this, basically all of it.
MSI Tomahawk is an amazing board . I have a B350 Tomahawk and the thing runs a Overclocked zen 1 R7 since 2018 and works like a champ .
Excellent video 🙂
Where is the picture of Steve attempting to hold all of the boxes though? Literally unwatchable!
Как обычно - ооочень крутой ролик,который разорвут на скриншоты по всему Миру). Браво!
Great video, thanks you.
I have never bought a board based on the VRM. As long as it can power my CPU without throttling or overheating, I don't care. But I'm glad to see that doesn't seem to be an issue with any of these boards.
It doesn't seem to matter with high-end MBs, but it certainly matters when they tested those low-end MBs - I think it was B5xx MBs, and some were quite a bit slower -.
good work. Thank you
Saying "half a dozen" instead of "six" is so fancy...
Which board should i pick (i7 12700k not planning to OC it)
- MSI Pro Z690-A Wifi ddr4
- MSI MAG H670 Tomahawk WIFI DDR4
They are priced exactly the same in my country
Having gotten a MATX case for compactness ages ago and bought the 12th gen at launch day I only had two choice when it comes to mbs, Asus prime or AsRock, which didn't even have any usb c ports. So the choice was obvious and I'm glad I got the Asus prime z690m.
Thank you!
Great info! I am looking to air-cool a 13700k and want to get a good board to keep it cool. It seems to me that 10 degrees difference in VRM thermals (say between the z690 Asus tuff gaming and Gigabyte UD) should be a major thing for me to consider. Does this translate to CPU temps? Am I missing something?
Maybe Gigabyte have 2 layers of copper - better tranfering heat to back ?
Good. I can rest easy then. Waited till last Friday for VRM tests, but bought the Tomahawk in the end. It's a really nice board, but the drivers are a nightmare to setup on Linux. You can't read many sensor data, some USB ports crash, and the new Bluetooth, and WIfi messes up the Lan connectivity.
Just as a heads up, it's not ideal for linux workstation use. At least at the moment, maybe after kernel 5.16+.
Great roundup, but disappointed to see no Asrock and Biostar.
May I reccommend to check boards light load Effieciency as well? An optimized VRM should not only good at full load. Efficiency also matters on light loads (editing in a design/office app, or browsing the web).
Thank you the hard work!
It doesnt matter. Vrm efficiency only scales to current draw and ambient temperature. So light loads draw so little current even the worst vrm will show like 99% efficiency. The efficiency difference between vrms only show when the load is high.
I'd be interested to see the MSI Pro Z690-P tested, to confirm whether the cheapest non-ASRock board is better than ASRock.
@Hardware Unboxed, perhaps you should read the Intel specs for the Z690 VRM, namely IMVP9.1. No more DrMOS can be used, so ... yeah, your info is 100% wrong when you say a certain motherboard uses DrMOS, they all use SPS.
I wanted the MSI Pro Z690 but it was out of stock locally and it was wait 2 weeks or get another MOBO so I got the Asus Prime Z690 Wifi D4, I would've gotten the TUF Z690 but it was 100$ more 😭 I hope it wasnt a bad choice in the long run at least I got a cashback
You can always change motherboards don’t worry too much about it. I know how it feels when you question your decision but there’s room for mistakes in builds just sell the parts you don’t want or make another budget build as a back up that’s what I have done
This just confirm my choise of getting the TUF D4(non wifi) model on sale doing black friday, + having a cashback in my region dropped the price way below that of the Tomahawk D4. I personally would have loved more usb and sata ports, But with these prices one has to find ways to settle.
Thanks for the very useful information. Standardised motherboard testing is rare. Considering your expertise in testing gaming performance, might be something you can look into ? How much fps changes between a cheap and the most expensive motherboards.
MSI A-Pro lineup has always a nice price/quality ratio
crazy how expensive these boards are now in late 2022.
Thank you.
Love the great testing/content. I understand why you would go with extreme high end case, AIO and PSU to avoid the test system from being a limit on the new Intel CPU's. But, I am not sure how realistic it is for most people to spend around $800+ (USD) on just these three components? It would be interesting to see what happens to the 12900k when put in a case with components that an average DIY gamer would choose like a 850w gold psu, a $100-150 case (4000D, 5000D) and either a 280mm or 360mm AIO. That would shave about $350 to $400+ off the build price... But, could Intel's new CPU's survive in such an environment at a normal household temperature of say 25c or 26c or would it turn into a good imitation of an air fryer? Again, fully understand for testing why you chose to go high end... But still curious what would happen with more realistic conditions.
12900k, 280AIO, Corsair 400D airflow= similar results.
We are still waiting for the 13th Gen motherboard reviews from the king of benchmark
I wish you guys also did itx boards
We will be getting OC tests too? I think after OC Gigabyte will do over 80c.
GUUYS ,YOU ARE THE BEST ,TNX
Gigabyte has released a new bios to address the calibration of the VRM for "better performance". Maybe a revisit of the these tests with a more mature bios is on order?
yess its true. done update that bios with my z690 aorus pro
Can we please talk about the atrocious audio solutions included with the majority of the boards?
Choosing between z690-a and UD AX. Same price near me. I like the look of the gaming x the best, especially since it doesn't have the blue green pink audio connectors, but I can't seem to find it in stock anywhere except 3rd party sellers on amazon.
Awesome, it would seem similarly to the x570 lineup, the TUF gaming from Asus and the Tomahawk from MSI are the best bang for your buck
Awaiting for B660 motherboards VRM benchmark & Reviews
Could I suggest monitoring the wall-power of the system while doing this sort of testing? It would be kind of interesting to know if the boards differ in efficiency and, if so, by how much. I realize that that number would include PSU efficiency, but as long as it's the same PSU, it should still be a fair measure of relative efficiency, and if it differs by any significance, it would be an interesting factor by which to distinguish boards that are otherwise fine in terms of temperatures.
That would be very little differences. Not worth measuring for those ~ 10W of difference between different boards.
Mid-70s on the low-tier boards with 12900K is great and puts to shame boards twice as expensive. Note that MSI Pro-A achieved that at noticeably higher Vcore than others...
Also, Gigabyte's DDR4 boards currently suffer from issues (most notably, with RAM) so it's best to skip them for a while, until they fix them.
Have the Gaming X and the XMP profile works perfectly with the new BIOS (which was out before my board even arrived).
@@stuartb3082 People have difficulty hitting 3600 Gear 1 on Gigabyte, while the same CPU+Memory boots 4266 Gear 1 on Asus/MSI and is stable at 4133 Gear 1...
I have the z690 UD DDR4 and have no problems with RAM.
@@MSJChem I also have Z690-UD DDR4. It can't run 4 sticks of 3200 CL14 (Samsung B-die) at CR 1T, same sticks taken from Z390-UD where it worked fine. Otherwise it had training issues with tighter timings which all used to work. Internet's current state of collective knowledge suggests that you need to manually raise voltage by 10 mV (for example, manually enter 1.36 instead of 1.35 it pulled from XMP) to actually get it to maintain the voltage and stability, but I'm not sure if it does anything or just the usual placebo/voodoo setting :)
Great review Steve, it's sad all the gigabyte boards were mediocre and that cheap Asus was surprising with how thin that heatsink is. My current PC has a z490 aorus elite based on your previous vrm comparison
Please make a fresh new video on B670 & Z790 Motherboards seperately 🙏🏻☺️🙏🏻
hes got my mobo in the thumbnail
9:56 you mixed them up. You are talking about z690-p but torpedo is marked. .. did you mix them up in the chart or in speech? You are praising it, but the chart shows it wasn't that good. So which one is it?
Please do an actually affordable mb vid
When I bought my X470 motherboard in 2018 I considered $200 to be high end. How things have changed :P
200 wasnt high end in 2018 xD
@@Waldherz i’m probably just cheap :)