Gigabyte Z890 AORUS Master Motherboard Review – Strong Memory Support, Great Design

Conclusion - Mastered For Core Ultra

Last year, Gigabyte introduced its refreshed Z790 AOURS Master X which proved to be a nice upgrade over the previous Z790 Master variant. This year, Gigabyte is offering a completely upgraded model in the form of the Z890 AORUS Master, featuring support for Intel's Core Ultra 200S CPUs and adopting the Z890 chipset.

Gigabyte isn't compromising a bit on the next-gen Master, instead, it's aiming to offer upgrades in every department. For performance, you can expect solid support for Core Ultra 200S out of the box with zero hiccups using the latest BIOS. Whether you are running stock or overclocked, the 21-phase power delivery is rock solid and delivers a punch when you need to push it that extra mile. There's a reason we resorted to using the "Extreme" mode since that can show us the drawbacks of each motherboard when the CPUs are pushed past their "Performance" or baseline profiles. The Z890 Master had no issues in either mode.

For memory support, AORUS goes for a four DIMM DDR5 solution with up to 256 GB capacity support and up to 9500 MT/s speeds. The motherboard also has a new AI Snatch mode which comes pre-loaded with a huge dataset of profiles, perfect for CPU and memory overclocking. Gigabyte has worked with Kingston to enable support for AI Snatch on the latest Renegade DDR5 CUDIMM modules which come with a 8800 MT/s speed out of the box (XMP) but can be tuned up to 8933 MT/s through a single click. We also had no trouble in pushing our memory kit to 9200 MT/s speeds on the AORUS Master. Another interesting aspect of the Master is the included DDR Wind Blade fan which acts as a secondary active-cooling solution dedicated to the memory modules.

In terms of design choices, the Z890 AORUS Master has the same futuristic vibe that AORUS is known for with a very subtle RGB approach this time. The shiny mirror finish, & brushed grey plates with the nano-carbon heatsinks look great and the E-ATX form factor makes a lot of sense for a board of this tier. Little things such as the M.2 and PCIe EZ mechanisms make building PCs more fun and less annoying since you can access the M.2 and GPU slots with ease.

The things we loved about the Gigabyte Z890 AORUS Master:

• Familiar & Attractive "Futuristic" Design
• Strong VRM Solution
• Great For CPU Overclocking
• Great Memory Support (DDR5-9500 MT/s)
• Great VRM Heatsink
• Lots of USB ports (Including Dual USB4)
• Five M.2 slots with heatsinks
• Latest WIFI7 & BT5.4 Support
• Bundled Fan for Memory modules
• EZ Toolless Design For GPU, M.2 Slots, WIFI Antenna
• Feature-Rich BIOS Firmware
• ATX Form Factor

Things that we would have liked to see:

• Dual LAN ports
• Lower Price
• More Audio Jacks

Regarding storage options, you are getting five M.2 slots, two of which are Gen5 while the rest are Gen4 but retain full bandwidth. The PCIe slots are also full x16 designs with Gen5 x16 on a single & Gen4 x4 & x1 on the rest. Gigabyte's M.2 heatsinks have always been the best on the market as the company was the first to adopt proper aluminum finned designs and this time they have been upgraded to the new "XL" variants for the Master, offering better thermals and EZ Latch-Plus tool-less designs.

On the USB side, the motherboard has a total of 23 USB connections including 2 USB4 Type-C. All the latest IO features included WIFI7 with an EZ Plug mechanism which makes the hassle of removing or installing WIFI antenna connections super easy. There's also a single 10GbE LAN port and the onboard EZ DEBUG panel makes for easy debugging. Gigabyte's latest BIOS for its AORUS Z890 motherboards is also full of tuning features with features such as AI Perddrive that allow the users the best profile based on temperatures alongside the standard "Baseline", "Performance" & "Extreme" profiles.

Gigabyte's Z890 AORUS Master is priced at $599 US. That's a very high price considering the Z790 AORUS Master X was priced at $549.99 US which in itself was a bump over the original Z790 Master which cost $499 US. However, Gigabyte has added a lot of features to this motherboard, it's their top motherboard, just below the Tachyon which is an overclockers-exclusive, and the Xtreme which is designed for crazy enthusiasts who want nothing short of the best. The Master is also one of the best designs that AORUS has on offer and it shows in terms of its performance, fantastic memory support capabilities, a huge array of USB and M.2 connections, a wide range of IO, and the use of several EZ design methodologies.

 

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