Conclusion - Quadruple The Z790 Action
Looking at the four different Intel Z790 chipset motherboards, I noticed that at stock, their overall CPU performance with the Core i9-13900K was relatively the same. The performance only changed when using overclocked configurations and tuning the memory speeds since that depends largely on the BIOS, OC Tuning options, & compatibility that each motherboard has on offer. So let's start with the most expensive option that we had for testing today.
MSI MEG Z790 ACE - Your Golden Ticket!
MSI's MEG Z790 ACE is a very beautiful motherboard. It has a very mature theme with a pure black color scheme with small 24K gold hints all over the motherboard. Whether you want to use the on-board RGBs or not, this motherboard will look impressive regardless. The MSI MEG Z790 ACE has a powerful 24+1+2 phase VRM design and also has the highest-rated memory support of all the Z790 boards we tested so far at 7800 MHz+. This will ensure that you can get the fastest DDR5 DIMMs and install them on this motherboard without any hiccups. We tested the board with a DDR5-7200 which was overclocked to 7666 without any issues at all.
The large and massive VRM heatsinks provide some of the best temperatures I have seen on all five of the motherboards that we had for testing. Even when overclocked, the VRMs ran really cool & within spec. The dual 8-pin connectors might feel in an odd position but I managed to find them a bit easier to manage rather than having them stuffed along the far left corner of the chassis.
In terms of I/O, the MSI MEG Z790 ACE comes with double the Thunderbolt 4 ports (USB Type-C) thanks to an onboard JHL8540 chipset. These provide up to 40 Gbps transfer rates and up to 15W charging. The standard USB interfaces feature 10 USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports (including 2 Gen 2x2), 4 3.2 Gen 1, and 4 USB 2.0 ports. There's also a 60W Power Delivery option through the front panel USB headers that can be enabled by plugging in the 6-pin power connector on the motherboard.
Expansion slots include triple PCIe x16 slots (two Gen 5 and 1 Gen 4). Now the motherboard does not have any additional PLX chip so the slots will be sharing lanes with each other. Since there are only 16 Gen 5 lanes on the Raptor Lake CPUs, you will be restricted to x8/x8 when running two Gen 5 devices. There is also a single Gen 5 M.2 slot which will also share x4 lanes from the CPU so you'll end up with just x12 Gen 5 lanes. All M.2 slots come with a beefy cooling heatsink with dual-sided thermal pads which MSI has been offering for a while now. These ensure that you'll run all high-end Gen 5 and Gen 4 SSDs with good cooling support. The SATA options are limited to just 6 and I would have liked 2 more ports considering the premium nature of this motherboard but five M.2 slots kind of makeup for that.
Since this is a $700 US motherboard, MSI didn't leave anything out and features two 2.5 GbE LAN ports on the motherboard along with WIFI 6E capabilities. I am also happy to see that there are plenty of tuning options on the motherboard and a wide array of ARGB headers and fan headers are placed on the motherboard and very easy to access. I am seriously impressed by the MSI MEG Z790 ACE motherboard, it is a board that has so many things good about it that one cannot stop. I will definitely recommend anyone building a high-end Intel 13th Gen PC to get the MEG Z790 ACE, it's definitely a costly motherboard but it's worth every buck.
ASRock Z790 Taichi Carrara - Made From Marble!
Our next motherboard on the list is the ASRock Z790 Taichi Carrara. Marking the 20th Anniversary of ASRock in the motherboard market, the Carrara is a fresh new design that shares its specs and design with the standard Taichi but in a marble-esque design. Rather than going all white, this new marble pattern is a first on motherboards. ASRock told us that they were inspired by the rock of the same name 'Carrara' which is found in Italy and has a very exotic look, just like the motherboard it self.
So what's in store for us with the Z790 Taichi Carrara, well you are getting an insanely powerful 24+1+2 phase VRM design and memory support of up to DDR5-7000. The motherboard pushed Intel's Core i9-13900K to an overclock speed of 5.7 GHz without any hiccups but I must say that a few issues with the power consumption at idle and full load were noticed along with the fact that these unwanted power spikes resulted in the VRMs to run really hot. Now, the Carrara has a nice set of heatsinks with Heatpipe solution and even an active fan that sits underneath the I/O cover and that did an excellent job lowering the temperatures. On the positive side, these issues will be addressed in a new BIOS that's coming out soon.
Update: As expected, ASRock's latest BIOS fixes all the power issues that we faced on their two Z790 motherboards and are now inline with the rest of the motherboard offerings.
So on the I/O front, you are getting two LAN ports (1 x 2.5GbE and 1 x 1GbE), an insane 13 USB 3.2 ports (1 Gen 2x2, 2 Gen 2, 10 Gen 1), dual Thunderbolt 4 ports (Type-C) and 6 USB 2.0 ports. That's massive for users who want all the USB slots they can get hands-on. Expansion is very strong too with three PCIe x16 slots (2 Gen 5 x16/x8) and a single PCIe 4.0 x4 slot. There are also given M.2 slots, four of which are Hyper and 1 of which is Blazing Gen 5. The Gen 5 M.2 slot shares CPU lanes with the dGFX so you'll have to keep that in mind when running a Gen 5 graphics card or a Gen 5 M.2 SSD. Good thing is that no current GPU can saturate the Gen 4.0 x16 slot fully so a Gen 5.0 slot running at x8 mode will hardly affect your performance.
One good thing I found about this motherboard is that all of the necessary power, reset, DEBUG LED switches are located at the bottom and are easy to access. The M.2 slots themselves have very nice heatsinks over them with dual-sided thermal pads and the screws don't come off loose which is a plus in my books. The Audio is also strong with an ALC4082 CODEC, an ESS SABRE9218 DAC, & WIMA-grade capacitors on their own isolated PCB. ASRock has really offered something fresh with its Carrara design and the Z790 Taichi Carrara at $499.99 US is a rock-solid motherboard that has a huge variety of expansion/IO options and a powerful VRM that can support some hefty overclocks.
ASRock Z790 Steel Legend WIFI - A Mid-Range Legend?
Looking at our second ASRock motherboard of this review, we have the Z790 Steel Legend WIFI and we can see that ASRock has become fond of the white and silver color scheme a bit too much. This motherboard also looks great and the silver heatsinks with the white snow camo on the RGB plates look really nice. By default, the RGB accents are subtle but you can also use the ASRock RGB suite known as Polychrome Sync to adjust the three individual RGB LED zones (I/O cover / PCH / M.2 Armor heatsink).
For its price, the ASRock Z790 Steel Legend WIFI is quite the stacked option with an 18-phase power delivery design, triple PCIe x16 slots (Gen 5 x16, Gen 4 x4, Gen 3 x2), & five M.2 slots! One of these M.2 slots is rated at Gen 5 speeds (Blazing M.2). Now for the top Gen 5 slot, it houses a Gen 4 slot in parallel too so only can be used at once. So in reality, you have four SSD devices that can connect to the motherboard, that's still good. Out of the five M.2 slots, just one sits below no heatsink but considering the price range of this motherboard, it was expected for ASRock to cut the costs some where.
I/O and storage remain strong with 8 SATA III ports although four of which are hidden oddly under the PCH heatsink and can be really hard to reach. There are 15 USB 3.2 ports (1 Gen 2x2, 2 Gen 2, 12 Gen 1) and three USB 2.0 ports. There are no Thunderbolt ports on the board but you do find a Thunderbolt AIC connector that can support Thunderbolt cards such as the AIC supplied by the manufacturer itself. The board also has three addressable RGB headers and while there is no LED for debugging, there are small LEDs that will tell you the boot code. The motherboard performed well and was able to support DDR5-7200 memory fine. At this price, you are expected to lose a bit of feature but the ASRock Z790 Steel Legend still retains a good amount of connectivity options such as the 2.5GbE LAN port and WIFI 6E support.
If you are a fan of white-colored motherboards and can't afford the higher-end Carrara, then the Steel Legend comes at a decent price of just $289.99 US.
Gigabyte Z790 AERO G - Sub-$300 US Creator Goodness!
The final motherboard for today's mega roundup is the Gigabyte Z790 AERO G. This motherboard comes in at a mid-range price of $299.99 US and is a surprisingly good motherboard given that it has taken inspiration from the workstation and server-grade motherboards.
Placed within the creator segment of Gigabyte's lineup, the motherboard has a very durable design with solid aluminum fins colored in silver and large M.2 heatsinks which cool off the five M.2 slots that this motherboard has to offer. The thing about this motherboard that should please most users is the fact that it is the least flashy of all the other products that I tested here. And while one might expect it to feature the least overclocking options, the motherboard provides up to DDR5-7600 memory support. That's something alright!
You get lots of IO, a 2.5GbE LAN port, WIFI 6E, and during my tests, the VRMs ran really cool and the power delivery was smooth with no unwanted spikes. The BIOS on the motherboard is also easy to use but also very detailed if you go in advanced mode. If I had to rate the BIOS, then it is almost on par with MSI's though MSI does offer a tad bit more options and ASUS leads in all regards. This is a solid motherboard but for $10 US cheaper, the ASRock Z790 Steel Legend WIFI is a slightly better option with the extra ports and such. That still makes the Z790 AERO G a choice worth considering.
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About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
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