ASRock X670E Steel Legend (AMD AM5)

The ASRock X670E Steel Legend is the mid-tier model from ASRock’s X670E family. It has an integrated I/O shield, great RGB implementation (with three aRGB connectors and one RGB compliant), PCIe 5.0 compatibility, PCIe 5.0 NVMe drives support (you can install one), and 4 SATA ports. There are no power/reset/clear CMOS buttons, which could come in handy when overclocking. You get a 2.5+1 Gbe Ethernet and Wi-Fi compatibility. The looks are excellent and should fit most of the builds. ASRock X670E Steel Legend has an excellent power delivery with 16+2+1 phase VRM. That should be enough even for the AMD Ryzen 9 7950X and possibly the new processors for the AM5 socket. The power delivery section is cooled with a radiator; no fans are included (so overall, that’s good). There are six fan headers – so you shouldn’t be disappointed in that department, but some would like more (for example, eight). You won’t get Thunderbolt 4.0 ports, but on the other side, you’ll get many USB ports (11x Type-A) at the rear panel. Audio performance is more than decent, but we expect fresher than ALC1220. The price is rather steep, as the chipset itself is expensive. There are “only” 4 SATA ports, but the number of M.2 slots makes it a relatively minor drawback, especially since the 2.5” drives are not necessarily visibly cheaper (and they’re limited to 500 MB/s). We didn’t like that there is no radiator for the M.2 right below the GPU. It would be tough to cool the drive placed there. The ASRock X670E Steel Legend is a very solid (mainly due to the VRM) option, but nothing would stand out; it’s a typical mid-tier product. It’s a bit expensive (due to the used chipset), but we could find it for 299 USD, still - for the X670E motherboard, it's a relatively attractive price. Still, you shouldn’t be disappointed with the performance and the provided features; that’s why we’re granting an “Approved” award for this motherboard.