ASRock Z690 Steel Legend (Intel 1700)

Mit den Steel-Legend-Modellen gibt ASRock den Interessenten eine zumeist durchschnittlich ausgestattete Platine in die Hand, deren Hauptmerkmale die silbergefärbten Kühlkörper sind, die den Eindruck von Stahl erwecken sollen. Für Intels Alder-Lake-S-Prozessoren gibt entsprechend das Z690 Steel Legend (WiFi 6E), das wir von ASRock für den Test erhalten haben und es gegen die anderen Modelle haben antreten lassen.

If it's the greater value that you are after (or just have budgetary limitations) then the Z690 Steel Legend remains to be a more affordable motherboard at ~250 USD (but still is a lot of money). The usage of DDR4 is a benefit in overall value as well. We do recommend a DDR4 3600 CL 16 or 18 kits. This will help you shave off 75 USD of your build whilst the performance differential is close to NIL aside from a small differential here and there. A more value board does offer fewer features, but with a Dragon (Realtek based) 2.5 GigE ethernet jack, eight SATA3 ports, HDMI and DP, and three M2 slots, I think 95% of your needs are covered. The board still looks nice, has some RGB elements, and other than that is simply performing outstandingly well for a DDR4 board. The 13 phase 50A stage power delivery we do not see as a limiting factor either. Concerning the TDP values of the 16-core top model Core i9-12900K with its 241 watts, this is not surprising, especially when considering the overclocking capabilities of the processor itself. Two P8 power plugs have been provided to ensure that you do not run out of breath while working here. In our belief for lots of people, Alder Lake is what they've been waiting for, a completely new architecture with improved IPC and fabulous overall performance, so lots of people will make the step to upgrade as it also brings PCIe Gen 4.0 and 5.0 as well as DDR5 support and WIFI6E to the table. For 20 bucks more a WIFI6E enabled version is available also, which I would opt without hesitation. In the end, we feel that ASRock has a compelling offer with the Steel legend. It might not sit in that uber-high premium segment, but has the price that fits + you'll save on the bill of cost for not using DDR5. Definitely recommended.