Thursday, October 8th 2020

ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero Motherboard Pictured

AMD is expected to announce its 5th Gen Ryzen Socket AM4 processors based on the "Zen 3" microarchitecture later today, and it's rumored that these chips will not be accompanied by a new chipset. Motherboard vendors aren't missing the opportunity to refresh their product-stacks with new boards based on existing AMD X570 and B550 chipsets. ASUS has a new premium Socket AM4 product in the works, the ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero. We know this board is based on the X570 from its unchanged generation number "VIII," for this chipset.

From what we can tell, the ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero is based on an identical PCB design to the original Crosshair VIII Hero/WiFi. The changes appear to be cosmetic, with all of the board's heatsink design and color schemes aligning with the company's latest ROG generation (eg: the Maximus XII Hero). Another interesting spot by our readers is that the board lacks a chipset fan, and makes do with passive cooling for the X570. Dark, diagonal ridges replace the smooth brushed metal with chrome-like accents of the original. It remains to be seen if the new wave of AM4 motherboards come with out-of-the-box support for Ryzen 5000 series, since the data-sheet for the Dark Hero only mentions 2nd- and 3rd-Gen Ryzen chips. In any case, the board supports USB BIOS Flashback, and all AMD 500-series chipset motherboards are expected to receive Ryzen 5000 support through BIOS updates.
ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero
Update 12:32 UTC: ASUS mentions the two key areas of development for the Dark Hero are a completely fanless chipset cooling solution, and the use of 90 A DrMOS in the CPU VRM (compared to 60 A on the original).
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24 Comments on ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero Motherboard Pictured

#2
aktpu
Well, it's passively cooled X570, so that's nice. Now do the same to the ITX board
Posted on Reply
#5
Ja.KooLit
oh... i wonder where I can get that passive pch fan to replace my crosshair viii hero pch noisy fan
Posted on Reply
#6
FlanK3r
It is not only this difference, also VRM is tronger, Dark use 90A powermosfets (classic Hero "only" 60A). Dark is also more optinmized for higher DRAM cloks with Zen3 ,-)
Posted on Reply
#8
btarunr
Editor & Senior Moderator
TheLostSwedeProduct page is up.
www.asus.com/Motherboards/ROG-Crosshair-VIII-Dark-Hero/
Thanks, so what's new are:
  • Fanless chipset heatsink (rare for X570)
  • 90A DrMOS on the CPU VRM instead of 60A on the original Hero (overkill, but should run cooler)
  • Updated styling in line with the Maximus XII series
Posted on Reply
#10
fynxer
The passive cooling is massive, wonder how it effects the motherboard when it gets hot and covers so much real estate of the motherboard.
Posted on Reply
#11
TheLostSwede
News Editor
fynxerThe passive cooling is massive, wonder how it effects the motherboard when it gets hot and covers so much real estate of the motherboard.
I guess you're not aware of the reason for the fan? It was added in case people run RAID with two PCIe 4.0 NVMe drives, as it apparently heats up a lot then.
This board doesn't allow for two NVMe drives via the chipsets...
Posted on Reply
#12
FlanK3r
I like the RAM frequency, yeah, yeah....:rockout:;) U will be shocked a little with Zen3 IMC
Posted on Reply
#13
Nater
Awesome, just what we need, mainboards that are even MORE expensive. I just don't see how these boards are worth the $$. (buys it anyways)
Posted on Reply
#14
Mayclore
Why is ASUS still Pawn Stars-ing this price bracket and saying "Best I can do is two M.2 slots"?
Posted on Reply
#15
Calmmo
Batman edition, fanless is also a plus i guess.
Posted on Reply
#16
TheLostSwede
News Editor
MaycloreWhy is ASUS still Pawn Stars-ing this price bracket and saying "Best I can do is two M.2 slots"?
Because this is a mid-tier model? Also, see my comment above.
Posted on Reply
#17
everydae
Still no thunderbolt header it looks like. Asus, you are leaving me no choice but go with Gigabyte...
Posted on Reply
#18
Tomgang
So same chipsæt, but at least chopset fan free. That is nice. No little fan whinning. So it dosent look like there will be much news on the motherboard side then. All throw the 90A DrMOS concerns me.
Not by the motherboard it self. But this combined with the rumors of 5900X will have 150 watt TDP stock. Tells me Zen 3 might be a fast, but also a power hungry CPU desing. I hope i am wrong on that part.
Posted on Reply
#19
Jism
NaterAwesome, just what we need, mainboards that are even MORE expensive. I just don't see how these boards are worth the $$. (buys it anyways)
The more expensive ones actually have a better overall featureset, just depends on your wishes. I bought a 250 euro board and i regret it. I'd wish i went for the more premium one with proper BIOS support and all that.
Posted on Reply
#20
Nater
JismThe more expensive ones actually have a better overall featureset, just depends on your wishes. I bought a 250 euro board and i regret it. I'd wish i went for the more premium one with proper BIOS support and all that.
Yeah I got a Strix B450-F Gaming and regretted it almost instantly. Realized during my build it didn't have the front panel USB-C connector. (first build since Core 2 Q6600, i was rusty) The mainboard choices today are absolutely insane. I kind of wish they'd shave down the product stacks, it's hard enough figuring out what's different between boards of ONE brand, and then when you start comparing brands vs each other...forget about it.
Posted on Reply
#22
MxPhenom 216
ASIC Engineer
Are the chipset fans for these X570 boards that bad? Keep seeing people complain about them
Posted on Reply
#23
Caring1
MxPhenom 216Are the chipset fans for these X570 boards that bad? Keep seeing people complain about them
Those people would probably complain about a pea under their mattress. ;)
Posted on Reply
#24
Megatron
@FlanK3r There is the small difference of being able to overclock the single core speed below a certain amp draw and then seemlessly change the overclock to multithreaded clocks i.e. whatever you set for ccx1/ccx2 manually (or default):
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