ASUS at the 2024 International CES expanded the lineup of BTF apparently cable-free hardware to its premium ROG product line. The company had debuted BTF with its mid-range TUF Gaming product line, which we've extensively covered here. While the TUF Gaming BTF built showcased an all-white scheme, the ROG BTF line makes no such deviations from its main scheme. First up, we have the ROG Maximus Z790 Hero BTF motherboard, a variant of the Z790 Hero with its connectors and headers facing the reverse side of the PCB; and a power slot for BTF graphics cards.

Next up, we have the BTF-ready variant of the ROG Hyperion GR701 case. A compatible case is needed for BTF to work, because the motherboard tray needs to have cutouts in the right places for the ports and connectors of the motherboard to stick out. There's a little extra crawlspace behind the motherboard tray in the ROG Hyperion GR701, so some of the higher gauge power cables can make tight bends. The crown jewel of the ASUS ROG BTF series has to be the graphics card. ASUS has done the unthinkable—to get a GeForce RTX 4090 to run off its BTF power connector. It's a remarkable feat considering that the RTX 4090 is a 425 W TGP graphics card, and the overclocked ROG Strix version only draws more power than the average RTX 4090.The ROG Maximus Z790 Hero BTF comes with a proper 12VHPWR connector behind the board (good luck bending a cable to that one). Apparently, this is capable of delivering the 600 W to the BTF power slot on the graphics card. With the card installed, the biggest bit of ugliness with high end RTX 40-series graphics cards—the power cable that can't be made to bend too tightly—is solved. As a reminder, "BTF" isn't an industry standard, it's an ASUS-exclusive set of cable-free hardware. BTF is an acroym for "back to the future!" (we're not making that one up).