ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII Hero (WiFi)

[Black Haru]

Another high-end X570 board, this time from ASUS! The ASUS ROG Crosshair VIII HERO (WiFi) boasts a massive VRM and loads of overclocking aids. In such a competitive price bracket, this X570 board will have to bring something special to the table, so can it deliver?

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[ryun]

Seems like a good board, but I'm honestly waiting to see if more fanless x570 ones come out before buying.

 

[Joss]

waiting to see if more fanless x570 ones come out

This.

 

[Turmania]

Don't expect fanless boards apart from one that gigabyte made and that costs twice as this. Hopefully AMD will get it right with their next Gen cpu boards next year.but for this year there is only one option.

 

[Dammeron]

Seems like a good board, but I'm honestly waiting to see if more fanless x570 ones come out before buying.

Yeah. I wonder why hig-end boards still rely on a little whiny fan, instead of having a bigger radiator. We're talking 25W here - it's not THAT much to cool.

 

[Nkd]

I still don't understand why you keep using ddr4 2400 mhz. I mean are you kidding me? 90ns memory? lol. So you think someone is going to grab a board for 400 and throw in ddr4 2400 mhz? Atleast test the thing with minimum official support. I am running 3733mhz and I have 64-65ns in AIDA64 and way better results then you in this review. I am not sure if TPU is doing this to put x570 in bad shape on purpose, lol.

 

[bug]

Yeah. I wonder why high-end boards still rely on a little whiny fan, instead of having a bigger radiator. We're talking 25W here - it's not THAT much to cool.

I doubt even a bigger radiator is needed, AMD could simply make these using a smaller node. I think currently they're made on 32nm.

I still don't understand why you keep using ddr4 2400 mhz. I mean are you kidding me? 90ns memory? lol. So you think someone is going to grab a board for 400 and throw in ddr4 2400 mhz? Atleast test the thing with minimum official support. I am running 3733mhz and I have 64-65ns in AIDA64 and way better results then you in this review. I am not sure if TPU is doing this to put x570 in bad shape on purpose, lol.

I think you do understand, reference systems are reference systems. Not easily changed.

 

[Nkd]

I doubt even a bigger radiator is needed, AMD could simply make these using a smaller node. I think currently they're made on 32nm.


I think you do understand, reference systems are reference systems. Not easily changed.

Lets use real world. Ain't no one buying this board and putting in 2400mhz memory period! There is nothing reference about this board. 3200 is officially supported by AMD so thats reference to me on zen2. We can't use reference as an excuse, may need to update the memory modules once in a while lol.

 

[bug]

Lets use real world. Ain't no one buying this board and putting in 2400mhz memory period! There is nothing reference about this board. 3200 is officially supported by AMD so thats reference to me on zen2. We can't use reference as an excuse, may need to update the memory modules once in a while lol.

I'm sure Nate will be happy to do it once you volunteer to re-run all the previous tests for him.

 

[phill]

Another board for my Hero collection Just need this one and the 7 at the moment...

Don't care about the fan on the board, I'd very much doubt we'd hear that over the top of the rest of the fans in the system lol

 

[bug]

Another board for my Hero collection Just need this one and the 7 at the moment...

Don't care about the fan on the board, I'd very much doubt we'd hear that over the top of the rest of the fans in the system lol

I'm pretty sure the fans are inaudible out of the box, otherwise reviewers will slam these hard. The problem, however, is how it behaves a year or two down the line. Because it's a mechanical moving part and prone to collecting some dust.

 

[Vlada011]

I would rather EVGA X299 Dark with Intel i9-10920X. ...Than any AMD.
Actually Intel always had competitive processors in Skylake-X and for some time in Cascade Lake-X.
Only prices are abnormal. X299 owners special with first models i7-7820X now have chance to become competitive with AMD for 650$ on same motherboard and RAM.
Not bad. Special because AM4 socket look anemic compare to X299 and TR4.

 

[phill]

I'm pretty sure the fans are inaudible out of the box, otherwise reviewers will slam these hard. The problem, however, is how it behaves a year or two down the line. Because it's a mechanical moving part and prone to collecting some dust.

If they do fail just replace and move on. Had to do something similar with a Z77 OCF board, fan on the VRM died and just replaced with another... Failing that, could always just put a 120mm over the top of it and go from there.... lol

 

[erek]

what's the deal with Far Cry 5 though? surprised to see such a big difference between motherboards?

 

[bug]

If they do fail just replace and move on. Had to do something similar with a Z77 OCF board, fan on the VRM died and just replaced with another... Failing that, could always just put a 120mm over the top of it and go from there.... lol

You shouldn't have to do that after forking out $350+ for a motherboard.

 

[Oberon]

I doubt even a bigger radiator is needed, AMD could simply make these using a smaller node. I think currently they're made on 32nm.

The X570 chipset is just the IOD from the CPU, so it's made on 12 nm.

You shouldn't have to do that after forking out $350+ for a motherboard.

You don't have to do it anyhow. They're perfectly capable of operating with very small passive cooling as demonstrated by der8auer. The fans are probably a reliability precaution given the propensity of people to build systems in cases with almost no airflow.

 

[phill]

You shouldn't have to do that after forking out $350+ for a motherboard.

Indeed, but there's always a water block option I'm sure

 

[kapone32]

The one thing I don't like about X570 boards is how they treat PCI_E. If you plug in a GPU @ x16 you lose all of the rest of the lanes.

 

[Oberon]

The one thing I don't like about X570 boards is how they treat PCI_E. If you plug in a GPU @ x16 you lose all of the rest of the lanes.

That's simply not true. The CPU provides 16 lanes of PCIe 4.0 for PCIe slots, 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes for one M.2 slot, and 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes for the chipset, which then provides its own PCIe lanes for additional M.2 and PCIe slots on the motherboard. Perhaps some motherboard makers have provisioned the 16 lanes from the CPU in a way that means some connections are disabled with a GPU installed, but it definitely not a limitation of the platform.

 

[kapone32]

That's simply not true. The CPU provides 16 lanes of PCIe 4.0 for PCIe slots, 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes for one M.2 slot, and 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes for the chipset, which then provides its own PCIe lanes for additional M.2 and PCIe slots on the motherboard. Perhaps some motherboard makers have provisioned the 16 lanes from the CPU in a way that means some connections are disabled with a GPU installed, but it definitely not a limitation of the platform.

This is taken directly from the specs. I know that they do provide 3 M2 slots from the chipset. I am also aware that you can put 1 M2 drive on the top slot to communicate directly with the CPU. My thing is what is the point of having those x16 slots if they will be disabled if you run 1 GPU @ x16. I know that you could get around that by running at x8 but them you would still lose 1 slot. That makes (for me) the X570 boards no different than the B450 boards in terms of lane availability (Yes i Know PCI_E 3.0 x4.0). For me it is a problem if you want to add expansion cards or even a capture card.

3x PCIe 4.0 x16 slots (x16/x0/x0 or x8/x8/x0 or x8/x4/x4)
3x PCIe 4.0 x1 slots

 

[Oberon]

*actually going back and reading your post* The worry of running a GPU at 8x is a non-issue. There is absolutely no performance to be had running x16 vs x8. Even a 2080 Ti running x8 loses a maximum of 3% performance, and that's because it's relegated to PCIe 3.0.

 

[Axaion]

I'm sure Nate will be happy to do it once you volunteer to re-run all the previous tests for him.

Seems a bit of a cop-out, basicly saying because something takes time to re-do or update, you should NEVER re-do or update anything, because it takes time.

Does he not get paid to do the reviews?, if not? - alright, fine.

 

[kapone32]

So the X570 boards do indeed come with PCI_E lane splitting?

 

[Aldain]

RGB NOT BEING AS BRIGHT AS YOU WANT IT IS A NEGATIVE???

Dear Gaben wizzard what in the actual fuck??

 

[kapone32]

*actually going back and reading your post* The worry of running a GPU at 8x is a non-issue. There is absolutely no performance to be had running x16 vs x8. Even a 2080 Ti running x8 loses a maximum of 3% performance, and that's because it's relegated to PCIe 3.0.

I am well aware of that but again I must come back (my opinion) why install x16 slots on the board if only 1 can run at that speed. Especially at the price point for some of these boards, it would seem ridiculous to me that you have slots that you can't be fully used, that is why I never got into B450 boards.