The Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX is a well built, practical board with great features, including 2.5 Gb/s LAN, a top-shelf VRM, and an integrated I/O shield. When it comes to looks, the Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX may not turn heads like some more flashy designs, but the neutral gray and black theme of the B550 AORUS Pro has an appeal of its own that easily fits almost any build.

Out of the box performance was great for the Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX. Memory overclocking was not quite at the same level of the other B550 boards I have tested so far, but isn't far off. I was able to achieve 4000 MHz CL16 stable with my Trident Z Neo kit. Tightening the memory timings was not successful, with the Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX unable to boot into Windows at 3600 MHz CL14. For CPU overclocking, I was able to achieve 4.4 GHz on all cores, which matches the other B550 boards I have tested. VRM thermals were excellent as well, staying under 65 °C even during my VRM torture testing.

The Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX has a lot going for it. As with the other B550 boards I have looked at, the final question is: Should you buy a high-end B550 motherboard or a low-end X570 motherboard. For not much more than the Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX, you can get some pretty decent entry-level X570 boards.

The Gigabyte Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX offers premium features, such as 2.5 Gb/s LAN, WiFi 6, top-tier VRMs, and even a metal backplate; all with almost no downside. Since Mini-ITX boards already are limited to one PCIe slot, you are not missing out on extra PCIe 4.0 GPU support. You do potentially lose PCIe 4.0 for one M.2 slot, but considering the competitive price and great feature set, that is an easy trade off.

The Gigabyte B550I AORUS Pro AX is a compelling choice for those looking for a capable Mini-ITX motherboard for their high-end Ryzen CPU that won't break the bank.