There was a time when Gigabyte flooded the market with quite a few boards all primarily based on the identical chipset and have set, with solely minor, almost indiscernible variations. They might tweak a community controller right here or take away a SATA controller there. For sure, few of us welcomed this strategy, because it difficult the decision-making course of when selecting their motherboards.
I had thought these days had been behind us, however Gigabyte is as soon as once more following an analogous sample with the Gaming X AX, which, for all sensible functions to the tip consumer, is indistinguishable from the Z790 Aorus Elite AX.
Because the title suggests, the 790 Gaming X AX is constructed across the Z790 chipset, providing help for PCIe 5.0 and DDR5 reminiscence. It’s designed across the LGA 1700 socket and is appropriate with Intel twelfth, Intel thirteenth, and next-gen CPUs. Value noting is that the board doesn’t have a Gen5 M.2 socket; as a substitute, Gigabyte has opted to help as much as 4 Gen4 M.2 sockets. This determination aligns with the board’s worth level and meant consumer base. Gen 5 SSDs are nonetheless comparatively scarce, expensive, and never usually what a purchaser of such a motherboard owns.
Setting apart PCIe storage help, the Gaming X AX affords a normal set of options, all counting on native chipset capabilities. This isn’t a serious situation as a result of the Z790 platform comes geared up with ample connectivity choices, making the necessity for extra third-party controller chips pointless, if not redundant.
Nonetheless, there’s one space the place Gigabyte might have invested extra, and that’s within the audio division.
Gigabyte doesn’t specify the audio controller on the motherboard, however it’s a low-end Realtek codec, the ALC897, to be exact. Whereas the selection of audio codec is a poor manner of assessing audio capabilities, it does increase questions concerning the surrounding elements which are doubtless chosen to match this controller. To that finish, Gigabyte helps this Codec with high-end audio capacitors and PCB shielding to minimise electrical noise. All issues we’ve seen earlier than are consistent with the price-sensitive purchaser the board is hoping to entice. Because the meant viewers is probably going to make use of a USB headset, the audio element might not be of serious concern. As for audiophiles, they’d most likely go for the SPDIF output and course of audio by way of a extra succesful system.
Visually, latest Gigabyte boards have adopted a extra interesting design. The times of utilizing Aorus orange on heatsinks and different board parts are gone, changed with a lovely mixture of metallic greys and white accents in opposition to a darkish PCB. This graphic design, together with the hefty heatsinks, contributes to the board’s general engaging look.
For these in search of RGB lighting, you could be disenchanted as there’s none. As a substitute, the Gaming AX gives 4 RGB/ARGB headers to accommodate your lighting wants. The one lighting on the motherboard is a four-light POST cluster, every LED comparable to CPU, DRAM, VGA, and BOOT success.
Transferring on to the rear IO, the Gigabyte Z790 Gaming X AX takes a comparatively conservative strategy. It boasts ten USB ports, with two being 10Gbps, three at 5Gbps, 4 USB 2.0 ports, and only one Sort-C 20Gbps port. It is a missed alternative, contemplating that the chipset natively helps ten USB 3.2 10Gbps ports, along with ten 5Gbps ports from the PCH. The remainder of the rear IO follows Gigabyte’s typical format, that includes two stereo mini-jack outputs and two SMA connectors for the WIFI and Bluetooth dongle.
Talking additional to WIFI, the Gaming X AX is available in three revisions, 1.0, 1.1, and 1.2, with the first distinction being the WIFI controller used. Model 1.0 employs the Intel AX210 controller, 1.1 makes use of the Intel AX211, and 1.2 opts for the Realtek 8852 possibility. It’s unsure which model you’ll obtain at retail, which isn’t supreme as some customers could have points with a specific community controller and thus must know precisely what controller they’ll get after they buy the board.
Setting all that apart, let’s delve into efficiency. The Gigabyte board utilises a 6-layer PCB. Typical of entry-level boards from all producers. This issues as a result of 6-layer boards usually scale back high-speed DRAM help, particularly when in comparison with 8- and 10-layer PCB choices. Surprisingly although, the Gaming X AX nonetheless manages to help DRAM kits rated as much as DDR5 7600. Noteworthy since Gigabyte’s opponents typically help kits as much as DDR5 7200 solely.
As a lot as lovers recognize this, the reality is most customers are likely to go for reminiscence within the DDR5 5600 to DDR5 6400 vary, that means this high-speed DRAM help will stay untapped.
As if in recognition of this, Gigabyte has included customized DRAM profiles within the BIOS starting from DDR5 5200 all the way in which to DDR5 6400. Within the superior menu, customers can determine the DRAM IC used on their reminiscence and choose the corresponding DRAM profile. It’s a easy addition to the BIOS, however one which’s appreciated because it makes it simple to extract extra efficiency from the reminiscence with out the necessity for DRAM tuning information. That mentioned, it’s essential to notice that utilizing these BIOS profiles will override the utilized DRAM XMP settings.
The very last thing to say regarding efficiency has to do with CPU voltage settings. Nothing notably uncommon for Gigabyte, however the load line choices, even in any case these years, are nonetheless perplexing. Gigabyte insists on making customers select between synonymous choices comparable to “customary,” “regular,” and “medium”. It’s unclear why they don’t use ranges from 1 to eight like different motherboard distributors. As a common advice, nevertheless, it’s advisable to go away this setting on “Auto” or “Turbo.” Different settings both provide extreme CPU voltage or inadequate voltage below load. This quirk usually doesn’t impression efficiency, however in additional superior overclocking situations, it will possibly complicate issues.
The better problem for the Gaming X AX is that it lacks voltage offsets for the E-core clusters. Whereas this may not concern most customers, it’s noteworthy in that, just like the P-cores, the usual voltage equipped below load is increased than crucial. This results in elevated warmth output and energy consumption, which in flip prevents the CPU from sustaining its highest clock frequency, or, if it does, it’s for transient durations.
On the Core i9-13900K used for testing, for instance, every E-core cluster’s voltage can usually be diminished by as much as 65mV. Contemplating there are 4 such clusters throughout the CPU, the discount in thermal output by the E-cores (A rise in general CPU thermal headroom) permits the P-cores to maintain their 5.5GHz operation. Sadly, Gigabyte’s board lacks this potential to scale back E-core cluster voltage, that means the CPU could not attain its peak efficiency ranges as it will on motherboards with this feature. Nonetheless, for many functions, notably gaming and on a regular basis use, this efficiency discrepancy is minimal because it primarily manifests in artificial benchmarks.
In abstract, the Gigabyte Z790 Gaming X AX is a succesful motherboard. Its most vital benefit lies in its potential to ship a well-rounded set of options at a extremely aggressive worth level. It even manages to supply just a few extras to sweeten the deal. On the present worth of R5,400, it’s troublesome to not advocate this board to patrons in search of a budget-friendly possibility.
