ASUS ROG STRIX X299-E Gaming review - A motherboard tested

ASUS ROG STRIX X299-E Gaming review

We review the €349,- enthusiast class X299-E Gaming motherboard, yes the ASUS ROG STRIX. A nice looking motherboard in dark theme offering nice features, design and of course performance. This X299 motherboard can house Kaby-Lake-X and Skylake-X processors.

This motherboard is intended for Intel Skylake-X processors that will be released this summer based on Socket LGA2066, however, the motherboard also supports Kaby Lake-X procs in the form of the quad-core Core i7 7740K and Core i5 7640K. We got our grubby little paws on a 10-core Skylake-X processor, as such welcome to this full review (but not thanks to Intel). Intel’s primary processor business has been releasing and refreshing quad-core processors for years now with an E type (e.g. Broadwell-E / Haswell-E) processor release every now and then. They had no rush and have been competitive and relaxed all the way for years now. Intel did anticipate Zen or Ryzen, but the AMD consumer-aimed Threadripper 16-core and Naples server segment 32-core made Intel step up its game a notch. Initially it was expected that Intel would announce a new 10 and maybe 12-core processor based on Skylake-X architecture. With everything that has been going on, there now have been a number of announcements going from top to bottom with an unexpected quad-core Kaby Lake-X release as well as announcements that entails Intel will release 18-core processors. The Skylake-X processors up-to 10 cores are going to be released initially. You will not see any availability for the 18, 16 and 14-core parts anytime sooner than October/November 2017. Skylake-X will release up-to 10-cores only. It is rumored that in August we’ll see the 12-core part - but consider that intel isn't talking with EU press anymore, who really knows right?

ASUS will be offering Intel X299 based boards in three motherboard series; Prime, TUF, and ROG. All aesthetically pleasing, all have RGB LEDs that can be combined with ASUS Aura Sync and all get proper solid audio with a SupremeFX integrated audio based on a Realtek S1220A codec. ASUS offers a standard sized ATX board with the ASUS ROG STRIX X299-E Gaming, it can support three-way graphics configurations from NVIDIA or AMD with the PCIe slots having SafeSlot technology (reinforced slots die to say heavy graphics cards). There are no SATA Express slots and neither will you find a U.2 port for enterprise-grade SSDs (not that ANY consumer is using these anyway. ASUS will offer storage including dual M.2 PCIe slots. The main slot is hidden under the chipset heatsink, which ASUS says reduces drive temperatures. A secondary one mounts drives vertically near the DIMM slots. ASUS includes AC WIFI as the STRIX has an integrated 802.11ac Wi-Fi module.