Gigabyte has announced the X870 AORUS Elite WIFI7 motherboard – the second one based on the new AMD chipset after the previously presented X870E AORUS Master. The new product is designed for the latest Ryzen 9000 processors, but is also suitable for previous generation models with Socket AM5.
Image source: gigabyte.com
The new model is based on the more affordable AMD X870 chipset (without the “E”), which offers a set of interfaces almost identical to the AMD B650E, but now with USB4. The new product is made in the ATX form factor on a 6-layer printed circuit board. Power is provided by a 24-pin ATX connector and two 8-pin EPS connectors. The power subsystem is made in a 16+2+2-phase configuration, and vCore has an 8-phase design with phase doubling. The processor socket is connected to four DDR5 slots supporting up to 256 GB of memory.
Expansion slots include PCI-Express 5.0 x16, PCI-Express 4.0 x16 and PCI-Express 3.0 x16, with the former equipped with a lever for quick removal of the video card. For storage, there are three M.2 5.0 x4 slots, two of which are connected to dedicated NVMe 5.0 x4 lanes, and the third borrows 8 lanes from PCIe 5.0 x16; there is also a fourth M.2, which is PCIe 4.0 x4 and connected to the X870 FCH – the entire quartet is equipped with radiators. Four 6 Gb/s SATA ports are also provided for drives.
The range of network interfaces, as you might guess from the name, includes a Wi-Fi 7 card, which, depending on the version of the board, can be MediaTek MT7925 or Realtek RTL8922AE, and in both cases supports Bluetooth 5.4. The wired network interface is represented by a 2.5-gigabit Ethernet port on the Realtek controller. The USB set includes two USB4 40 Gbps ports with DisplayPort, two USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 20 Gbps, two USB 3.2 Gen 2 type-A 10 Gbps, as well as four main and two additional USB 3.2 Gen ports 1 at 5 Gbit/s.
The built-in sound card is based on the Realtek ALC1220 codec with SNR 120 dB, ground layer insulation and high-quality capacitors; Gigabyte has also provided support for high impedance headphones. There is a wide range of elements that will be useful for self-assembly: POST code indicator, LEDs indicating the point of failure, SMD power and reset buttons, USB BIOS Flashback, PCIe x16 card ejection mechanism, the ability to quickly connect a Wi-Fi antenna module and SSD M. 2 without tools, as well as three addressable RGB 2.0 headers. The cost of the Gigabyte X870 AORUS Elite WIFI7 motherboard has not yet been specified.