Blog

While we are celebrating the release of the Ryzen 3rd Gen CPUs and the new Radeon RX graphics cards today, we are equally happy about the release of the new X570 motherboards! ASUS brought us their most recent TUF motherboard, and it is surely well-equipped.

It’s still a high-end motherboard; after all, all X570s are fairly fancy right now. While it isn’t as “extreme” as the flagship boards, it nevertheless checks all the boxes for high-end PC gaming and beyond. It will support the flagship Ryzen 9 CPUs and will have significant overclocking capabilities owing to its 12+2 VRM, 6-layer PCB, and TUF components.

TUF (The Ultimate Force) motherboards from ASUS first appeared over ten years ago with the introduction of the Sabertooth 55i; since then, this range has grown enormously alongside ROG as a high quality, highly durable brand for those seeking top-level performance without the aesthetics that are often found on ROG themed solutions.

The ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard builds on this with a fully-featured motherboard based on the versatile AMD X570 chipset, while preserving certain ROG platform classics like Aura Sync, BIOS flashback, and Turbo LAN. Let us now move on to the board specs.

ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard Appearance & Layout

The ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard has a matte black PCB with the TUF Gaming series logo printed on the back panel cover. In line with the understated color scheme, the VRM and chipset heat sinks are all black. The ATX form size of the board provides more than enough surface space to house the integrated components while also making the board compatible with the majority of available gamer-friendly enclosures.

The board’s back is completely devoid of sensitive components, with only a few microscopic chips dotting the surface. The mounting space behind the socket is fully component free, with the exception of the region directly below the CPU socket.

ASUS designed the ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard with a 14-phase digital power system that can provide more than enough power to the CPU for whatever you throw at it. To guarantee better power delivery, ASUS uses a mix of Dr. TUF chokes, TUF capacitors in the 5k range, and MOS power stages. Dual huge dark chrome metal heat sinks cool the VRMs. Two 4-pin fan headers and a trusted module port header are located to the top left of the CPU socket.

The 8-pin and 4-pin ATX12V power connections are positioned on the board’s upper right side, between the VRM heat sinks and the back panel cover.

ASUS built the board with two M.2 slots, one between the CPU socket and the primary PCI x16 slot (M.2 1) and one on the lower left side of the secondary PCIe x16 slot (M.2 2). ASUS elected to provide an M.2 port cover exclusively for the M.2 2 slot.

The cover stretches the whole length of the slot and is secured with thermal tape along the inner surface. Previous studies revealed that such plates reduced M.2 card heat by more than 10 degrees Celsius when utilized in a strictly passive arrangement, with best cooling achievable when used in combination with active air-flow over the port plate.

The board features four DIMM slots with Dual Channel memory mode enabled, with modules inserted into slots 1 / 3 or 2 / 4. Memory rates exceeding 3200MHz are considered overclocked and fall outside the AMD Ryzen 3 series standard memory speed requirements.

A USB 3.0 header, the 24-pin ATX power connection, and a 5V addressable RGB LED header are located just beneath the memory port block. The primary and secondary 4-pin CPU fan connectors, as well as a 12V RGB LED header, are located to the top right of the DIMM slots.

A low-profile aluminum heat sink actively cools the AMD X570 chipset. The fan connects to a power header located behind the chipset sink. Aside from the two PCIe x4 M.2 slots, the board has eight SATA III ports, four in the port block directly beneath the processor and four on the board’s surface to the left of the chipset. All SATA ports can be used with a drive placed in either M.2 port.

The board has four PCIe slots in total, two PCIe 4.0 x16 slots and two PCIe 4.0 x1 slots. Depending on the CPU, the PCIe x16 slots can be used in x16 or x4 mode. It’s worth noting that ASUS engineered the primary PCIe x16 slot to accommodate a triple-slotted video card without interfering with the secondary PCIe x16 slot.

In addition, the primary slot has been strengthened with steel to minimize damage when utilizing video cards with bigger coolers in a vertical mount posture.

The integrated audio components on the board are situated right above the PCIe ports. To reduce line noise and distortion produced by other integrated components, the audio subsystem is housed on an isolated PCB. ASUS developed the audio system around the Realtek S1200A CODEC and excellent Japanese-sourced Audio capacitors to provide maximum audio performance.

ASUS built in support for attaching RGB LED strips directly to the board through the RGB LED headers situated in the board’s lower left and lower right quadrants (near the DIMM slots). The board has 4-pin 12V RGB and 3-pin 5V addressable RGB LED headers.

Connecting an RGB LED strip to the header synchronizes the LED strip’s color and activity with the inbuilt LEDs on the motherboard. An external RGB strip is attached to one of the headers in the board’s lower right quadrant.

The UEFI reset jumper, front panel, and surface mounted SATA ports are all placed on the lower left edge of the board, in addition to the 12V RGB LED header.

ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard Specifications

Model	TUF GAMING X570-PLUS
CPU	AMD AM4 Socket for AMD Ryzen™ 5000 Series/ 5000 G-Series/ 4000 G-Series/ 3000 Series/ 3000 G-Series/ 2000 Series/ 2000 G-Series Desktop Processorscores supported varies by processors.
Chipset	AMD X570
Memory	4 x DIMM, Max. 128GB, DDR4 5100(O.C)/5000(O.C)/4800(O.C.)/4600(O.C)/4400(O.C)/4266(O.C.)/4133(O.C.)/4000(O.C.)/3866(O.C.)/3733(O.C.)/3600(O.C.)/3466(O.C.)/3400(O.C.)/3200(O.C.)/3000(O.C.)/2933/2800/2666/2400/2133 MHz Un-buffered MemoryDual Channel Memory ArchitectureECC Memory (ECC mode) support varies by CPU.
Graphic	Integrated Graphics in AMD Ryzen™ 5000 G-Series/ 4000 G-Series/ 3000 G-Series/ 2000 G-Series Desktop ProcessorsMulti-VGA output support : HDMI/DisplayPort   ports- Supports HDMI 1.4b with max. resolution 4096  x 2160  @ 24  Hz- Supports DisplayPort with max. resolution 4096  x 2160  @ 60  Hz

ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard Conclusion

Aside from that, the ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard is a great motherboard. Even though we put a Corvette engine in a Prius, thermal and power management on the board remained steady throughout our tests! The platform stood up well to anything we threw at it.

Finally, this is what we propose with the ASUS AM4 TUF Gaming X570-Plus Motherboard:

If you want to get onto the X570 platform with all of the functionality afforded by the Ryzen 3000’s Zen 2 architecture, but without the added flair, it is a decent alternative for entry-level system builders. The BIOS provides both basic and advanced mode protections to assist users as they learn to adjust their system.