Asus TUF Gaming X870 Plus WiFi: USB4 for reasonable money

Motherboards with AMD X870 chipsets are already in stores. Unlike the older models designed for the AM5 platform, also compatible with Ryzen 9000 processors, X870 motherboards must support the USB4 interface, and there are more minor changes. We start our analysis of motherboards with the new AMD chipsets with the Asus model – the TUF Gaming X870 Plus WiFi. The mid-range also has a strong VRM.

Conclusion

Even in the relatively lower-end TUF series, Asus has a very well prepared motherboard for even the most powerful Ryzen 9 processors. Even at a power consumption above 200 W, the highest temperatures on the VRM end up at 72.4 °C in our test environment. And that’s without the heatsinks, which we remove from the boards for the purpose of creating temperature maps. In other words, at this level (VRM) there is headroom for overclocking even the most powerful Ryzen 9s or for operation in less favorable conditions due to the higher air temperature of the working environment. Whether because of extremely quiet system cooling or, in short, for typical summer temperatures (of air) without air conditioning.

However, most users won’t bump into the limits of VRM overheating, and the power efficiency is also quite decent. The compute or gaming performance per unit of power consumption is above average with respect to this platform. It should be remembered that we are still talking about a motherboard priced at 335 EUR. It is not an outright low price, but it is not that high either. Especially when you consider that USB4 connectors or the elegant PCIe ×16 slot release mechanism are already included. The TUF B660 Plus WiFi (D4) is simpler in every way, but admittedly also cheaper. You’ll pay more for a TUF board on the AM5 platform. But that’s also for the support of super-fast DDR5 memory, up to 8000 MT/s for supported memory kits. The TUF Gaming X870 Plus WiFi has PCIe 5.0 support for SSDs in addition to graphics cards.

Relatively weaker, average to below average, are the SSD coolers. M.2 SSD slots perform at high, expected speeds similarly to all the USB ports or the Ethernet connection.

Memory latency is indeed a bit lower with the new BIOS (v0801) than on the Gigabyte B650E Aorus Pro X USB4, but we didn’t come across any performance test where we could talk about any remarkable increase in speed. The results of all speed tests that are shaped by the CPU or graphics card are otherwise fine on the TUF Gaming X870 Plus WiFi board, without any anomalies.

Overall, after taking into account the features, we can recommend the Asus TUF Gaming X870 motherboard with a clear conscience even for builds with more powerful Ryzen 9-class processors. Unless you miss some more substantial ARGB LED lighting (here it is represented only symbolically, in the lower right quadrant) or you are looking for something unusual in the features, this will be a good choice. Also commendable is the work on the fan management interface, where the GUI has finally been improved.

Upozornenie: For Czech and Slovak customers, there is a considerable cashback of 30 EUR /695 CZK. This can be redeemed after registration of the motherboard. A similar service with some cashback should be available in some form in other markets, but we don’t have a comprehensive overview.

English translation and edit by Jozef Dudáš

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Some of the tested boards are also available in the Datacomp e-shop

Special thanks to Blackmagic Design (for licenses for DeNoise AI, Gigapixel AI and Sharpen AI) and Topaz Labs (for licenses for DeNoise AI, Gigapixel AI and Sharpen AI)