X299 AORUS Gaming 7 Review
The Intel's X299 platform had little effect on the high end PC market. Consumers and we all were excited about the new platform, but after the VRM heating issue of X299 motherboards and announcement of the new AMD's show-stopping 16-core Threadripper CPUs now consumers have a lot to choose from.
Anyway today we are reviewing another X299 motherboard, this time is a Gigabyte product the AORUS X299 Gaming 7 motherboard with RGB Fusion, Digital LED, Triple M.2 with Thermal Guard, ESS SABRE 9018 DAC, Killer DoubleShotâ„¢ Pro, Front & rear USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C and more.
Now let's see what this AORUS board have for us.
Features
Supports Intel® Core™ X-series Processor Family
Quad Channel Non-ECC Unbuffered DDR4, 8 DIMMs, DDR4400+(OC)
Intel® Optane™ Memory Ready
Intel® VROC ready
ASMedia 3142 USB 3.1 Gen 2 with USB Type-Câ„¢ and Type-A
Front USB 3.1 Gen 2 Header
3-Way Graphics Support with Dual Armor and Ultra Durableâ„¢ Design
Server-Class Digital Power Design
121dB SNR AMP-UP Audio with ALC1220 & High-End ESS SABRE 9018 DAC with WIMA audio capacitor
Sound BlasterX 720°, the top-of-the-line audio engine solution for 4K gaming and entertainment
Killer DoubleShotâ„¢ Pro for the best gaming networking experience possible
Killer 2x2 802.11ac Wireless – AC 1535
Intel® GbE LAN Gaming Network
RGB FUSION with Multi-Zone Digital LED Light Show design, support digital LED & RGB LED strips
Swappable Overlay for Accent LED
Smart Fan 5 features Multiple Temperature Sensors and Hybrid Fan Headers with FAN STOP
Triple Ultra-Fast M.2 with PCIe Gen3 x4 interface and Thermal Guard
NVMe PCIe Gen3 x4 U.2 support by optional adaptor
USB DAC-UP 2 with Adjustable Voltage
Precise Digital USB Fuse Design for Stronger Protection
Anti-Sulfur Resistor Design
Ultra Durableâ„¢ 25KV ESD and 15KV Surge LAN Protection
Lightning-Fast Intel® Thunderbolt™ 3 AIC Support
GIGABYTE UEFI DualBIOSâ„¢ with Q-Flash Plus USB port
APP Center Including EasyTuneâ„¢ and Cloud Stationâ„¢ Utilities
Specifications
Package
Motherboard comes in a mate gray/orange colour finishing box with a big AORUS logo with motherboard model no. in front At the rear of the box, we find that Gigabyte goes into great detail on the specifications of the motherboard
Inside the box
Looks
Board is a solid build in the mate black colour theme.
Layout
Detailed layout of board.
1. New Intel LGA 2066 Socket Supports New Intel Core X-series Processor Family
2. 8 x DDR4 memory slots, support up to 128GB. Quad channel memory architecture
Overclock DDR4 memory frequencies up to 4400MHz.
3. ATX Power connector (24-pin EATXPWR)
4. 2 x ATX CPU Power Connector (8-pin + 8 Pin ATX12V).
5. Back I/O ports : PS/2 keyboard/mouse port, USB Type-Câ„¢ port, with USB 3.1 Gen 2 support, 4 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A ports (red), 4 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports, 2 x RJ-45 ports, 2 x MMCX antenna connectors (2T2R), optical S/PDIF Out connector, 5 x audio jacks (Center/Subwoofer Speaker Out, Rear Speaker Out, Line In, Line Out, Mic In))
6. Fan Connectors : 1 x CPU fan header, 1 x water cooling CPU fan header, 4 x system fan headers, 1 x system fan/water cooling pump header, 1 x 3 Amp fan/water cooling pump header
7. Debug Code display.
8. 9.Front 2 X USB 3.1 Gen1 connectors and USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C port.
10.8 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors.
11. Front Panel Connector
12. 2 x USB 2.0 Connectors
13. Power button, reset button, ECO button and OC button
14. Trusted Platform Module (TPM) header (2x6 pin, for the GC-TPM2.0_S module only)
15. 2 x RGB (RGBW) LED strip extension cable headers
16. Front panel audio connector
17. Expansion Slots : 2 x PCI Express x16 slots, running at x16 (PCIEX16_1, PCIEX16_2), 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x8 (PCIEX8), 2 x PCI Express x16 slots, running at x4 (PCIEX4_1, PCIEX4_2)
18. 19. M2_1 slot supports 2242/ 2260 /2280 storage devices, M2_2 slot supports 2242/ 2260 /2280/ 22110 storage devices. Intel® Optane™ Memory Ready
Removing Heat-sinks
Gigabyte used aluminum heatsink in this board with proper thermal pad installed. The chipset heatsink have backlit AORUS logo.
I/O cover is having a separate RGB LED PCB mounted..
AORUS X299 Gaming 7 Motherboard with bigger VRM heatsink connected via heatpipe increases surface area for better heat dissipation and a thick back plate with proper thermal pad, Two 8-pin power connector with a bank of bypass capacitors on 12v rail. Interesting VRM solution.
Component Layout
Let's now see what all components GIGABYTE have planned for this board.
1. 2. 8-phase digital power controlled via International Rectifier IR35201 PWM Controller IC and IR3556M (Integrated PowIRstage) is a synchronous buck gate driver co-packed with a control MOSFET and a synchronous MOSFET with integrated Schottky diode with output current capability of 60A DC each.
3. Two 2-Phase digital memory power supply section controlled via International Rectifier IR35204 PWM Controller IC and IR3553M MOSFET
4. These two are VCCSA and VCCIO VRM sections controlled via International Rectifier IR35204 PWM Controller IC and IR3553M MOSFET which only run with a KabyLakeX CPUs. SkylakeX cpu don't use these VRMs.
5. Realtek RTS5411 USB3.1 Gen1 Hub chip.
6. 11. ASMedia ASM3142 a USB3.1 Gen2 Controller.
7. Realtek RTS5423 a USB3.1 Gen2 Controller
8. 9. Intel and Killer GLan controllers
10. NXP Semiconductors CBTL08GP053 a USB Type-C High Performance Crossbar Switch ICs used for Type-C connector interface
12. 18. iTE 8295FN Microcontrollers used for RGB Fusion with Digital LEDs controlling .
14. Intel X299 Chipset
15. Two MX 25L12873F chip for dual UEFI BIOS.
16. 17. AORUS AMP-UP Audio is powered by a Realtek ALC 1220 120dB SNR HD Audio - The ALC1220 is a high-performance multi-channel High Definition Audio Codec with up to 120dB SNR for crystal clear audio along with premium quality Nichicon fine Gold audio capacitors.
Rear Audio port have its own ESS SABRA HiFi DAV with WIMA audiophile grade capacitors and a Dual High Performance, High Fidelity Audio Operational Amplifier LME49720 from Texas Instruments
RightMark Audio Analyzer (RMAA) suite is used for testing AORUS AMP-UP Audio against ASUS Xonar U7 External Sound card. You can see clearly the difference between Noise level, dynamic rang and Total harmonic distortion percentage produced by AORUS AMP-UP Audio
RMAA ASUS Xonar U7
RMAA AORUS AMP-UP Audio
19. ITE 8951E Chip.
20.ITE 8686E is the SuperIO chip.
Testing
| CPU | Intel Core i7 7820X CPU |
| Board | AORUS X299 GAMING 7 |
| RAM | 4 X 4GB Corsair DDR4 |
| SSD | Kingston SV300 120GB |
| Cooler | CM MasterLiquid 280 Pro |
| GFX | ASUS STRIX GTX 950 |
| PSU | Cooler Master V1200 |
| Display | Acer S220HQL |
| OS | Windows 10 |
BIOS
Bundled Software
Benchmarks
Power Consumption
Wattage reading as per displayed by APC Pro 1000VA (Model no. BR1000G-IN) UPS. Running Cinebench R15
Pros
- Very good VRM Cooling design
- Two 8-pin CPU power
- Good Audio
- WIFI onboard
- Good RGB lighting options
Cons
- Slight high power Consumption
Conclusion
GIGIABYTE AORUS X299 Gaming 7 motherboard has performed well in compression with other X299 boards we have tested yet. AORUS X299 motherboard have incorporated one of the best VRM cooling solution resulting in a higher/stable CPU performance and overclocking.
AORUS X299 Gaming 7 motherboard with its build quality and features make it one of the best X299 motherboard out there. If you are really planning for a X299 based higher end desktop build than the AORUS X299 Gaming 7 motherboard is best for you and worthy of our PC TeK Reviews EXCELLENCE Award.
Manufacturers Info
Site Link
Thanks.