14 DAY TRIAL // ASUS usually reserves the Republic of Gamers brand for the absolute best hardware in its portfolio, but its policy seems to have become a lot more flexible now. The Z97-Pro motherboard shows that much.
You may have noticed the lack of ROG in the product name. That's because ASUS didn't include it, despite launching the newcomer through the ROG website. We can understand why other people are calling the Z97-Pro a semi-ROG product.
The platform is no flagship, that's for sure, but it might just steamroll over every other would-be mini gaming PC motherboard on the market.
The specs of the ASUS Z97-Pro motherboard
We may as well get the obvious ones out of the way. There are four memory slots, for one thing, meaning that you can install quite a lot of DDR3 RAM.
This also seems to be a full-ATX motherboard, so you don't, in fact, get to make a mini gaming PC from this thing. The “budget” systems still need mid-tower cases or larger.
As you can see, one of the three full-size PCI Express slots is colored grey instead of black. That doesn't mean you can only install one video card though.
In fact, you can choose between an x8/x8 dual-GPU configuration (NVIDIA SLI or AMD Crossfire) and an x8/x4/x4 configuration for tri-AMD gaming. In other words, for three video cards that can sync their resources despite the bandwidth difference.
It does put a damper on the purpose of the new motherboard though. ASUS envisioned it as a way to build a strong gaming PC around an Intel Pentium CPU (Pentium G3258 can overclock, for example), and AMD graphics might not scale well. Nevertheless, the option is there just in case.
Moving on, the motherboard benefits from an Ethernet port, USB support, SupremeFX audio with an ALC1150 codec (with PCB separation), EM shielding, and headphone amplifiers with auto-detection.
Finally, ASUS tossed in PCI Express to PCI connectors, two M.2 ports, SATA Express (12 Gbps instead of just 6 Gbps), ROG oriented DIGI+ control of the power delivery, SupremeFX audio, red/black heatsinks, and a BIOS with all the options needed for overclocking.
Availability and pricing
The ASUS Z97-Pro hasn't been given a tag yet, and we don't know when sales will begin. One thing's for sure, though. ASUS will have to somehow stay below the $100 / €80 price, because a higher price than that will put people off it, no matter how great it is.
