Gigabyte Z890 Aorus Elite X Ice Motherboard Review @ TechPowerUp
Gigabyte’s Z890 AORUS Elite X Ice is positioned as a feature rich all white LGA1851 motherboard for Intel Core Ultra Series 2 desktop processors, aimed at high end gaming and showcase builds. It pairs a 16+1+2 phase 80 A power stage VRM with an 8 layer 2x copper PCB, large finned heatsinks, and extensive VRM and M.2 thermal armor, so power delivery and storage thermals are well covered. You get four DDR5 slots that officially support very high overclocked speeds up to around DDR5 9500, a full length PCIe 5.0 x16 slot with reinforced Ultra Durable armor, multiple PCIe 4.0 slots, and five M.2 sockets, including a PCIe 5.0 slot for next gen NVMe drives. Connectivity is stacked for a modern flagship style board, with 2.5 GbE LAN, WiFi 7, a rear Thunderbolt 4 capable Type C port on some regional SKUs, plenty of USB including front panel USB C, and Gigabyte’s RGB Fusion support for coordinated lighting.
If you're considering a value-conscious Intel system and want a good-looking motherboard with all the trimmings for around $200, then Gigabyte has a gem here with great connectivity and cooling, especially if you're building a white PC.
The Elite X Ice also leans hard into builder friendly touches and aesthetics. The all white theme covers the PCB, heatsinks, and shrouds, designed to match current white cases and AIO coolers, while EZ Latch hardware on the PCIe and M.2 slots makes it simple to swap GPUs and SSDs without fighting tiny screws. There are onboard power, reset, and Q Flash buttons, diagnostic LEDs, an EZ Debug zone, and audio based on a modern Realtek codec with WIMA caps for clean output. In general impressions, the board is praised for its looks, strong overall feature set, and solid performance, with pricing around 320 to 330 US dollars putting it in the upper midrange of Z890 offerings. The main caveat is platform related rather than board specific, since the LGA1851 socket is only for new Core Ultra chips and offers no backward compatibility with older Core i Series LGA1700 processors, so this is a forward looking choice for builders committing to the new Intel generation.
Related Web URL: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/gigabyte-z890-a...
