Gigabyte Z390 AORUS MASTER (Socket 1151/Z390 Express/DDR4/S-ATA 600/ATX)

Instantly strikes you as quality the minute you take it out of its box. Super sturdy and just really well made. Upgraded from a hero xi and its night and day. Has every feature you could wish for. I've a water cooled build so my cpu and gpu blocks are using the 2 addressable rgb headers. My ek d5 pump res combo is in a standard rgb header, so for the first time ever I have one piece of software controlling all my rgb and it works flawlessly. The vrm is incredible. Made even better by the back plate that actually works and the decent finned heatsink. There was a bit of controversy that the cheaper boards in the aorus line up had a better vrm as they use 50amp power stages and smart doublers but in controlled testing with all heatsinks removed the all ir vrm with its 40 amp power stages ran 1.5c cooler. So what's better on paper doesn't always equate to reality. I've heard a lot of people complain about gigabytes bios but I've had zero issues with it and it's my first gigabyte board. Every setting you could ever wish for, plus an ez bios for simple adjustments. The only flaw I can find with it is its automated oc'ing options. Just dont go near them. They use an insane/dangerous voltage. Just enabling mce my 9900k was using up to 1.45v!! Even my hero xi only used about 1.32v. Oh yeah, nicest looking mb I've ever had too. Just the right amount of rgb in the right places. Making my dad a pc out of all my old bits and pieces so was the perfect excuse to get a new mb. One last thing, when you put your pc to sleep, the rams rgb turns off, yey!!

Brilliant well made board everything you could need Gigabyte have done themselves proud with the Aorus Master.Onboard audio has improved dramatically in the last couple of years and that is what the focus of my review is about.I had a usb dac bypassing the onboard audio on my previous board and delivering direct to my amplifier and on to my speakers. The usb dac stopped working and i had to connect the amp up to the onboard audio via a single jack plug to rca splitter cable. I was impressed how good the sound was using the just the onboard ALC1200 Realtek on my Z370 board, so much so that when i spotted the Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Master and read the reviews and specs and found out that it had not only a Realtek ALC1200 dac but also a ESS Sabre 9118 dac as well as other improved audio components i just had to see and hear if it was any good, i took a gamble and made a purchase. Really glad i did.I don't know the technicalities of how the two dacs work together, but it works and boy does it ever deliver . The sounds are much more cleaner and clearer i think the audio is of a high quality, high enough certainly to be classed real HI-Fi. I have it connected via the jack plug rca splitter to my Yamaha S301 amp using pure direct coupled to a pair of Q Acoustics 3020 speakers and a Q Acoustic 2070s subwoofer. The sound is in my opinion way better than the very expensive standalone usb dac that i owned previously and better than the Z370 Realtek ALC1200 on it's own.My headphones are Sennheiser hd 650 and these i plug into my amp. Listening to music on my headphones is heavenly crystal clear best ever i've heard.I'm using mp3 files most at 320 bit but also a fair few Flac files which play superbly and i am using JRivers as the music player with playback set to (Realtek (R) Audio) [ WASAPI ]Hope this review helps anyone looking for a good audio using onboard rather than paying inflated prices for standalone dacs, the board may seem expensive but it is cheaper than a paying hundreds of pounds for overpriced audio dacs

I have bought this motherboard for my first build. From the moment I took this mother board out the box, it seemed evident that the build will be easy as everything was perfectly marked on it and had easy access. ATX board, with plenty of room and quality. The design is likeable, I do like the layout and the colours. The LED light on it seems perfect in the dark, you can set it to be still, flashing, pulsating, and you can set different colours as well. Good compliment. It has 8 USB3 ports in the back, absolutely amazing, for the money it is a well put together an dgreat motherboard. The onboard audio sounds much better than my previous H87 motherboard!

I did a lot of research before I decided to buy this particular make and model of Z390 mobo. As well as having all the features and functionality that one should expect of the Z390 class, this mobo stands out because it has. in my opinion, the best VRM [voltage regulator module] implementation. This coupled with the excellent heat sink design and the substantial, integral metal backplate ensures that your CPU of choice will never suffer from thermal throttling. I have been using this model for over a year now and it has really lived up to expectations. Recommended.

It was a joy building with the motherboard and also impressed with the build quality and features for a budget z390 mobo.The colour scheme was simple and clean for the build, the vrms have an impressive sink and never got too hot in the testing I did, I paired with an i5 and the processor ran with no issues. The XMP profile of the memory had no issues either. Plenty of sata ports for expandibility and also enough usb plus a m.2 key.This mobo was the first time I used an air cooler but the process worked just fine getting it mounted.The bios is still a litte too simple but navigation is ok.Overall I’m very impressed with this mobo, much better revision than the z370 version!