If you are upgrading to the LGA 1700 platform for the first time, you should look at the latest Z790 refresh motherboards; while it is possible to install a 14th generation chip on a Z690 or 1st generation Z790 board after a BIOS update, the Z790 refresh board is where new buyers should focus their attention. In general, Z790 refresh boards are more sophisticated and feature-rich than previous generations, but as you might imagine, the high-end options can be very expensive.

However, not everyone wants to buy a nuclear Core i9 14900K and a $1000+ graphics card, so if you're looking to upgrade on a more secular budget, a board like the Asus TUF Gaming Z790-Pro WiFi can probably meet that will do the trick. At $299/AU$609, the TUF Z790-Pro is still a relatively expensive option, but less expensive than Asus' ROG Strix and Maximus boards. The TUF Z790-Pro promises a good balance of features and affordability, and, like the rest of Asus' TUF series, is reliability oriented.

The Asus TUF Gaming Z790-Pro WiFi is a standard ATX board with a fairly utilitarian design with no fancy bells and whistles. I'm not sure if I like the wall of text above the rear I/O panel, but I doubt I'll be spending much time looking at it instead of at my monitor. The board is black with a slight gray tint. There is a small RGB section on the right side of the board, next to the memory slots.

At a high level, a high-performance VRM solution with a sturdy heatsink, four M.2 slots, WiFi 6E, DDR5-7800 memory support, and two 20Gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 ports mean most gamers will have the right core feature set to means they are covered.

Generally, the board is similar to the TUF Gaming Z790-Plus WiFi, but the newer Pro adds faster memory support than the native 14th generation and 30W fast charging via an internal 20Gbps USB case header. Additionally, the audio section has added depop protection circuitry and the BIOS has been tweaked slightly; there is no Z790-Pro DDR4 option.

Let's start with a few key points: the TUF Z790-Pro comes with seven fan headers. Not a huge number, but enough for an AIO setup and a handful of case fans, three ARGB headers, one RGB header, a Thunderbolt 4 / USB4 add-in card header, two 5Gbps USB ports, four USB 2.0 ports, and the aforementioned 30W support for 20Gbps Type-C ports. This is a good feature for those who want to charge their devices as quickly as possible.

PCIe slots are also plentiful, consisting of a PCIe 5.0 x16 slot, a PCIe 4.0 x16 slot (electrically x4), a PCIe 4.0 x4 slot, a PCIe 3.0 x16 slot (electrically x1), and a PCIe 3.0 x1 slot. This provides flexibility when expansion cards are needed.

The four memory slots support speeds up to 7800 MHz. While some boards support speeds of 8000 MHz or more, 7800 MHz is ostensibly more than enough for a mid-range board. This is a nice step up from the DDR5-7200 support of the TUF Z790-Plus. It can also handle 48GB sticks, as expected. [The primary M.2 slot on the TUF Z790-Pro only supports PCIe 4.0 SSDs. This means that if you want to take full advantage of the fastest SSDs, you are out of luck. The other three slots all support PCIe 4.0; three of the four M.2 slots are cooled by screw-in integrated heatsinks; there are four SATA ports, two on the traditional sides and two more on the bottom of the board; and the SATA ports are located on the bottom of the board.

The VRM heatsinks on the TUF Z790-Pro are above average, but not as good as more expensive boards. We were unable to read the VRM temperatures in the software, but at 14900K under prolonged load, VRM temperatures are difficult to find. It was on the hot side to the touch, though not alarmingly so. Not many people will run 14900K on this board, but if they do, good airflow is a must.

The VRM itself is decent for a board in this price range: a 16+1+1 design with 60A stages. This is adequate for the i9 processor and can power other 12th, 13th, and 14th generation processors; CPU cooling will be stressed long before the VRM is stressed.

I/O on the back of the board is nothing short of adequate, the most notable feature being the 20Gbps Type-C port. In addition to this, there are three 10 Gbps ports (one of which is Type-C) and four 5 Gbps ports. In other words, there are only eight USB ports. It is also commendable that Asus has labeled them according to speed rather than the various official USB names, which are ridiculous and confusing.

The remaining ports include DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.1 ports. The inclusion of these high-bandwidth video ports is a welcome addition. Less significant on a 12th or 13th generation board is the omission of the CMOS clear button and especially the BIOS flashback button, which is worth noting. Antenna ports are non-standard; Asus calls them Q antennas; WiFi support is 6E only, and the single network port supports 2.5GbE speeds.

Audio on the board is provided by the Realtek S1220A codec. High quality capacitors and depop circuitry are included. Not a bad solution, but the base ALC1220 codec is a few years old now.

System Performance

Gaming Performance

Benchmark performance of the TUF Z790-Pro is generally good. Compared to the other three Z790 refresh boards I have tested so far, it often manages to gain the lead.

Gaming performance is also strong, but ultimately, given that engineers have spent enough time on Intel's hybrid chips and the underlying BIOS microcode is mature, one would expect all Z790 refresh boards to perform very similarly to each other

The Z790 refresh boards are expected to perform very similarly to each other.

Note that the 14900K is a very hot running chip. Even my 360mm AIO was not enough to stop thermal throttling under heavy loads. [14900K is too much to overclock unless you do custom water cooling.

Memory overclocking, however, is an area that has improved dramatically. This is partially due to improvements in the 14th generation memory controller, but the Z790 refresh board was designed with faster Hynix chips in mind. I was able to achieve DDR5-8000 on this board, something that was not possible with my 13900K sample. This is only slightly less than the Gigabyte Z790 Aorus Master X, but this board is close to twice the price of the Asus.

There are many reasons to like the Asus TUF Gaming Z790-Pro WiFI. It is one of those boards that performs equally well before and after adjustments; everything runs smoothly, as opposed to the initial BIOS of the Z690 board and its accompanying 12th generation processors. Even when using different types of memory, its performance is remarkably consistent; Asus' BIOS is solid; the Z690's BIOS is very stable; and the Z690's BIOS is very stable.

I really like the 30W compatible case header. This makes it easy to charge devices at my desk and reduces the need to move devices to another wall charger. Expandability with a variety of PCIe slots and a VRM that can hold a full 14900K is noteworthy; if the TUF Z790-Pro can handle it, it can handle any LGA 1700 processor.

However, there are two significant drawbacks. First, it lacks WiFi 7 support, which was seen as one of the main differentiating features between the first and second generation Z790 boards. Personally, I don't think this is a deal-breaker, as I don't plan to upgrade my home network to support WiFi 7 anyway, but the second issue is a bigger one.

The issue is price; the TUF Z790-Pro has some very strong competitors in this price range. In particular, the MSI Z790 Tomahawk Max is the same price, but has WiFI 7, more SATA ports, more USB ports, and PCIe 5.0 SSD support. However, it lacks 30W power supply support and has fewer expansion slots, so it's up to you to decide which features are most important.

Many people are happy to pay a little extra for the Asus name; if you buy Asus, you get a very polished board that supports a variety of memory speeds and capacities, excellent expansion card support, high-quality BIOS, and 30W power supply support.

If Asus were to drop the price a bit more, perhaps to the same level as the TUF Z790-Plus (and it surely will drop in time), the TUF Gaming Z790-Plus WiFi would surely be a more attractive option... if only WiFi 7...