Gigabyte's AM4 Flagship: The Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7 Motherboard

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By Michael Justin Allen Sexton
published

In preparation for Ryzen’s impending launch, OEMs have placed several AM4 motherboards up for pre-order. We now get a look at Gigabyte’s Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7 AM4 flagship, but you may not be able to pre-order it in your area.

They "neatest" feature of the Aorus AX370-Gaming K7 is its use of interchangeable RGB LED overlays that give additional customization options. The board also has RGB LEDs located around the RAM slots, PCI-E slots, audio hardware, and heatsinks. If you feel the need for more RGB LED lights, there are also two light strip headers on board.

As a flagship motherboard, AX370-Gaming K7 also boasts the best overclocking features out of Gigabyte’s AM4 product line up. It has numerous power phases covered by large heatsinks, and it supports two BIOS chips to ease recovery from a bad overclock. Gigabyte also equipped its Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7 with a third-party clock generator. Although most people will prefer to OC by raising the CPU multiplier, the added clock generator will make BCLK overclocking easier and more stable.

Gigabyte opted to use a unique audio configuration that consists of two Realtek ALC1220 audio codecs. One codec is devoted to the front audio ports, whereas the other one is used for the rear audio jacks. These codecs are also equipped with AMPs, relatively high-end capacitors, and various types of protection against EMI. Gigabyte also licensed Creative’s Sound Blaster X-Fi MB5 software to further enhance the performance of these chips.

The Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7 has a total of four USB 3.1 Gen 2 ports. Two USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A ports are connected to the X370 chipset, while a third is powered by an ASMedia controller. The ASMedia controller also supports a USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C port located on the rear I/O panel.

For storage connections, Gigabyte offers a total of eight SATA-III ports, an M.2 Key M slot, and a U.2 connector. The board also has two SATA-Express connectors, but these will almost certainly go unused, as virtually no SATA-Express devices exist.

There is currently no word on pricing or availability for the Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7 in the United States. It's available for pre-order in Canada for $219.99 CAD on Newegg, however, and if it's priced comparably stateside, it should be around $168 USD when it is released.

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Gigabyte Aorus GA-AX370-Gaming K7
ChipsetX370
Memory Support4 x DDR4-3200MHz
Onboard GraphicsHDMI1.4
Audio2 x Realtek ALC1220Sound Blaster X-Fi MB5
LANIntel GigabyteKiller E2500
StorageM.2 Key MU.22 x Sata Express8 x Sata-III
USBUSB 3.1 Gen.2 Type-C3 x USB 3.1 Gen.2-Type-A7 x USB 3.1 Gen.1 Type-A4 x USB 2.0
Michael Justin Allen Sexton
Michael Justin Allen Sexton is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He covers hardware component news, specializing in CPUs and motherboards.
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49 Comments Comment from the forums
  • ttt_2017
    Can any one explain to me why they added 2 Audio chips ?

    Usually when you use the front audio ports the rear ones will stop working .. that is the front will also use the same Audio chip but routed to the front instead of the rear ports..

    no one uses both Rear and front active at the same time ... what is the point Gigabyte ?
    Reply
  • Sam Hain
    19344774 said:
    Can any one explain to me why they added 2 Audio chips ?

    Usually when you use the front audio ports the rear ones will stop working .. that is the front will also use the same Audio chip but routed to the front instead of the rear ports..

    no one uses both Rear and front active at the same time ... what is the point Gigabyte ?

    Straight from their website: http://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-AX370-Gaming-K7-rev-10#kf

    "No longer are you limited to quality audio from only the rear of your Gaming PC, the new AORUS AX370-Gaming K7 offers dual ALC1220 Codecs, a high-performance multi-channel high-definition Audio Codec with 120dB SNR. These Codecs offer crystal clear audio and features such as Smart Headphone AMP, 114dB SNR recording for precise voice chats and hardware decoding of DSD128, ensuring users get the best possible audio quality from their PC."

    "Automatically detects impedance of your head-worn audio device, whether earbuds or high-end headphones to provide optimal audio dynamics—preventing issues such as low volume and distortion. With the AORUS AX370-Gaming K7 incorporates dual Smart Headphone AMPs guaranteeing that users will have a plug-n-play experience whether they connect their headphones to the front or the rear of their system."
    Reply
  • Purgatorysrath
    That is one Nice looking board with alot of goodies for sub 200 dollars! If in fact it sells that cheap. I would definately be in the Market for this.
    Edited: due to incompetent typing on my phone.
    Reply
  • g-unit1111
    I'm definitely planning on picking one of these up. The white one will look very nice in my H440.
    Reply
  • uglyduckling81
    Fairly useless 'heatsinks' if you can call them that. Imagine putting a huge block of aluminium with almost no fins on top of your CPU. The thing would be heat saturated in no time and overheat. Heatsinks should have fins to increase surface area. These are essentially just aesthetics, which indicates to me VRMs don't really need heatsinks to operate. In actual fact good quality VRMs are fine working up to 125-150 degrees C so they really don't need a heatsink. You will also note LN2 overclockers remove all that junk to get better access to the CPU itself and they achieve epic results.
    I do note they have a couple of grooves cut in them so they are probably slightly better than MSI's 'heatsinks' which are just solid blocks of aluminium.
    Also they don't have the MSI M2 heat trap cover which is good as well. Can not stand aesthetics getting in the way of performance.
    Reply
  • areksoo
    That is a price error. How is it possible that the Gaming 5 is more expensive than the Gaming K7? $220 is probably the US price.
    Reply
  • g-unit1111
    19345372 said:
    That is a price error. How is it possible that the Gaming 5 is more expensive than the Gaming K7? $220 is probably the US price.

    Newegg had the K5 for $195, so I think the 7 would be somewhere between the $195 - $230 range, I don't imagine it will be more expensive than the Crosshair VI.
    Reply
  • anbello262
    19344774 said:
    Can any one explain to me why they added 2 Audio chips ?

    Usually when you use the front audio ports the rear ones will stop working .. that is the front will also use the same Audio chip but routed to the front instead of the rear ports..

    no one uses both Rear and front active at the same time ... what is the point Gigabyte ?

    This would actually be great if combined with a specific type of software that lets you "separate" audio stremas into different audio outputs. For example, music on the hdmi output while skype on the headset, or a youtube video on the headphones with music on the speakers. All with individual sound sliders.

    Too bad te last software that could do this only works up to WinXP. I'm gonna try to do something that is capable of this, when I'm better at programming. It is actually great for shared pc or spaces.
    Reply
  • valeman2012
    Usually Gigabyte focus on durability for users to enjoy, that why you see good quality sound...and other stuff.
    Reply
  • erekp
    Did anybody else notice that Gigabyte's Gaming K3 is the ONLY B350 (or any other sub-370 series!) chipset sporting an ALC 1220??? That's a damn steal compared to the other companies, although I haven't used any Giga stuff in a while. I'l wait for the review, but still, wanted to point out that of all the board fully announced (i.e. with specs and price), Gigabyte has the lowest end board that STILL contains an ALC 1220...
    Reply