Motherboard manufacturer ASRock has introduced the Steel Legend series of motherboards. The ASRock B450 and B450M Steel Legend, which are first models to come out of the factory, are specifically designed for AMD's latest Ryzen processors.
ASRock carves the Steel Legend motherboards from 2-ounce copper high-density glass fabric PCBs (printed circuit boards). The boards feature a sapphire black exterior with a camouflage design complemented by silver XXL aluminum alloy heatsinks and ASRock's own Polychrome Sync addressable RGB lighting.
The ASRock B450 and B450M Steel Legend are equipped with the brand's "Full Spike" electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection on the USB, Ethernet, and audio ports. Both motherboards also employ premium 60A power chokes and Japanese Nichicon 12K black capacitors as components for their power delivery subsystem.
ASRock B450 Steel Legend
The ASRock B450 Steel Legend conforms to the standard ATX form factor and has a six-phase power delivery subsystem. The motherboard comes with four DDR4 memory slots and can accommodate up to 64GB of memory and memory speeds exceeding 3,533MHz. The board has four SATA III ports originating from the AMD Promontory B450 chipset and two SATA III ports from the ASMedia ASM1061 controller. The motherboard also has two M.2 PCIe 3.0 ports (one at x4 and the other at x2). However, only one of them is equipped with a full-cover heatsink.
ASRock outfitted the B450 Steel Legend with a generous helping of expansion ports that include two PCIe 3.0 x16 ports and four PCIe 2.0 x1 ports. The motherboard supports CrossFireX configurations up to two graphics cards. Display outputs on the ASRock B450 Steel Legend include one HDMI 1.4 port and one DisplayPort 1.2 output. Internet connectivity is provided via the Gigabit Ethernet Realtek RTL8111H controller.
The audio solution is based on Realtek's ALC892 codec and provides five gold-plated 3.5mm audio jacks and an S/PDIF optical output. The list of USB ports on the ASRock B450 Steel Legend consists of two USB 2.0 ports, one USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A port, one USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C port, and four USB 3.1 Gen1 ports. Additionally, the motherboard has two USB 2.0 headers and a USB 3.1 Gen1 header. A PS/2 combo keyboard and mouse port are present as well.
ASRock B450M Steel Legend
As denoted by the "M" in its name, the ASRock B450M Steel Legend is the MicroATX version. It comes equipped with the same power delivery subsystem design and number of DDR4 memory slots as its ATX counterpart. However, ASRock reduced the storage options to four SATA III ports instead of six. The M.2 Gen 3.0 x4 and Gen 3.0 x2 ports are still present, but neither has a heatsink.
The ASRock B450M Steel Legend has a PCIe 3.0 x16 slot and a PCIe 2.0 x16 slot. The motherboard can house up to two AMD graphics card in a CrossFireX configuration. Due to the lack of PCB space, the ASRock B450M Steel Legend only provides a single PCI 2.0 x1 slot for connecting other devices. In terms of display outputs, there's the HDMI 1.4 port and DisplayPort 1.2 output. The Realtek RTL8111H controller is responsible for delivering internet connectivity through the Gigabit Ethernet port.
The Realtek ALC892 codec continues to power the ASRock B450M Steel Legend's audio solution. Audio outputs include five gold-plated 3.5mm audio jacks and an S/PDIF optical output. The USB ports and internal USB headers on the ASRock B450M Steel Legend remain untouched. The PS/2 combo keyboard and mouse port also remain.
ASRock didn't reveal the ASRock B450 and B450M Steel Legend's pricing or availability.
