Asus brought seven X299 motherboards to Computex, and now it's made five available for pre-order.
Manufacturers have rushed to release X299 motherboards ahead of the launch of Intel's new X-series CPUs. Those processors are all about power--Intel upped their core and thread counts, boosted their clock speeds, and reorganized their cache subsystems for improved performance. Taking advantage of those improvements requires new motherboards, though, and so we find ourselves in the middle of an X299 gold rush.
Pre-orders are now available for the Prime X299-Deluxe, Prime X299-A, TUF X299 Mark 1, TUF X299 Mark 2, and ROG Strix X299-E Gaming motherboards via Newegg and Amazon. Prices range from $260 for the TUF X299 Mark 2 on the low end and $490 for the Prime X299-Deluxe on the high end. (As of this writing, there's no difference in price between Newegg and Amazon for any of the available motherboards.)
Asus said on its website that its goal was to create "X299 solutions for every scenario, from hardcore gaming with bleeding-edge customization and cooling to boards engineered to endure the toughest conditions." That's why it has five boards spread across three product lines--the company has targeted the Prime series at overclockers, the TUF series at people who demand a little durability, and the ROG Strix series at gamers.
Of the motherboards it took to Computex, Asus has yet to reveal additional information about the ROG Rampage VI Extreme or ROG Rampage VI Apex. Those boards are expected to offer even more overclocking support than the models available for pre-order today--Asus said at Computex that overclockers broke all kinds of performance records with the ROG Rampage VI Apex and a Kaby Lake-X Intel Core i7-7740K processor.
Newegg said it will start to ship the Prime X299-Deluxe and Prime X299-A on June 26; the TUF X299 Mark 1, TUF X299 Mark 2, and ROG Strix X299-E Gaming will ship on June 30. Amazon said that it plans to release all five of the motherboards on June 26. You can find all the boards here:
- Prime X299-Deluxe: Newegg, Amazon
- Prime X299-A: Newegg, Amazon
- TUF X299 Mark 1: Newegg, Amazon
- TUF X299 Mark 2: Newegg, Amazon
- ROG Strix X299-E Gaming: Newegg, Amazon
If you're looking for X299 motherboards from other manufacturers, Gigabyte is offering three Aorus Gaming boards with the chipset, and MSI is also running a pre-order event for five X299 motherboards across various product lines. And if you're more curious about how these new X-series CPUs will perform, check out our review of the Intel Core i9-7900X.
