Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex is available for pre-order on Newegg — Launches April 4 at $749

Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex
(Image credit: Asus)

At CES, Asus unveiled its premium Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex motherboard, engineered for extreme CPU and memory overclocking. Notably, this marks Asus' debut ROG Apex board for AMD Ryzen processors.

Based on a listing at Newegg, the ROG Crosshair X870E Apex is available for pre-order starting at $749 and hits shelves April 4th next month.

This motherboard is designed around AMD's premiere X870E chipset, supporting Ryzen 7000 (Raphael), Ryzen 8000 (Phoenix) and Ryzen 9000 (Granite Ridge) processors. The key distinction between X670E and X870E boards is that the latter must include USB 4.0 ports, two of which are featured on this board.

To maximize the memory overclocking potential, Asus has implemented a one DPC (DIMM Per Channel) layout with this motherboard. It advertises minimum (OC) transfer rates of 8200 MT/s, 9600 MT/s and 8000 MT/s for Ryzen 9000, Ryzen 8000 and Ryzen 7000 series processors.

In terms of storage, there M.2 slots, three of which are PCIe 5.0 and directly linked to the CPU while the remaining two connect via the chipset rated at PCIe 4.0 speeds, alongside four SATA ports.

For expansion, you get two PCIe 5.0 x16 slots which support the Q-Release Slim feature, which has put Asus in hot waters recently due to reports of cosmetic damage to the GPU's PCIe connectors. Nonetheless, following the primary slots, there's another PCIe 4.0 x4 slot and a PCIe 3.0 x1 slot to fulfill your needs.

The rear I/O of the X870E Apex offers a compelling array of choices including two USB 4.0 (Type-C) ports, six USB 10 Gbps (five Type-A and one Type-C) and two USB 5 Gbps (Type-A) ports. This is backed up by the Wi-Fi module, an Ethernet port, one PS/2 connector, two audio jacks, one S/PDIF out port, a BIOS FlashBack button and a button to clear the CMOS battery.

On the front-end, the board features one USB 20 Gbps port (Type-C with 60W PD/QC4+), one USB 20 Gbps connector, support for four USB 5 Gbps in addition to four USB 2.0 ports. Importantly, the front Type-C port supports PPS (Programmable Power Supply) which can be useful for supported devices, such as Samsung Galaxy phones which can leverage battery bypass charging in games.

The motherboard features eighteen 110A, two 110A, and two 80A power stages coupled with MicroFine alloy chokes and high-quality capacitors. It has all the bells and whistles of a premium offering with support for Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4. On the software-end, Asus offers its own suite of overclocking tools such as Dynamic OC Switcher, Core Flex and Asynchronous clock.

The Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex follows the more all-rounded Hero offering that launched last year. The primary difference is that Apex-series motherboards are geared towards extreme overclockers and the like. Per the Newegg listing, Asus is set to launch the X870E Apex next month starting at $749, a $50 premium over its Hero sibling.

Hassam Nasir
Contributing Writer

Hassam Nasir is a die-hard hardware enthusiast with years of experience as a tech editor and writer, focusing on detailed CPU comparisons and general hardware news. When he’s not working, you’ll find him bending tubes for his ever-evolving custom water-loop gaming rig or benchmarking the latest CPUs and GPUs just for fun.

Read more
Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex
Asus introduces its first AMD Apex motherboard for Ryzen CPUs — Crosshair X870E Apex brings extreme overclocking features to the AM5 platform
9800X3D Hero
Rare Ryzen 7 9800X3D emerges in bundles starting at $639 — one per buyer to prevent scalpers
Minisforum BD790i X3D motherboard
AMD's mobile X3D chips come to desktops — Minisforum's $599 MoDT debuts with Ryzen 9 7945HX3D
B650M Pro X3D
ASRock's new 'Pro X3D' motherboard named for the Ryzen CPUs it is designed for
New G.Skill DDR5 memory/memory overclocks
G.Skill showcases DDR5-10600 RAM overlock and DDR5-8133 CSODIMMs
MSI's midrange Z890 Project Zero motherboards.
MSI reveals Project Zero motherboards featuring concealed connectors — the trio of midrange motherboards include PZ variants of Tomahawk models
Latest in Motherboards
GIGABYTE X870E AORUS Xtreme AI TOP
Enthusiasts report Gigabyte X870E Aorus Xtreme chipset temps exceeding 100°C
GoatWithAGun's motherboard
Motherboard dies after marathon 100-hour BIOS update process, vigil attended by thousands online
Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex
Asus quietly updates Q-Release Slim — removes metal frame blamed for scratching GPUs
24-hour BIOS update
24-hour BIOS update? User's attempt to flash motherboard becomes a marathon
Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex
Asus ROG Crosshair X870E Apex is available for pre-order on Newegg — Launches April 4 at $749
Asus store
Asus anticipates price increases as it shifts production from China
Latest in News
Despite external similarities, the RTX 3090 is not at all the same hardware as the RTX 4090 — even if you lap the GPU and apply AD102 branding.
GPU scam resells RTX 3090 as a 4090 — complete with a fake 'AD102' label on a lapped GPU
Inspur
US expands China trade blacklist, closes susidiary loopholes
WireView Pro 90 degrees
Thermal Grizzly's WireView Pro GPU power measuring utility gets a 90-degree adapter revision
Qualcomm
Qualcomm launches global antitrust campaign against Arm — accuses Arm of restricting access to technology
Nvidia Ada Lovelace and GeForce RTX 40-Series
Analyst claims Nvidia's gaming GPUs could use Intel Foundry's 18A node in the future
Core Ultra 200S CPU
An Arrow Lake refresh may still be in the cards with only K and KF models, claims leaker
  • Nitmare64
    Purchased! 🔥
    Thank you Toms Hardware!
    Reply
  • joartrak
    Sounds great and looks really good. That price point is pretty spicy. Although some boards are topping over $1000 which just feels painful. Like everything involved in PC building is just growing in price and that's both sad and disappointing.
    Reply
  • Notton
    Hint: It's aimed at people who want to push a 16-core into the >6.5Ghz range using liquid nitrogen.
    Only buy this if you need the feature set, or have cash burning a hole in your pocket.
    Reply
  • HardwiredWireless
    This is brilliant. People buy AMD to save a few bucks So Asus makes sure that they don't keep those dollars for very long.
    Reply