Maxsun iCraft Z790 Wi-Fi Motherboard Review: Competent and Well-Connected

Maxsun’s iCraft Z790 is a worthy motherboard if you can find it around MSRP ($309.99).

Maxsun iCraft Z790 Wi-Fi
(Image: © Tom's Hardware)

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Firmware

The Maxsun UEFI BIOS is a throwback to the days of old, looking somewhat basic compared to others from the major board partners. First, there isn’t an ‘easy mode.’ You just jump right into the advanced portion. Across the top are several headers (Main, Advanced, Power, Turbo, Startup, Security, and Exit), with subheadings below. The right third displays a system summary, including CPU temperatures and voltage, fan speeds, and more, while the left side is where to select the options within. It does the job and offers plenty of functionality; it’s just not one of the best-looking UEFIs.

Software

On the software side of things, there isn’t much to talk about. The only software available to download is the Maxsun LED application to control any attached RGB lighting. While the Maxsun LED application does the job, we couldn’t find a version that was entirely in English, so we’re not sure what some of the options are. We don’t find any driver installation helper applications or software utilities to control the system (be it fans or overclocking). Any tweaks have to come from the BIOS for now.

Maxsun iCraft Z790 Wi-Fi

(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)

Test System / Comparison Products

We’ve updated our test system to Windows 11 64-bit OS with all updates applied. We kept the same Asus TUF RTX 3070 video card from our previous testing platforms but updated the driver. We also updated to F1 22 for our games and kept Far Cry 6. We use the latest non-beta motherboard BIOS available to the public. The hardware we used is as follows:

Test System Components

Swipe to scroll horizontally
CPUIntel Core i9-13900K
MemoryGSkill Trident Z DDR5-5600 CL36 (F5-5600U3636C16GX2-TZ5RK)
Row 2 - Cell 0 Kingston Fury Beast DDR5-6000 CL36 (KF560C36BBEAK2-32)
GPUAsus TUF RTX 3070
CoolingCoolermaster MasterLiquid PL360 Flux
PSUEVGA Supernova 850W P6
SoftwareWindows 11 64-bit (22H2)
Graphics DriverNVIDIA Driver 522.25
SoundIntegrated HD audio
NetworkIntegrated Networking (GbE or 2.5 GbE)

Maxsun iCraft Z790 Wi-Fi

(Image credit: Tom's Hardware)

EVGA supplied our Supernova 850W P6 power supply (appropriately sized and more efficient than the 1.2KW monster we used previously) for our test systems, and G.Skill sent us a DDR5-5600 (F5-5600U3636C16GX2-TZ5RK) memory kit for testing.

Benchmark Settings

Swipe to scroll horizontally
Synthetic Benchmarks and SettingsRow 0 - Cell 1
ProcyonVersion 2.1.459 64
Row 2 - Cell 0 Office Suite (Office 365), Video Editing (Premiere Pro 22.6.2.2), Photo Editing (Photoshop 23.5.1, Lightroom Classic 11.5)
3DMarkVersion 2.22.7359 64
Row 4 - Cell 0 Firestrike Extreme and Time Spy Default Presets
Cinebench R23Version RBBENCHMARK330542
Row 6 - Cell 0 Open GL Benchmark - Single and Multi-threaded
BlenderVersion 3.3.0
Row 8 - Cell 0 Full benchmark (all three tests)
Application Tests and SettingsRow 9 - Cell 1
LAME MP3Version SSE2_2019
Row 11 - Cell 0 Mixed 271MB WAV to mp3: Command: -b 160 --nores (160Kb/s)
HandBrake CLIVersion: 1.2.2
Row 13 - Cell 0 Sintel Open Movie Project: 4.19GB 4K mkv to x264 (light AVX) and x265 (heavy AVX)
Corona 1.4Version 1.4
Row 15 - Cell 0 Custom benchmark
7-ZipVersion 21.03-beta
Row 17 - Cell 0 Integrated benchmark (Command Line)
Game Tests and SettingsRow 18 - Cell 1
Far Cry 6Ultra Preset - 1920 x 1080, HD Textures ON
F1 2022Ultra Preset - 1920 x 1080, Ultra High (default) Bahrain (Clear/Dry), FPS Counter ON

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Joe Shields
Motherboard Reviewer

Joe Shields is a Freelance writer for Tom’s Hardware US. He reviews motherboards.

  • mdd1963
    Maxsun?

    Never heard of them....(and as I've seen other established makers of mainboards with Z790's at sub-$200 on sale, that would seem a tad less risky....)
    Reply
  • Kindle2000
    mdd1963 said:
    Maxsun?

    Never heard of them....(and as I've seen other established makers of mainboards with Z790's at sub-$200 on sale, that would seem a tad less risky....)
    Z790 from established makers with similar power delivery is at least 350$.
    Reply