Box and Packaging
As with all ASRock’s Taichi range of motherboards, the box and packaging has a very nice design. Inside the box, you’ll find 2 antennae for the AC wifi, 4 SATA cables, 3 x M.2 screws for SSDs, ASRock post card, Instruction manual, software setup guide and a drivers disc.
The Motherboard
The motherboard has a nice matte black/grey finish, and all the connectors and components seems to in the right places. There’s plenty of room around the processor socket (LGA1151) and between the PCIE slots, which means less likelihood of add-on cards/components fouling the motherboard.
A large heatsink sits on top of the chipset with a nice Taichi logo and design. All three M.2 connectors are easily accessible, as werll as the headers for RGB, USB, fans and audio. There’s a nice plastic shroud that cover the I/O panel, which I like and you also get the added bonus of the heatsink (with heatpipe) which helps cool the mofets/VRMs around the processor socket.
A Closer Look
ASRock has included one heat shield/plate for one of the M.2 connectors … this is perfect for cooling your PCIE gen 3×4 SSD. I only wished the heat shield had RGB lighting 😛
There’s a total of 8 x SATA connectors for your HDDs and 4 x DDR DIMMs slots supporting dual-channel memory up to DDR4 4200+(OC). You’ll also find 3 x PCIE steel slots for multi-GPU configuration, and two RGB headers for ASRock’s PolyChrome Sync.
And finally, on the I/O panel, you find a wide range of connectors. These include … clear CMOS button, 2 x AC wifi anteanne, PS/2 connector for keybaord & mouse, 6 x USB 3.1, DisplayPort, HDMI, dual Gigabit LAN, USB 3.1 gen 2 (Type-A & Type-C), and an array of audio gold connectors.
