Closer Look
ASRock Z690 PG Riptide motherboard arrived in a retail package which is well described as all ASRock motherboards. The package is similar to that of the Extreme or Steel Legend series but, of course, has specific Riptide graphics and a PG logo.
We will find a well-protected motherboard, user’s manual, drivers and software DVD, SATA data cables, cable stripes, a graphics card holder, and M.2 screws inside the box. It’s everything we may need for the installation.
The motherboard looks quite interesting. Heatsinks are not as large as on higher series motherboards so that we can see more PCB and its texture. On the other hand, all parts are black with additional logos. Everything is rather simple but eye-catching.
I wish to see a pre-installed IO shield, like in most higher series motherboards, and also a larger heatsink covering all connectors on the back of the motherboards.
The motherboard has no additional fans, but used heatsinks are enough to keep everything cool. The chipset heatsink has a semi-transparent PG logo with a backlight that looks great, but we will barely see it if we use a larger graphics card.
The motherboard has a 13-power phase design, so not much worse than the Extreme or other, higher motherboards. It’s more than enough to support top series processors like our 12900K, which had no problems reaching its advertised maximum frequency.
The PG Riptide also has a gaming series NIC – Killer E3100G. It promises better results than on standard series LAN cards, but being honest, I haven’t seen any significant difference compared to Realtek or its Dragon series NIC.
The same as other four-slot motherboards, also the Z690 PG Riptide supports up to 128GB RAM in four 32GB memory modules. There are no problems with such high capacity up to at least DDR4-3600, but higher is not guaranteed. I assume that most users will stop at 16-32GB RAM and try to set it at a higher frequency for additional performance.
Below are some photos of the working setup. There were no problems with the compatibility of various CPU coolers, RAM, or graphics cards. Also, storage devices work at their full speed.
One more great feature is ASRock’s BIOS/UEFI, which I will describe on this review’s next page.
