The Box and Packaging
The box and packaging is almost exactly the same as ASRock’s original Taichi series. You get the usual user’s manual, software setup guide,, 2 pairs of SATA cables, 3 sets of M.2 screws, velcro straps for cable management, a USB bracket, along with a drivers disc, as well as the graphics card holder, a bundled 3cm active fan and the WiFi 6e antennas.
The ASRock Z690 Taichi RAZER EDITION Motherboard
The motherboard is absolutely feature-packed and comes in a matte black finish and is by covered by serveal large full length heatshield/heatspreaders that helps cool your SSDs. Near the top of the board, you’ll find extra heatsinks with heatpipe that helps to cool the VRMs/Mosfets surrounding the processor socket. The included 3cm active fan can be mounted for extra cooling.
The I/O panel includes another cooling fan, and the whole area is completely covered by the shround displaying the “RAZER EDITION” logo with RGB of course.
The DDR5 DIMMS slots are reinforced and uses surface mount technology to give better physical strength as well as a more stable memory signal. This unique design allows you to dramatically overclock DRAM module up to 6400MHz. Please take note: The DDR5 memory slot is NOT compatible with DDR4 ram.
For expansion, the board also comes with 2 x PCIe 5.0 x16 steel slot, 1 x PCIe 4.0 x16 slot, and 1 PCIe 3.0 x1 slot. Rest assured, we can confirm the PCIE 5.0 slot is backward compatible with PCIE 4.0 graphic cards and/other expansion cards.
The I/O panel is completely covered by the shround displaying the RAZER EDITION logo and comes RGB of course. The 4 little red squares located on the bottom left-hand corned of the board are the high end audio WIMA Caps. There’s also an internal independent SATA & USB Ports for extra secutiry. Once this feature is activated from BIOS setting, the independent SATA & USB port is cutoff from other ports to prevent malwares and ransomware from accessing.
Basically, this board is virtually identical to the original Taichi series, except of course it now supports with RAZER Chroma RGB.
A Closer Look
There are 2 x 8-pin PCIE power connectors on the top left-hand corner of the board. These are required to power the board to give you that extra stability.
The board comes with plenty of LAN and Wifi options. You get the Killer E3100 2.5G LAN, Intel Gigabit LAN and Killer AX1675 802.11ax (WiFi 6E) and 1 x Thunderbolt ports (Type-C). For storage, it comes with 2 x Hyper M.2 PCIE Gen4x4 and 1 x M.2 PCIE Gen3x4 slots, as well as 6 x SATA3 ports for SSDs.
For USB connectivity, there’s 1 x USB 3.2 Gen2x2 Front Type-C, 2 x Rear USB 3.2 Gen2 Type A, a total of 8 xUSB 3.2 Gen1 (4 Rear, 4 Front), and 1 x Independent USB 3.2 Gen1 Type A Port. I also like the usual onboard power on/off and reset buttons, as well as their clear CMOS button and their diagnostic LEDs.
The I/O panel include the BIOS flashback button, connectors for your WiFi antenna, HDMI port, lightning gamning ports, an array of audio connectors, USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports Thunderbolt 4 Type-C ports, Killer E3100 2.5G LAN and an Intel Gigabit LAN port.
