The Box and Packaging
The first thing that catches your eye is the Sonic the Hedgehog character on the box, which really stands out. But inside the box, you don’t get much … there;s the usual user manual, 4 x M.2 screws, a pair of SATA cables, and 2 velcro straps for cable management… and that’s it!
The ASRock Z790 PG SONIC Motherboard
On the back of the motherboard, you find another eye-catching Sonic the Hedghog design, making this motherboard really stand out.
The ASRock Z790 PG SONIC motherboard comes in standard ATX form factor, and features some really unique looking heatsinks with Sonic the Hedgehog design. The design covers the VRM/Mofets and the I/O hood, as well as the chipset and M.2 slot. You’ll also find a unique hologram showing the iconic golden ring on the I/O hood.
A Closer Look
The motherboard comes with 4 x DDR5 DIMM slots supporting ram speeds of up to DDR5-7200+ OC. Please take note: The DDR5 memory slot is NOT compatible with DDR4 ram.
On the top left-hand corner of the board, you’ll find 2 x 8-pin PCIE power connectors, which is needed to power the board, and to give you that extra stability.
For expansion, you get 1 x PCIE 5.0 x16 slots with + Surface-Mount Tech, 1 x PCIe 4.0 x16, 1 x PCIe 3.0 x1, and 1 x M.2 Key-E for WiFi.
For connectivity, you get the Killer E3100G 2.5G LAN, but no WiFi 6. For that you’ll need to get the optional M.2 Key-E addon module (optional). For storage, you get 1 x Blazing M.2 (PCIe Gen5x4), and 4 x Hyper M.2 (PCIe Gen4x4) slots, as well as 8 additional SATA ports.
You get plenty of USB connectivity. A total of 16 USB ports, all USB ports support ESD Protection. There’s …
- 1 x USB 3.2 Gen2x2 Type-C (Front)
- 2 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A (Rear)
- 1 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-C (Rear)
- 6 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A (4 Rear, 2 Front)
- 6 x USB 2.0 (2 Rear, 4 Front)
For RGB lovers, you’ll find 2 x 3-pin ARGB (5V) headers located on the top right side of the motherboard, and another 1 x 3-pin ARGB (5V) header, as well as 1 x 4-pin RGB (12V) towards the bottom middle of the board.
And finally, you also get all of ASRock’ unique features such as the auto driver installer, Dr. MOS, 2oz copper PCB, and the Realtek 7.1 HD Nahimic audio and Polychrome Sync.
The rear I/O panel include the DisplayPort, HDMI, 2 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A Ports (10 Gb/s), 1 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-C Port, 4 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A Ports (USB32_56 are Lightning Gaming Ports.), 2 x USB 2.0 Ports, 1 x Killer 2.5G LAN Port, HD Audio Jacks: Line in / Front Speaker / Microphone
