ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero Motherboard Review

Verdict and Conclusion

All said and done, the ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero is a feature-packed motherboard that performs as good as it looks.

Using AMD’s X670E chipset, it’s suitable for all AMD’s latest Ryzen 7000 series of processors on the new AM5 socket (LGA1718), and comes with 2 x PCIE 5.0 x16 slots, as well as supporting DDR5 ram with speed of up to DDR5-6400+ OC (if it works, see below).

The motherboard features a massive 18 + 2 teamed power solution rated for 110A per stage, and this is provides extra stability especially when overclocking your processor. To help cool such a power hungry motherboard, you’ll find enormous heatsinks that have been placed strategically around the board to offer unparalleled cooling to the VRM/Mosfets, while both chipsets and M.2 slots share a large central plate for widespread dissipation.

One of the features that really stand out is the Polymo lighting, which you can set via a choice of customizable patterns. You also get the usual diagnostic LEDs, onboard power-on and reset buttons and load of ARGB headers (Gen2).

However, one of the biggest problem with this board is the memory compatibility issue with EXPO certified DDR5 memory. I’ve tried 4 different brands of DDR5-6200 ram, and none of them worked with EXPO enabled. The system failed to boot. I tried lowering the speed to DDR5-5200, 5400 and 5600 with no success. However it did boot up at the lowest memory speed of DDR5-4800 (default). In the end, manage to run the ram at DDR5-6200 in single channel mode! I’m not alone, and I’m definitely not the first to experience this problem. There are hundreds of Reddit threads complaining about this memory issue. And on Asus’s QVL list, only a limited number of brands are listed, most notably G.SKill, but that’s beside the point. My DDR5-6000 should but boot up regardless. Asus needs to seriously sort his problem out. I’m hoping their new BIOS will fix this issue (waiting with anticipation).

During our tests, we used an AMD Ryzen 9 7900X processor and a GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card. We managed to pull some pretty good scores in all of our benchmarks, including a Cinebench R23 scores of 28,374 (multi core) and 1,972 (single core). For PCMark 10, we got a score of 9,592, and a score of 8,340 for PassMark9.

For UL’s latest Procyon Photo Editing Benchmark, we got a score of 10,725 and 7,783 for the video editing suite. For 3DMark Speed Way and Port Royal, we got a score of 5,137 and 12,953 respectively. And finally, for Timespy and Firestrike, we got decent scores of 18,044 and 40,029 respectively.

LAN connectivity is powered by Intel’s 2.5G LAN with support for WiFi 6E + Bluetooth 5.3. It’s definitely more than enough for the most content creator/streamer/gamer. For USB connections, this motherboard has one of the most I’ve seen with a total of 23 x USB ports (12 rear and 11 front). You get 2 x USB 4 Type-C, 2 x USB 3.2 Gen2x2, 9 x USB 3.2 Gen2, 2 x USB 3.2 Gen1 and 3 x USB 2.0.

For storage, it comes with a total of 6 x SATA3 ports, and 4 x M.2 slots for SSDs. These include 2 x PCIE 5.0 (Gen5) M.2 slots, 2 x PCIE 4.0 (Gen4) M.2 slots, and 1 x PCIE 5.0 (Gen5) M.2 Card.

I do like the M.2 Q-Latch, which allows me to easily install or remove an M.2 SSD without the need for extra tools. And I love the PCIE Slot Q-Release. It’s a physical button that unlocks the first PCIe slot’s security latch with one tap. It makes it easier to detach the graphics card from the motherboard at any time.

Feature-wise, this motherboard is absolutely packed, and I can’t really ask for more. They just need to fix the EXPO memory compatibility issue with a new BIOS and hopefully you should be good to go … so come on Asus!

The ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero motherboard currently costs around USD $699, which I think is staggeringly expensive. Having said that, it does offers a lot more than I expected.

Pros:

• Very good performance
• AMD X670E chipset
• Supports AMD Ryzen 7000 series processor
• 2 x PCIE 5.0 x16 slots
• PCIE 5.0 Gen5x4 slot for SSD
• Supports DDR5-6400+ (O.C.)
• Feature-rich
• Intel 2.5G LAN
• WiFi 6e support

Cons:

• EXPO memory compatibility issue
• Expensive

Final Words:

The ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero is one of those motherboards I wished I could give my unreserved stamp of approval and highest recommendations. It has an amazing set of enthusiast-grade features, offers very good performance, and comes with all the latest next-gen technologies. However, its biggest downfall is its inherent EXPO memory compatibility issue. I’m totally bamboozled by this. Strangely, the recently reviewed TUF Gaming B650-Plus WiFi (mainstream) motherboard didn’t have such issue, so I have no idea what could be causing the problem. Only Asus has the answer. A BIOS update should hopefully fix the issue. As it stands, I could only look at the price and features … and it’s a difficult decision to make.

You can buy the ASUS ROG Crosshair X670E Hero motherboard for around USD $699 from Amazon – https://amzn.to/3vCIfMg

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