ASUS ROG Maximus XI Hero [WI-FI] (Intel 1151 v2)

The ASUS ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO (WiFi) has an attractive, subtle, and complex design. While it may not have every bell and whistle, ASUS truly put some thought into what to include. The VRM is more than adequate for any of Intel's current or future mainstream CPUs. Even if it lacks the complexity and sophistication of some of its competitors, it has the current output to get the job done. The integrated rear I/O shield is an excellent touch, adding a little bit of luxury that lends itself perfectly to the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO (WiFi) refined gamer aesthetic.

We're pretty impressed with the ROG Maximus XI Hero, in particular, Asus' AI overclocking tool, which is a revolutionary new feature that will definitely appeal to those that are still overclocking novices or maybe haven't even ventured into the world of voltages and multipliers yet. The board is slightly better rounded than the previous two Z390 boards we've seen although both also pip Asus to the post in a couple of areas. The MSI MEG Z390 Ace has excellent power delivery, a better M.2 heatsink, and a couple of extra bells and whistles while the Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Master is better looking and has a more advanced fan control suite. However, we feel the Hero strikes the best balance in terms of features, and it also has an excellent EFI and slightly more polished software along with its AI overclocking tool. It's worth going for the non-Wi-Fi version if you won't be needing it, as you can save around £20. Otherwise, it's a close call, but ultimately it just does enough to grab our top award.

ASUS is spot on with the new Maximum XI HERO. it is a very enjoyable motherboard with a refined BIOS. We like new VRM design and heatsinks that go along with it. A bit of a miss is that ASUS stuck towards 1 Gbps Ethernet. Realtek now has 2.5 Gbps available and Aquantia 10 Gbps Ethernet. The Z390 Maximus XI Hero certainly is a nice looking product, the board kicks in nicely with exactly the right amount of RGB LEDs, and once activated it's just a completely different board to look at. The LEDs give the product really nice looks. Connectivity wise in terms of your PCIe slots for your graphics subsystem you are looking at a full x16 Gen 3 lanes for one graphics cards. The second and PCIe slot shares its lanes with the first one, ergo you'd end up at a configuration like x8/x8. The third x16 slot, in fact, is an x4 slot which draws its lanes from the chipset. We expect Coffee lake to be able to manage the 5 GHz domain on all cores with exceptions running up towards 5.2 GHz (all-core). I base this metric on high-perf air coolers or decent enough liquid cooling. From there onwards you are looking at proc ASIC quality and cooling being the more important denominator. There's little else to say other than this is a great motherboard in the mainstream segment. Highly recommended, but at the time of writing we did not have the final pricing available just yet, we expect it to be the 250 USD/EUR domain.