ASUS’ Z690 motherboard lineup leaks with DDR5 and DDR4 memory options

ASUS' Z690 motherboard lineup leaks with DDR5 and DDR4 memory options

It looks like ASUS’ high-end Z690 motherboards will be DDR5 exclusive

According to a filing with the Eurasian Economic Commission (EEC, via @Komachi), ASUS plans to ship many of its upcoming Intel Alder Lake Z690 motherboards with DDR4 and DDR5 memory options. 

In recent months, hardware enthusiasts have been debating about Alder Lake’s memory performance, with some speculating that DDR4 may offer gamers high framerates than DDR5 in some instances. Early DDR5 memory modules are expected to offer higher latencies than high-spec DDR4 memory modules, which could give DDR4 users a performance advantage when gaming on Intel’s Alder Lake series processors. This hypothesis requires dedicated testing when Alder Lake launches. 

According to the ECC listing below, all of ASUS’ high-end motherboard offerings will support DDR5 memory exclusively. These motherboard models include the ROG Gamximus Z690 Extreme, the ROG Maximus Z690 Formula, the ROG Maximus Z690 Hero, and the ASUS ProArt Z690-Creator 10G. 

Some motherboards will reportedly ship with both DDR5 and DDR4 based memory options, such as ASUS’ Prime Z690A/Prime Z690-A D4, Prime Z690-P/Prime Z690-P D4, and Prime Z690-V/Prime Z690-V D4. Let’s hope that consumers/retailers don’t mix up these motherboard designs during purchasing/shipping and buy/ship the wrong memory for their motherboards. There is a lot of potential for confusion here, and it’s all Intel’s fault for not committing to a single memory type with Alder Lake. 

ASUS' Z690 motherboard lineup leaks with DDR5 and DDR4 memory options

Lower-end motherboards like the ROG STRIX Z690-A GAMING D4, ROG STRIX Z690-E GAMING D4, ROG STRIX Z690-F GAMING D4, TUF GAMING Z690-PLUS D4, PRIME Z690M-PLUS D4, and PRIME Z690-V-SI-D4 will all support DDR4 memory exclusively according to this ECC listing. These motherboards will act as more affordable entry-level Z690 motherboard offerings, allowing consumers to benefit from cheaper DDR4 memory prices. Early DDR5 memory modules are expected to arrive at premium prices, especially high-speed/low latency modules. 

You can join the discussion on ASUS’ leaked Z690 motherboard lineup on the OC3D Forums.