ASUS Z490-Plus WiFi TUF Gaming Preview

Introduction

Any time a new product hits the market we’re always swamped with the high end products from the various manufacturers as they want to show off the new technology in its brightest light.

With the Z490 we’ve also had a few motherboards that step away from this flagship ethos and instead show off how much connectivity and speed can be packed into an otherwise fairly unassuming PCB. One such model is the ASUS TUF Gaming Z490-Plus WiFi. There is a non-WiFi model going to be available at launch too, but we’ve got the wireless one here. It is neither under the ROG branding, nor does it particularly step outside the box when it comes to the design.

Nonetheless, if you fancy a motherboard that is a lot less like the current aesthetic choices on the market then it might be right up your alley. An affordable motherboard will plenty of connectivity and performance potentially lurking beneath its utilitarian design might be exactly what you need to freshen up your build. So let’s take a quick run through the specifications before we look at it in the flesh.

Technical Specifications

The Z490 chipset has got a consistent set of connectivity options on it and the Z490-Plus WiFi TUF Gaming is no exception. All the elements we’ve seen so far in our previews of the Z490 range are present and correct, from the USB 3.2 Gen2 ports, through the Intel WiFi with Bluetooth 5.1 and the PCI Express 3.0 lanes available to both the M.2 and GPU side of things. But let’s look at it in the flesh.