ASUS Z590-A Prime vs Strix B560-A Comparison

Side by Side

We come out of the gates with our first slight surprise of the day. As you are probably aware the ROG branding went from being a red box with silver text and black accents to the inverse of that – black box with red accents – some time ago now. Similarly the Strix box has been resolutely black with the multi-hued ROG eye for as long as we care to remember. Not here. The Prime is in the black box with a clear product image, whilst the Strix goes for a white box with a drawing out of a textbook as the product shot and no ROG eye.

  
  

This is the money shot, the photo that shows why we’re pairing these two motherboards together. The differences are slight at best, with the extra PCI Express slot and armor along with a slightly different heatsink being the only really obvious changes. The keen eyed will spot other minor alterations between the Z590 and B560, but they both pass the “at a glance” test in the same way non-identical twins do.

  

Thankfully the Strix has a brand you can see when viewing it from the side, otherwise it would be tough to tell which is which. We’ll be banging this drum for a while, so get used to it.

  

Around the back is always where the majority of differences can be found when it comes to the retail price of two motherboards. However, you could be forgiven for thinking the Strix – on the right – is the more expensive of the two. It has WiFi and one extra button for the BIOS Flashback which are missing from the Prime. The Prime does have one more Type-C port, and a slight change between USB 3.2 Gen2 vs USB 3.2 Gen1 largely present on the Strix. Lastly the Prime has an SPDIF connector whilst the Strix has the ASUS Type-C audio header.