Layout

With the Z170-A ASUS decided to use the same color scheme, which is already in place with their X99 offerings. You find a black PCB as well as coolers with white elements and a white cover for the back I/O panel. As you might have expected, the layout has been well thought and there is for example enough clearance around the CPU socket to install even todays largest CPU coolers. If you want to install extra long graphics cards, there will be no issues, thanks to the angled SATA ports.

The ASUS Z170-A comes with a digital 8+2+1 phase power design. The CPU is backed up by eight phases, the iGPU can rely on two phases and the memory receives stable current supply from one phase. In general the power design on this board is adequate for the job at hand. It's even good for aircooled overclocking every now and then, but we would not recommend this board for extreme or continous high overclocking in combination with watercooling solutions. For that purpose ASUS has more suitable boards in its portfolio.

Totally you'll find four DIMM-slots on the Z170-A. Officially supported are DDR4 3400 (O.C.) / 3333 (O.C.) / 3300 (O.C.) / 3200 (O.C.) / 3000 (O.C.) / 2800 (O.C.) / 2666 (O.C.) / 2400 (O.C.) / 2133. There is engough space between the DIMM-slots and the CPU socket which means that you wont encounter compatibility problems with big coolers even when you choose to install RAM with big heatspreaders. Also supported are Xtreme Memory Profiles (XMP) in version 2.0.

On the Z170-A the southbridge is being cooled by a passive cooling block. A closer look at the VRM area shows there are two more individual heatsinks. The overall build quality of the blocks is good , which makes for product that feels very nice, when you're holding it in your hands.

Page 1 - Introduction	Page 14 - SiSoft Sandra 2
Page 2 - Specs and Delivery	Page 15 - UC Bench
Page 3 - Features	Page 16 - Super Pi 1M / 32M
Page 4 - Layout	Page 17 - wPrime 1024M Multi Core
Page 5 - Connectors and I/O	Page 18 - Cinebench
Page 6 - BIOS	Page 19 - Tomb Raider
Page 7 - Test setup	Page 20 - Metro Last Light
Page 8 - Preview / Gallery	Page 21 - Sleeping Dogs
Page 9 - 3D Mark	Page 22 - Power Consumption
Page 10 - 3D Mark 11	Page 23 - Performance Rating
Page 11 - 3D Mark Vantage	Page 24 - Price Comparison
Page 12 - PC Mark 8	Page 25 - Conclusion
Page 13 - SiSoft Sandra 1