ASUS X99-A Motherboard Review

ASUS X99-A Conclusion

The term 'budget build' means many different things depending on who you speak to. For a HTPC user, it will involve a small motherboard with integrated graphics. For a gamer it might be an i3 paired with a graphics card that doesn't require extra power, such as an R7 240. For an X99 user, the term is not so clear cut because there is no truly budget board in this market. The chipset has a lot of IO to play with, which manufacturers add on the basis that when a user buys the chipset, they have essentially already paid for it. This means buying enough connectors for 10 SATA ports, PCIe storage, multiple GPUs and so on.

The end result is that 'budget' for X99 means under $300 for the motherboard, paired with a $390 i7-5820K and some DDR4. In that sub-$300 range each manufacturer has least a single model to aim at this crowd (some more than one), and for ASUS this is the X99-A.

Off the top, the X99-A brings in 10 SATA ports, 10 USB 3.0 ports (5 from the PCH, 3 from a hub and 2 from a controller), three-way PCIe via x16/x16/x8, an M.2 x4 running at PCIe Gen 3.0 and SATA Express. Add in to the mix an Intel I218-V network port, an upgraded ALC1150 audio solution via Crystal Sound 2 and an EZ XMP button for good measure. ASUS' strengths also lie in the BIOS and software packages, offering an easy to use system.

Looking at the performance numbers, the X99-A hits the midfield across most of the system benchmarks, excelling in our audio tests and being very reasonable for power consumption. The lack of MultiCore Turbo affects it at stock speeds but a quick switch to position one of the TPU gives a 3.9 GHz overclock, and makes this less of an issue.

For users going budget, the X99-A is worth a look, especially when it is on offer. But ultimately I think that the X99-A creates the contrast to the X99-Deluxe. By comparison, the X99-Deluxe comes with tri-stream 802.11ac Wi-Fi, dual M.2 x4 Gen 3.0 possibilities, and add in fan controller card, dual SATA Express, 10 rear USB 3.0 ports, a styled rear panel and audio design as well as more SATA ports, another NIC and better box contents. Is that worth the $125 difference? As a budget build, the X99-A could be paired with an i7-5820K but a user would still require almost $1000 for a full system. It is hard to say if the price difference to other motherboards is worth it, depending on what the user ultimately wants to integrate (M.2, WiFi) into their experience.