ASRock Launches the Z490 AQUA Watercooled Motherboard for Gaming Enthusiasts

Global motherboard manufacturer ASRock announced its latest flagship motherboard, the Z490 AQUA to the delight of gamers and power hungry users alike.

The company says it is limiting the Z490 AQUA to only 999 units.

Using the latest 16 Phase 90A Dr.MOS & 2oz Copper PCBs, it delivers up to 95% VRM efficiency. To keep VRM's and 10-core processors cool even during sustained heavy loads or even overclocking, the Z490 AQUA features a water cooling system that decreases heat on the CPU VRMs to reduce VRM temps.

Decked in a matte black undershell, the Z490 features refined edges encased with a metallic armor which highlights the techno LED lighting. By adding an external base clock generator, PCIe 4.0 components such as extra slots and an M.2 socket you can be assured that the motherboard is ready to accommodate the next generation of CPUs.

The motherboard's built-in OLED display offers users status reports on CPU voltage, temperature, system fan speed, system status, and POST status.

The Z490 AQUA provides connectivity including Intel's Thunderbolt reversible USB Type-C interface delivering high bandwidth (up to 40Gb/s), AQUANTIA AQtion 10Gbps network and the latest WiFi6 (802.11ax) wireless internet connectivity.

Onboard ESS9218 DAC promises to deliver HiFi audio without distortion and with the 112dB THD+N there is support for higher impedance for up to 600ohm using headphones. Practical WIMA audio caps optimize the sound when working on high-end audio applications to satisfy even the pickiest audiophiles. Through the active dashboard interface users can tweak surround sound, voice, bass, and treble to their listening preferences.

Features

ASRock USB 3.2 Gen2

ASRock Front Panel USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C Header (10 Gb/s)
ASRock USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A Port (10 Gb/s)
ASRock USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C Port (10 Gb/s)

ASRock Super Alloy

XXL Aluminum Alloy Heatsink
90A Power Choke
90A Dr.MOS
Memory Alloy Choke (Reduces 70% core loss compared to iron powder choke)
Combo Caps (Nichicon 12K Black Caps)
Nichicon 12K Black Caps (100% Japan made high quality conductive polymer capacitors)
I/O Armor
Matte Black PCB
High Density Glass Fabric PCB
8 Layer PCB
2oz Copper PCB

AQUA Cooling Armor
Server-Grade Low-Loss PCB
AQUANTIA 10G LAN
2.5G LAN
Intel® 802.11ax WiFi
ASRock Steel Slots

ASRock Full Coverage M.2 Heatsink
ASRock Ultra M.2 (PCIe Gen3 x4 & SATA3)
ASRock Ultra USB Power
ASRock Status OLED
ASRock Full Spike Protection (for all USB, Audio, LAN Ports)
ASRock Live Update & APP Shop

Supports 10th Gen and future generation Intel® Core™ Processors (Socket 1200)
Digi Power design
16 Power Phase design
Supports Intel® Turbo Boost Max 3.0 Technology
Supports Intel® K-Series unlocked CPUs
Supports ASRock BCLK Full-range Overclocking
Supports ASRock Hyper BCLK Engine III
Chipset - Intel® Z490

Memory

Dual Channel DDR4 Memory Technology
4 x DDR4 DIMM Slots
Supports DDR4 4700+(OC) / 4666/4600/4500/4400/4333/4266(OC) / 4133(OC) / 4000(OC) / 3866(OC) / 3800(OC) / 3733(OC) / 3600(OC) / 3200(OC) / 2933/2800/2666 / 2400 / 2133 non-ECC, un-buffered memory non-ECC, un-buffered memory
Supports ECC UDIMM memory modules (operate in non-ECC mode)
Max. capacity of system memory: 128GB
Supports Intel® Extreme Memory Profile (XMP) 2.0
15μ Gold Contact in DIMM Slots

BIOS

128Mb AMI UEFI Legal BIOS with multilingual GUI support
ACPI 6.0 Compliant wake up events
SMBIOS 2.7 Support
CPU Core/Cache, GT, DRAM, VPPM,VTTDDR, VCCSFR, VCCPLL_OC, PCH Voltage, VCCIO, VCCST, VCCSA, VPERGCOMP, CPU Internal PLL, GT PLL, Ring PLL, System Agent PLL, Memory Controller PLL Voltage Multi-adjustment

Graphics

Hardware Accelerated Codecs: AVC/H.264, HEVC/H.265 8bit, HEVC/H.265 10bit, VP8, VP9 8bit, VP9 10bit, MPEG 2, MJPEG, VC-1
Graphics, Media & Compute: Microsoft® DirectX 12, OpenGL 4.5, Intel® Built In Visuals, Intel® Quick Sync Video, Hybrid / Switchable Graphics, OpenCL 2.1
Display & Content Security: Rec. 2020 (Wide Color Gamut), Microsoft® PlayReady 3.0, Intel® SGX Content Protection, UHD/HDR Blu-ray Disc
Supports HDMI 1.4 with max. resolution up to 4K x 2K (4096x2160) @ 30Hz
Supports Auto Lip Sync, Deep Color (12bpc), xvYCC and HBR (High Bit Rate Audio) with HDMI 1.4 Port (Compliant HDMI monitor is required)
Supports HDCP 2.3 with HDMI 1.4 Port
Supports 4K Ultra HD (UHD) playback with HDMI 1.4 Port

Audio

7.1 CH HD Audio with Content Protection (Realtek ALC1220 Audio Codec)
Premium Blu-ray Audio support
Supports Surge Protection
WIMA Audio Capacitors (For Front Outputs
ESS SABRE9218 DAC for Front Panel Audio (130dB SNR)
Pure Power-In
Direct Drive Technology
PCB Isolate Shielding
Impedance Sensing on Rear Out port
Individual PCB Layers for R/L Audio Channel
Gold Audio Jacks
15μ Gold Audio Connector
Nahimic Audio

1 x 10 Gigabit LAN 100/1000/2500/5000/10000 Mb/s (AQUANTIA® AQC107):
Supports Wake-On-LAN
Supports Lightning/ESD Protection
Supports PX
1 x 2.5 Gigabit LAN 10/100/1000/2500 Mb/s (Dragon RTL8125BG)
Supports Dragon 2.5G LAN Software
Smart Auto Adjust Bandwidth Control
Visual User Friendly UI
Visual Network Usage Statistic
Optimized Default Setting for Game, Browser, and Streaming Modes
User Customized Priority Control
Supports Wake-On-LAN
Supports Lightning/ESD Protection
Supports Energy Efficient Ethernet 802.3az
Supports PXE

Wireless LAN

Intel® 802.11ax WiFi Module
Supports IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n/ax
Supports Dual-Band (2.4/5 GHz)
Supports WiFi6 802.11ax (2.4Gbps)
2 antennas to support 2 (Transmit) x 2 (Receive) diversity technology
Supports Bluetooth 5.0 + High speed class II
Supports MU-MIMO

Slots - 3 x PCI Express 3.0 x16 Slots (PCIE1/PCIE4/PCIE5: single at x16 (PCIE1); dual at x8 (PCIE1) / x8 (PCIE4); triple at x8 (PCIE1) / x8 (PCIE4) / x4 (PCIE5))

2 x PCI Express 2.0 x1 Slots
Supports AMD Quad CrossFireX™, 3-Way CrossFireX™ and CrossFireX™
Supports NVIDIA® and SLI™
Support NVIDIA® SLI™ with NVIDIA® Quadro graphics cards
Supports NVIDIA® NVLink™ with dual NVIDIA® GeForce RTX series graphics cards
1 x Vertical M.2 Socket (Key E) with the bundled WiFi-802.11ax module (on the rear I/O)
15μ Gold Contact in VGA PCIe Slot (PCIE1 and PCIE4)

Storage

6 x SATA3 6.0 Gb/s Connectors, support RAID (RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, RAID 10, Intel® Rapid Storage Technology 17), NCQ, AHCI and Hot Plug
2 x SATA3 6.0 Gb/s Connectors by ASMedia ASM1061, support NCQ, AHCI and Hot Plug*
1 x Ultra M.2 Socket (M2_1), supports M Key type 2260/2280 M.2 PCI Express module up to Gen3 x4 (32 Gb/s)**
1 x Ultra M.2 Socket (M2_2), supports M Key type 2260/2280 M.2 SATA3 6.0 Gb/s module and M.2 PCI Express module up to Gen3 x4 (32 Gb/s)
1 x Ultra M.2 Socket (M2_3), supports M Key type 2260/2280/22110 M.2 SATA3 6.0 Gb/s module and M.2 PCI Express module up to Gen3 x4 (32 Gb/s)

Connector

1 x SPI TPM Header
1 x Power LED and Speaker Header
2 x RGB LED Headers
2 x Addressable LED Headers
1 x CPU Fan Connector (4-pin)
1 x CPU/Water Pump Fan Connector (4-pin) (Smart Fan Speed Control)
6 x Chassis/Water Pump Fan Connectors (4-pin) (Smart Fan Speed Control)****
1 x 24 pin ATX Power Connector (Hi-Density Power Connector)2 x 8 pin 12V Power Connectors (Hi-Density Power Connector)
1 x Front Panel Audio Connector (15μ Gold Audio Connector
1 x USB 2.0 Header (Supports 2 USB 2.0 ports) (Intel® Z490) (Supports ESD Protection)
2 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Headers (Support 4 USB 3.2 Gen1 ports) (ASMedia ASM1074 hub) (Supports ESD Protection)
1 x Front Panel Type C USB 3.2 Gen2 Header (Intel® Z490) (Supports ESD Protection)
1 x Dr. Debug with LED
1 x Power Button with LED
1 x Reset Button with LED
1 x Retry Button
1 x Safe Boot Button

Rear Panel I/O

2 x Antenna Ports
1 x HDMI Port
1 x Optical SPDIF Out Port
2 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Thunderbolt™ 3 Type-C Ports (40Gb/s for Thunderbolt™ protocol; 10 Gb/s for USB3.2 protocol) (Supports ESD Protection)*
2 x Mini DisplayPort Input Ports
3 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A Ports (10 Gb/s) (ReDriver) (Supports ESD Protection)
1 x USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-C Port (10 Gb/s) (Supports ESD Protection)
4 x USB 3.2 Gen1 Ports (Intel® Z490) (Supports ESD Protection)***
2 x RJ-45 LAN Ports with LED (ACT/LINK LED and SPEED LED
1 x Clear CMOS Button
1 x BIOS Flashback Button
HD Audio Jacks: Rear Speaker / Central / Bass / Line in / Front Speaker / Microphone (Gold Audio Jacks)

Software and UEFI Software

ASRock Motherboard Utility (A-Tuning)
ASRock Dragon 2.5G LAN Software
ASRock Polychrome SYNC
UEFI

ASRock EZ Mode
ASRock Full HD UEFI
ASRock My Favorites in UEFI
ASRock Instant Flash
ASRock Internet Flash
ASRock Easy RAID Installer

Hardware Monitor

Temperature Sensing: CPU, CPU/Water Pump, Chassis/Water Pump Fans
Fan Tachometer: CPU, CPU/Water Pump, Chassis/Water Pump Fans
Quiet Fan (Auto adjust chassis fan speed by CPU temperature): CPU, CPU/Water Pump, Chassis/Water Pump Fans
Fan Multi-Speed Control: CPU, CPU/Water Pump, Chassis/Water Pump Fans
Voltage monitoring: +12V, +5V, +3.3V, CPU Vcore, DRAM, VPPM, PCH, VCCSA, VCCST, VCCIO, VCCPLL_OC, VCCSFR, VCCSRF_OC
1 x Status OLED