Conclusion
ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX
At a price of $719.99 if you can find one in stock, the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX is expensive. It’s not remotely the most expensive motherboard in the lineup. The ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 EXTREME is around $1,099.99 and is equally difficult to get. There is a Glacial version of that with an included EK monoblock that costs a whopping $1,999.99 if you can stomach that.
However, don’t let the fact that the APEX isn’t the most expensive motherboard fool you. Its VRM implementation, sub-ambient cooling features, and dual memory slot design are second to none. This is ASUS’ top performance option and while it lacks some of the fluff of its more expensive brethren, it’s by no means stripped down or basic. It also manages to offer everything it does while remaining on the ATX form factor which increases chassis compatibility. The ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 EXTREME for example is E-ATX. Motherboards from other brands that directly compete with the APEX are also E-ATX, so that’s something to think about.
Installation and Setup
I’ve been working with the Z690 Express boards since their launch. I haven’t worked with all that many of them in total, but every Z690 motherboard I’ve installed has been somewhat tricky to deal with. Granted, this is the most recent board I’ve worked with so the UEFI has had time to mature, and get ironed out. Even so, the experience I had with the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX is by far the best of the bunch and the most trouble-free. I had the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 EXTREME in my personal rig from the week they launched and it was rough early on. While the aforementioned Biostar Z690 GTA Racing was decent, it still had a couple of issues here and there in the beginning.
The ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX was nothing like that. It felt like a mature product out of the box and it just worked. I also had no trouble with different memory kits. On some boards, even running at DDR5 5600MHz can sometimes be a challenge. Usually, there is some drama with the memory configuration and there is none of that here.
Performance
When it comes to performance, the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX is functionally like any other Z690 Express motherboard. However, it does have a couple of advantages. To be frank, you need to be taking advantage of its memory overclocking, water cooling, or sub-ambient cooling features to really justify a motherboard like the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX over something like the Biostar Z690 GTA Racing or even an entry-level DDR5 motherboard.
That being said, the motherboard is a solid performer but more importantly, it really isn’t hard to use despite its numerous advanced features. You can grab this thing, throw it into your chassis and it will just work.
Overclocking
Unfortunately, the Core i9 12900K isn’t really the CPU for stretching the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX’s overclocking prowess unless you are using liquid nitrogen. That being said, it is one of the motherboards that can do BCLK overclocking of lower-end, non-K SKU CPUs. It’s also a fantastic memory overclocker. I was able to get every bit of DDR5 6400MHz speeds out of it. This motherboard has every feature one could need to push any boundaries you can think of and many very few people would ever bother with.
Final Points
To put it simply, the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX is the best Z690 chipset board we’ve tested to date. The overclocking and general feature sets are virtually unmatched. More importantly, the motherboard is extremely robust and reliable. Obviously, the caveat here is price. Of course, this is a niche product in that the dual DIMM design limits what you can do with it in terms of total memory capacity.
It was expensive. However, it’s an awesome board and if you are looking to overclock a 12th-generation Intel CPU, this is probably the best possible platform for doing that. If you simply want to overclock the memory, this is probably the best possible motherboard you could have at the time of this writing. Unfortunately, it comes at a very high price tag. But that’s not a deal breaker I don’t think you’ll be disappointed in the ASUS ROG MAXIMUS Z690 APEX.
Simply put, this is the pinnacle of an enthusiast motherboard. For that, it earns our gold award.
