Introduction
In July of 2024, AMD announced the X870/E chipset, also along with the B850 chipset. In early January 2025 we began to see the release announcements of motherboards based on this B850 chipset which supports socket AM5 CPUs. This review will evaluate the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi motherboard.
The Steel Legend is a distinctly themed motherboard from ASRock and it is generally included in all their recent motherboard releases. This board is the familiar white-silver accented with black ports and is generally placed near the top of gaming-centric offerings. ASRock is coming to this release loaded to the hilt with motherboard choices. There are no less than 16 different B850 motherboards to choose from in all shapes and sizes.
In fact, one-half of the B850 offerings from ASRock are either mATX or ITX. Our ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi is one of seven full ATX boards with plenty of connectivity and storage as well as full options within the UEFI/BIOS for overclocking the CPU and memory. Also, the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi pushes the requirements pedal all the way to the floor, including Gen5 PCIe and Gen5 M.2 support. About all that is missing on this board is USB4 which is an optional offering on the B850 motherboards.
In simplified terms, the AMD B850 has a single promontory chipset and supports PCIe 5.0 (Gen5) to the NVMe with graphics support of PCIe 5.0 being an optional feature, otherwise, it supports PCIe 4.0 (Gen4) graphics. It also supports up to USB 3.2 20Gbps natively and lacks the USB4 mandatory spec of the AMD X870/E chipsets. Motherboards based on this class of chipset still support CPU and memory overclocking, however, for full enthusiast tweaking options. AMD has a great chipset comparison chart available for reference.
With the release of the B850 chipset motherboards comes the plan to allow entry or upgrade to socket AM5 at an affordable price without sacrificing form or function. Our ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi is priced currently at $209. Let us proceed and test out the theory.
Packaging and Contents
This ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi was received directly from ASRock. As you can see the left corner got a bit dinged on the way. The contents were undisturbed. The structure of the packaging is what we have come to expect, obviously, it can take a hit and come out just fine. The board is packaged in an anti-static bag. There isn’t much else to talk about. We see a Quick Start booklet, WiFi antenna, case badge, two SATA cables, a thermistor prob,e, and a coupl ofe cable straps.
ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi Features
The ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi is a full ATX motherboard. As we discussed earlier the Steel Legend is very consistently carried across ASRock motherboards and graphics cards. It has a nice white and silver color scheme and all-black ports. It is a rather good-looking board. The heatsinks are likewise heavy brushed aluminum with silver and black decals and lettering. The heatsinks are solid aluminum which gives the board a solid feel. The PCB is eight-layer copper inlayed so there is no flex or bend to the board at all. There is RGB on this board along the bottom of the secondary M.2 heatsink as well as no less than four RGB headers for more if you need it. No digital readouts or power buttons on this motherboard, but ASRock does use a set of De-Bug LEDs in the right upper corner for some guidance if you do run into an issue.
There are four M.2 slots on this board. The primary M.2 slot has an EZ release mechanism. The secondary M.2 heatsink, housing M.2#3 and #4 needs a screwdriver to remove, the screws are secured to the heatsink to keep them put, a great idea. The M.2_2 slot has no heatsink. All the M.2 slots have tool-less hold-down mechanisms consisting of a small rotating latch. The M.2 heatsinks have top-mounted thermal pads. The primary M.2 slot has a bottom-mounted thermal pad as well. The primary PCIe slot has a “Graphics Card Lite” latch located alongside the rear release. It is essentially an enlarged tab that sits on the latch for people with fumble fingers, making it easier to release your GPU. It is a nice touch. The primary PCIe is also metal-reinforced.
The rear I/O panel of the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi has a fairly well-equipped set of connections. There are nine USB-A ports (three 5Gb/s and two 10Gb/s) and two USB-C ports (10Gb/s) alongside WiFi7 and 2.5Gb ethernet. The wireless is from a MediaTek RZ717 and the LAN is Realtek Dragon RTL 8125BG. Audio can support up to 7.1 channels via a RealTek ALC 4082 codec. The audio also supports Nahimic Audio from Steel Series. Recall that B850 chipsets do not require USB4 support, so honestly, that’s all that is lacking on the I/O side of things.
Power Delivery
This motherboard uses a 14+2+1 Smart Power Phase setup with 80amps across the VCore. This should be more than adequate power and protection for CPU overclocking. The dual 8-pin CPU power connectors are placed in the standard location on this Steel Legend board, the top left. As was stated above, the VRM heatsinks are heavy brushed aluminum. We did not identify any heatpipes. The PCB is advertised by ASRock as an eight-layer server-grade board with 2oz copper layering. ASRock also utilizes black 20K capacitors for what they feel is higher quality and longevity.
CPU Socket, Memory and Storage
The ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi supports socket AM5 CPUs in the Ryzen 7000, 8000, and 9000 series. There is ample space surrounding the socket to place most if not all CPU coolers. Our MSI AIO MAG Core 360I gave us no mounting issues. Memory supported includes DDR5 DIMMs up to 256 GB in total. Frequencies are advertised up to 8000MT/s (OC). XMP and Expo profiles are supported for 1 click overclocking. The memory slots are double-latched. Spacing seems adequate for large CPU coolers. The only issue here may be tall DIMM heatsinks in slot A1 and low cooling fins on an air-cooled heatsink.
There is actually quite a bit of storage on this motherboard. Slot M.2_1 supports Gen5 SSDs (Blazing M.2) and slots 2 through 4 support full-speed Gen4 SSDs (Hyper M.2). Along with this are four SATA 6 Gb/s right-angled ports on the right-hand side of the motherboard powered by an ASM 1064 chip. M.2#1 and #2 are from the CPU while M.2#3 and #4 are from the B850 chipset. Transfer rates are 128Gb/s Gen5 and 64Gb/s Gen4. Of note, if the M.2_4 slot is occupied, PCIe slot 2 will be disabled.
Expansion
Expansion on this motherboard consists of one primary Gen5x16 PCIe slot and one PCIe Gen4x4 slot. The primary slot is supplied by the CPU, the other by the chipset. The primary slot is metal-reinforced and has a very nifty “Graphics Card Lite” Release latch located on the right-hand edge (pen pointer added for emphasis in photo). It isn’t quite an EZ release button or lever and you still have to get your finger near the back end of your GPU, but it is helpful, nonetheless. Again, if you populate M.2_4 you will disable PCIe slot#2.
The interesting point about this layout for expansion and storage is spacing. Even with a large 3-slot GPU, ASRock has placed the M.2 slots well out of the way. If you have a thin-ish Gen4 SSD you will definitely be able to utilize slot#2 which has been difficult on many of the X870/E motherboards. Plus it is no loss that M.2 slot #2 does not have a heatsink cover, because you generally can’t use it due to fitment under the GPU.
I/O
The rear I/O panel is well supplied on the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi motherboard. The panel has the motherboard plate embedded which is nice. Working from left to right: HDMI port, WiFi antenna, BIOS Flashback button, Four USB-A 2.0 ports, two USB-A Gen3.2 (10Gb/s “Ultra Power”), two USB-A 3.1 (5Gb/s “Lightning Gaming”), one USB4-C (10Gb/s), 2.5Gb RJ-45 ethernet, USB-A Gen3.1 (5Gb/s) port, USB-C (10Gb/s) port and SPDIF and sound outputs.
On the main board, we have a total of six 4-pin fan headers. Three on the top right, one labeled AIO, two on the bottom row, and one tucked just behind the I/O panel. The “Fantastic” software in the BIOS can control all these with one click, or individually. On the right edge of the board, we have a single USB type C front panel header (20Gb/s), one right-angled and one flat USB Gen 3.1 headers (5Gb/s), and four right-angled SATA ports. The bottom edge houses the front panel header, two USB 2.0 headers, and the front audio header. This board has a total of four LED headers, three are addressable and one is a 12V four-pin header. This will be a nice compliment to the row of RGBs already on the board. If you need it ASRock Polychrome SYNC is available as a download.
UEFI/BIOS
The ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi uses a standard UEFI/BIOS, an American Megatrend AMI UEFI. Entering the BIOS is quite easy from the logo screen on the boot. The BIOS enters the main screen for “Advanced mode” by default. There are “Advanced” and “Easy” modes to choose from. The Easy Mode is a single screen that gives basic information as well as the options to select RAM overclocking profiles, enable PBO, and Boot priority. Boot priority is simply a drag and drop which is nice and easy to use. Hitting F6 will take you to Advances Mode which is where OC Tweaker and Advanced submenus reside, as well as the Tool menu and Hardware Monitoring/Fantastic menus.
Recall that the B850 motherboards have both manual and automatic overclocking settings for the CPU and RAM. This allows for quite a bit of tinkering if that is what you enjoy. Quite honestly, if you look at the X870 Steel Legend WiFi motherboard review, you will find that the BIOS for the B850 Steel Legend is essentially identical.
Our ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi came to us with BIOS version 3.15 dated 12 Dec 24. The latest BIOS is listed on the ASRock support as 3.18.AS01 dated 23 JAN 25. We updated the BIOS to this version using the “Instant Flash” software in the Tools section of the BIOS. Instant Flash is very simple to use. Once the BIOS version is unzipped on a flash drive, all we had to do was enable the tool and it located the BIOS version automatically. Once enabled the tool did all the work. ASRock also has “BIOS Flashback” in which all you need is a PSU and the BIOS version. The button is located on the rear I/O panel.
We found working within the UEFI, was well organized. Navigation was very straightforward. The main sections were all well labeled and submenus were categorized to be easy to find. The layout was very smooth to navigate and selections could mostly be made with a single mouse click.
Subsystem and CPU Testing
Testing the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi was accomplished using the benchmarks below. The following components were used: Ryzen 7 7700X, Corsair Vengence DDR5 32GB at 6000MT/s (CMH32G5M2D6000C36), MSI Spatium M580 Gen5 NVME, and ASRock Radeon 7600XT Steel Legend 16GB graphics card. Comparison results are discussed from the recent review of the ASRock Phantom Gaming X870 RIPTIDE WiFi motherboard and ASRock X870 Steel Legend WiFi motherboard.
Benchmark Results
Above is the gallery of results that were obtained from all our standard benchmarks. In each, we compared the results to our prior X870 motherboards as discussed. All in all, there were no surprises. The ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi gave us results that were the same or even slightly better than those recorded from X870 chipsets. In the end, there were simply no glaring outliers. Specifically, if you look at the last screenshot, VRM Temperatures, the VRMs showed a cool 33C with all CPU cores at 100% and CPU temperatures of 86C. That is a very nice result right there.
Conclusion
This review allowed us to evaluate a brand new ASRock B850 chipset motherboard, the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi. This full-sized ATX board has a nearly identical layout to its counterpart, the X870 chipset Steel Legend WiFi. In fact, our board has more onboard storage than the X870 chipset. In addition, the B850 Steel Legend WiFi supports socket AM5 CPUs, DDR5 DIMMs up to 8000M/T, and Gen5 PCIe and SSDs. About all you sacrifice for a lower price tag is USB4 support.
Installation and Use
The ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi presented no problems with set-up or initial boot. All components were installed with ease and the layout presented no issues. The CPU socket is uncluttered, memory slots are double latched, EZ release latch on the primary M.2 and a new “Lite” GPU latch. The only place you need a tool is to remove the secondary M.2 heatsink. The M.2 spacings are well thought out for the use of large GPUs. Did we mention there are four M.2 slots? Well, one Gen5 and three full Gen4, are pretty nice. You don’t get any USB4 but you do have more USB ports than you need, that’s a fact. Overall, side by side, you simply can’t tell much difference between the B850 and the X870 Steel Legend motherboards and that is just fine.
The first boot-up was no issue. The UEFI/BIOS is essentially the same as the X870. Navigation was easy and menus made sense. You have full automatic and manual overclocking ability for the CPU and memory. Instant Flash works without a hitch and it is very easy to use. Windows 11 was installed quickly and easily, with no issues. Every benchmark ran without a problem and the results were essentially the same as our X870 chipset motherboards featuring the same identical components. Cooling was no issue. Using a 20-minute run-through of Cinebench R23 the board ran flawlessly.
Final Points
Our evaluation of the ASRock B850 Steel Legend WiFi was sort of a Deja-Vu. This motherboard looks and performs exactly like the X870 model we have previously reviewed. The B850 Steel Legend is a nice-looking white and silver ATX board with black accents and very subtle RGBs. It was easy to use and performed without a hitch from the jump. About all you sacrifice is two USB4 ports but you gain an extra M.2 slot over the X870 variant. The performance in benchmarks is pretty much identical. The ASRock B850 Steel Legend is a uniquely designed, well-built, gaming-centric motherboard that comes loaded with everything the B850 chipset has to offer. ASRock didn’t leave anything out here except a high price tag. This board represents a good value at $209.