ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING Motherboard Review
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The ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING Motherboard
Intel has held off releasing their more mainstream chipset for the 300-series for quite a while and we’ve seen the release of the H370, B360 and H310 motherboards only after nearly half-a-year of having the Z370 chipset in what was a really rushed move from Intel. Despite that, users did benefit by getting a much more cost-effective quad-core part from Intel and of course, Intel’s first mainstream consumer-oriented 6-cores. Despite that though, platform cost has been a barrier for many upgraders as Intel has reluctantly saved the lower portion of the 300-series chipset until only recently, forcing many to stick with the much costlier Z370 or just hold off on upgrading. In some cases, some users even jumped ship to AMD because of their better value proposition. Still, Intel wouldn’t be swayed and they stuck with their launch calendar.
The H370 and B360 chipsets are essentials scaled down versions of the Z370, the primary differences mainly focusing on the lack of overclocking support and enthusiast features but also to I/O options. Given their prices though, H370 and B360 chipsets have been mostly relegated to mid-tier status which is perfectly fine especially for buyers of non-K edition processors who have no interest in overclocking and just want a straight build with a single GPU that works as intended.
In this review we’ll take a look at the ASUS ROG Strix B360-F GAMING. Serving as the more conservative full-ATX motherboard in the ROG Strix gaming line, this motherboard borrows many attributes and features from its high-end brothers at the mainline ROG family but still maintain a distinct appeal of its own without touching ROG pricing territory. ASUS has recently expanded their family of products for their motherboard stack and has made it distinctly clear what the tiering is for their products. You can check out our coverage of ASUS’ new motherboard lines for a primer.
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The Intel B360 Chipset
Intel’s B360 sits in the middle of the Intel 300-series chipset stack and is aimed primarily at bare-bones build particularly for businesses hence the B in the naming designation. Over time though, the business designation of this chipset family has been set aside and has become the secondary mid-market offering for Intel. Board makers have made it so that the B360 usually sits just a touch below the H370 and offers features and functionality accordingly.
Right off the bat, the main limitation that most builders may want to know about the B360 chipset is that it doesn’t support multiplier-unlocked overclocking. That means while you can use a K-processor like an Intel Core i7-8700K on B360 motherboards, it won’t allow you to overclock via multiplier so you’re very restricted if you want to go further hence why many builders will never recommend this combination. The B360 chipset also has a memory speed limit of 2666Mhz meaning even if you have a DDR4-3000 kit, the maximum you can go is at 2666.
Closer Look
ASUS has been very uniform in their packaging design for a while now particularly for the ROG STRIX and this release isn’t any different. Featuring the bright AURA-inspired ROG logo in the front, we get a nice shot of the motherboard on the box cover alongside bold print of the motherboard model name. Do note that the ROG STRIX family is quite a large motherboard collection and there are small distinctions in naming particularly chipsets and designations e.g. H370-F vs B360-F or B360-G et.al. At the back of the box we have a detailed rundown of the motherboard segments as well as features highlighted by special marketing bullets.
As this is a mid-market model, the offering is relatively slim but ASUS doesn’t skimp on a few goodies. The ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING features a sticker sheet with labels, a door hanger, and a greeting card. Also included are M.2 mounting screws, SATA cables, RGB extension cable and zip ties.
ASUS has been experimenting with motherboard designs for their ROG Strix series for a while now and they seem to have finally nailed their recipe with the monotonous black/grey shade of the recent releases. The ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING along with its 300-series chipset family members offer a new striking design feature: cyber-text. These print patterns emblazoned across the motherboard PCB give a bit of extra aesthetic detailing to the board without going over-the-top on the VRM or PCH heatsink. The prints do go across the board as well as the back. Speaking of the back, as always, ASUS has done a great job on solder work with barely any protrusions or flux residue in this motherboard.
The lower half of the motherboard gives us a decent amount of expansions. Given the limitations of the B360 chipset, we’re restricted to an x16 PCI-E slot operating at x16 via the processor and three x1 PCI-E slots and another x16 slot operating at x4 from the chipset. We have the CMOS battery lodged in-between the PCI-e x16 slots and you can actually use the provided stickers to cover-up the battery with an ROG logo. We also have two M.2 slots, the upper one operating at x2 and supports both PCIe and SATA while the lower one is strictly PCIe and runs at x4.
For some reason, ASUS decided to deck out the SATA ports vertically and by that I mean all 6 SATAIII ports line the right edge of the motherboard. This may not be a big deal but if you’re filling every single one and want decent cable management, they’re gonna be a challenge to weave to the rear of the case tray.
One of the most convenient features that ASUS has recently implemented together with a few other brands is the inclusion of pre-installed I/O shields. I’m admittedly one of those people that will usually finish a build only to find that I forgot to install the rear I/O shield and that can be a ton of work. With the pre-installed I/O shield, this lessens the risk of such bungles and also reduces potential accidents with the rather sharp edges of the I/O shield as well as misaligned placements that may ruin ports.
Despite its mid-market position, ASUS still equips a decent VRM on this motherboard: a 10+2 power phase design, complimented with decent components.
As mentioned in the opening, this motherboard supports DDR4-2666 memory at max. This is a chipset limitation and not by ASUS. Users can install a maximum of 4 sticks in this motherboard with a maximum total capacity of 64GB.
ASUS has stuck with their SupremeFX implementation for the audio on this motherboard as well. This is a souped-up version of the ALC1220 from Realtek with ASUS’ own implementations. ASUS is also an audio card maker so trust them to be able to deliver a decent onboard audio solution with the SupremeFX.
Performance Testing
Processor: Intel Core i7 8700K
Motherboard: ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR4-3600 2x8GB
Storage: WD Blue SSD 1TB
Graphics Card: ZOTAC GTX 1080 Ti AMP! Edition
Cooling: Thermaltake Water 3.0 360mm
Power Supply: Seasonic Platinum P1000
Display: ViewSonic VX2475Smhl-4K
Notice: As many already know, most motherboards will have varying frequency multipliers and this may affect performance overall. As this is part of their out of the box configuration we see it fit to use them as is. All data presented here in are with the default motherboard settings for stock performance. Overclocked performance will be indicated where needed. For non-Z series motherboards, all benchmarks are performed on DDR4-2133 default settings.
As always, we’ll let the numbers do the talking.
Rendering and Encoding
Arithmetic Benchmarks
System Benchmarks
Memory Performance
Temperature and Power Draw
In this test we’ll measure how much manufacturer-set BIOS settings affect temperature and power draw. As we’re dealing with pre-launch samples, more mature BIOS may change these over time.
We really don’t put too much stock on individual component temperatures as they will vary depending on usage and we do not benchmark using extreme loads anymore as they’re not reflective of real world applications. To stress the CPU, we use a 20-minute run of AIDA64 stress test. We recorded the peak CPU temps and cross-match HWINFO and AIDA64 readings. For power readings, we measure the peak system draw.
While everything seems to be close to each other, its worth noting that the ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING does score a touch cooler and draws less power under load than the rest of our motherboards. This may be due to how ASUS has tuned its power delivery as well as voltages in the BIOS making it a bit more conservative.
Conclusion
ASUS has created a pretty good strategy to capture most of the market when it comes to motherboards. They have a good stack of solutions for people looking to build high-end multi-GPU gaming systems as well as basic, single GPU gaming machines. With the Z series chipsets becoming more and more expensive, the mainstream choice has roughly fallen on the hands of the H370 and B360 and when paired with the right components, the B360 platform is a great option for those that want to stick with a single GPU machine with no overclocking. Most people that actually just want to game are fine with that.
Focusing on the ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING motherboard, it’s got a lot going on for it: great build clean layout, quality you can feel with the dense PCB. Everything’s right here. Ultimately it falls down to price and ASUS premium is still in effect and you do get a significant mark-up versus other B360 motherboards with this one. What it does give you is of course ROG-level quality and a couple of its features: you get a full x16 PCI-e for your GPU, SupremeFX audio, two M.2 slots, support for four DDR4 memory sticks up to DDR4-2666. There’s a touch of RGB as well and the cyber-text PCB print is unlike anything you’ve seen before. It’s a really well done motherboard and if you value ASUS quality, you’re getting peace of mind with your purchase.
The ASUS ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING motherboard looks impressive and performs just as great as well. ASUS maxes out the B360 chipset and brings a cost-effective platform for builders that want a long-term investment for their 8th-gen build.
ASUS backs the ROG STRIX B360-F GAMING motherboard with a 3-year warranty. We give it our B2G Silver Award!
