How do you justify spending $600 on a motherboard alone? Most people don't, but for those who are willing to pay that kind of premium, EVGA's Z490 Dark Kingpin (because I refuse to type it as "K|NGP|N") attempts to earn its high price by batting users over the head with overclocking amenities for their Intel Comet Lake setup, like a triple BIOS and dual DDR4 memory slots.
Wait, just two memory slots? (This is the last question I'll ask, I promise. Cool with that?) Having just two DIMM slots is usually an indication of a small form factor (SFF) motherboard, but this one is actually bigger than even a standard ATX mobo, falling into the extended ATX (E-ATX) category, measuring 12 inches long by 10.89 inches wide (304.8 x 276.6 mm).
EVGA is not skimping on memory support to save a buck. For the most part, overclockers who chase world records often do so with just a single stick of memory, and sometimes two, but rarely more than that. In this case, the Z490 Kingpin Edition supports up to 64GB of DDR4-5000+ memory, versus 128GB of DDR4-4400+ memory on the regular model. So you get fewer DIMM slots, but a board that is tweaked to facilitate higher frequencies.
Other overclocking aids include a pair of debugging LEDs in the upper-right corner, in-BIOS stress testing, PCIe disable switches, a 10-layer PCB and 18-phase digital VRM, high quality capacitors, onboard temperature and voltage monitoring, dual probe-it connectors, and onboard clear CMOS, power, and reset buttons. There's also a "Slow Mode" switch that will lock the CPU multiplier to the lowest possible setting, so users can switch between the maximum OC and low speeds in real time.
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For general usage, the board serves up eight SATA 6Gbps ports (six of them native, the other two by way of an ASMedia controller) with RAID 0/1/5/10 support, two M.2 slots, four PCIe slots, dual LAN ports (Intel 1Gbe and Intel 2.5GbE), onboard 7.1 channel audio, and onboard Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0 connectivity.
Users will also find five USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports, a single USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C port, two USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A ports, a mini DisplayPort, and a PS/2 combo port, along with various USB headers.
The Z490 Dark Kinpin Edition is available now direct from EVGA.
