We have not reviewed many ASRock boards, but when the X870E Taichi landed on my desk, I was eager to take a look. While I normally flock to ASUS, MSI or GIGABYTE when I put together a rig for our offices, this new board had me interested, and I love the look. The ASRock X870E Taichi leans into an understated premium look that is striking, and while it is not at the level of some of the top-tier boards on the X870E platform, it strikes a good balance of features and price that should work for many builders.
As you can guess from the name, the X870E Taichi is built around AMD’s top-tier X870E chipset, meaning it comes with all the bells and whistles we have come to expect, including full PCIe 5.0 support for both your graphics card and your storage. If you are running a Ryzen 9000 series processor or even a Ryzen 7000 chip, this board is ready for it right out of the box. The AM5 socket gives it legs for the future, since AMD has committed to supporting this platform for the foreseeable future. That kind of longevity matters when you are spending this much on a motherboard, especially at PC part prices as they stand right now.
Unboxing the X870E Taichi, you will immediately feel just how solid it is. The signature gear-inspired design on the heatsinks gives it a mechanical, almost industrial look that sets it apart from the competition. It has a look all its own that I rather enjoy, a mix of steampunk mixed with modern PC parts, and it somehow works. The reinforced PCIe slots, the hefty VRM heatsinks, and the full-coverage backplate all point to a board designed to handle heavy loads without flinching, and made to work with demanding workloads without breaking a sweat (at least that is the impression it gives off)
The ASRock X870E Taichi ships with a 24+2+1-phase power delivery setup using 110A smart power stages. In plain terms, this means the board can feed clean, stable power to even the most demanding Ryzen processors. What is most impressive is how this translates in testing, with the temperatures around the VRM staying well under control, even under extended all-core workloads. If you plan to overclock, this board gives you plenty of headroom to push beyond stock settings. As always, overclocking is not for everyone, but at least the ASRock X870E Taichi is built to deliver the stability you need if you want to try pushing your CPU a bit past what it ships with.
The X870E Taichi brings all the support you would hope to see from a modern DDR5-based board, and with BIOS tuning, it can push memory speeds well beyond baseline specs. AMD’s EXPO profiles work smoothly, and for those who like to tinker, the manual overclocking options in the BIOS are thorough without being overwhelming.
The board ships with four DIMM slots, so there is room to grow if your workload demands more capacity down the road. And if that was not enough, the board supports up to 8200+ overclocked memory if you want to push the limits on your RAM sticks, and offers a 256 GB maximum, 4x 64 GB, if you want to kit your system out as far as it can go.
The board also ships with a plethora of M.2 options to build out your new system, giving you flexibility in how you configure everything. You get multiple M.2 slots, including dedicated PCIe 5.0 lanes for next-generation NVMe drives. ASRock has also included solid heatsink coverage over each M.2 slot, which helps keep drive temperatures in check during sustained read and write operations. For anyone working with large files, whether that means video editing, game development or data analysis, the storage bandwidth on this board is hard to beat.
“The ASRock X870E Taichi leans into an understated premium look that is striking…”
The ASRock X870E Taichi ships with the level of connectivity you would expect at this price point, featuring Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 as standard. The rear I/O panel is packed with USB ports, including USB4 with Thunderbolt 4 support. It features two USB4 40 Gbps Type-C ports, five USB 3.2 Gen2 10 Gbps Type-A ports, three USB 3.2 Gen1 5 Gbps Type-A ports and two USB 2.0 480 Mbps Type-A ports. That last detail is a big deal for content creators who rely on fast external storage or docking stations. You also get a 5G Ethernet port alongside a 2.5G port, giving you options for wired networking depending on your setup.
While I really enjoyed the overall build, the BIOS was, on the other hand, a mixed bag for me. ASRock has made steady improvements over the years, and the X870E Taichi’s UEFI is well organized for the most part. Finding key settings such as memory timings, fan curves, and boot priorities is straightforward. That said, some of the deeper overclocking menus could use a bit more polish in their layout and labelling. It is not a deal-breaker by any stretch, but compared with the very best BIOS interfaces on the market, there is still a gap, and ASRock has some catching up to do.
Honestly, the nitpicks about the BIOS rest more on how this board is priced. At $479.99 USD, the X870E Taichi is firmly in enthusiast territory, so it is up against some heavy competition. You are paying for premium power delivery, top-end connectivity and future-proof features, but there are capable X870 boards out there for considerably less if you do not need every bell and whistle.
The value here really depends on whether you plan to take advantage of things like the extra connectors on the board, the level of ports on offer and the solid build that many will never take full advantage of. If those features matter to your workflow, the Taichi earns its keep. If they do not, you might be better served by something more modest.
There is a lot to like about the ASRock X870E Taichi, and the brand has delivered a solid entry that manages to stand out in a crowded market. It is a well-built, feature-rich motherboard that delivers where it counts: power delivery, connectivity and storage speed. It handles AMD’s latest processors with ease and gives enthusiasts plenty of room to push performance further. The Taichi line has always been about substance over flash, and this generation is no different. For builders who want a rock-solid foundation and are willing to pay the premium, the X870E Taichi is easy to recommend.
