Asus BTF: Rear motherboard connectors for the first time for LGA 1851 and AM5 20 comments
Image: Asus
With Back-to-the-Future (BTF), Asus has its own standard for rear power connections on motherboards; with Advanced BTF, the card can also power the graphics card via a contact. Until now, these motherboards were only available for Intel‘s Socket 1700, but spin-offs for LGA 1851 and, for the first time, AM5 will follow soon.
The ROG Maximus Z890 Hero BTF is a luxury card
Intel’s new socket receives its first Advanced-BTF motherboard in the form of the luxurious ROG Maximus Z890 Hero BTF. As usual for a Hero, Asus pulls out all the stops in terms of features: The power supply is generously sized with a 22 + 1 + 2 + 2 design (110 A / 90 A / 90 A / 80 A) and is covered by expansive heat sinks.
The card offers a total of six M.2 slots, three of which support PCIe 5.0, 5 Gigabit + 2.5 Gigabit LAN on separate controllers from Intel and Realtek, two Thunderbolt 4 ports and Wifi-7. There is a massive backplate on the back of the motherboard.
All this will undoubtedly have its price, even the “normal” ROG Maximus Z890 Hero without back-connect costs more than 760 euros, the surcharge for the Advanced BTF variant will probably be high.
TUF-Gaming B850-BTF Wifi brings reconnection to the AMD platform for the first time
The first AMD motherboard with Asus BTF is much more down-to-earth, also here in the Advanced version with a hidden power supply for the GPU via a contact on the board. Being part of the TUF gaming series and featuring the B850 chipset, the card should put a lot less strain on your wallet.
Asus isn’t sharing many details with the public yet; On the specs side, it is only stated that the card will support Wifi 7 and that one of the M.2 slots will work with PCIe 5.0.
Asus TUF-Gaming B850-BTF (Image: Asus)
Apparently the TUF-Gaming B850-BTF Wifi is still a long way from being released to the market, only one teaser image has been shared with the public and the exact specifications don’t seem to have been determined yet. As a result, unlike the ROG Maximus Z890 Hero BTF, there is no product page for the AM5 card yet.
Topics: AM5 AMD Asus CES 2025 Ryzen motherboards Source: Asus
Thomas analyses motherboards to reveal their secrets: performance, connectivity, and overclocking options.
