AsRock Z270 Taichi motherboard review

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   I've seen AsRock's Taichi motherboards featured and reviewed online by many people for both function and form, so when I decided to do my new Kaby Lake build, I decided I wanted to Z270 Taichi for both form factor and function.
Unboxing the motherboard was a good experience.  The board was packed well in foam and fastened in, so it wouldn't flop out and cause any undue damage.  The included SATA cables are a nice touch, as not many decide to include SATA cables for ease of use.

The installation was straightforward and went in just fine.  Everything connected good and solid, as it should be, so that part was no issue.  The board has enough ports to accommodate just about any user, as it has 10 SATA ports, 2 USB 2.0 headers, and 2 USB 3.0 headers, which allows for AIO coolers, front panel connectors, and with the 3 2.0 headers, you can have front-panel connectors, an AIO, and a power supply that connect via that method with ease.

One of the puzzling things about this design is why the choice to put the case fan headers in the middle of the motherboard right by the CPU.  To me, I would have rather had those on the sides or the top to make for a cleaner overall aesthetic.  The rest of the connectors were in good locations for easy connection.

Also, for a board that supports RGB, it was a little disappointing that the ONLY place there is RGB on the board itself is around the chipset heatsink.  I was hoping perhaps the other covers on the board would have sported similar lighting, and having only one RGB header limits some options.

When I first got this board for my i7-7700K CPU, I had some issues getting a good high overclock out of it, as the temperatures spiked quite high, even on a 240mm liquid cooler.  I know these chips can run hot, but a 240mm cooler should be adequate for keeping temps in check.  For a while, I could only comfortably achieve a 4.6 boost OC on the preset, so I had to be content with that.

With the new 2.0 BIOS update, however, this changed for the better!  After the update, I was able to use the 4.7 OC preset, have my RAM sped up to 3200mhz, and the temps under load are now only in the 60's C, which is a huge improvement over what it was able to do before - no other changes were done other than the OC preset, so this was a nice welcome update.

Aside from the odd placement of the case fan headers, I can safetly say this is a really good board for the value for your Kaby Lake processors.