Price and Availability
The Asus Maximus VII Gene is now widely available. Currently it has a retail price of $209.99, or £149.98 also with free shipping, or around Php 11,500.
The M7 Gene’s retail price is very close to the Maximus VII Hero, which is currently at $219.00. So if ever you want a full blown ATX motherboard, better get the Hero instead.
Asus Maximus VII Gene Review: Conclusion
Just like its predecessor, the Asus Maximus VII Gene is a rock solid and great performing motherboard. This motherboard is great for almost everybody looking for an M-ATX solution. Whether you are a gamer, enthusiast or an overclocker, the Maximus VII Gene will not disappoint you in terms of performance, not unless you are looking into the high-end desktop X99 platform.
However, the Maximus VII Gene is not a perfect motherboard and there are few things that I didn’t like about it. First is the no inclusion of the MPCIE add-on card. There is a slot on the rear I/O ports section, but the MPCIE card is not include in the package. I think it should be included considering that you already paid for a premium price. But this shouldn’t stop you from considering this motherboard, because you would want this motherboard for performance and system stability. Another minor thing is that it would be great if Asus included at least one SATA Express slot, just for future proofing in case WD decides to release their SATA Express based hard drives soon.
Now when it comes to performance and system tweaking and tuning, it’s all hands down for the Maximus VII Gene. You can easily overclock your processor, your memory or your graphics card at better settings compared to other Z97 motherboards. Of course this level of system stability and tweaking can also be experienced with the M7 Hero. I reached 4.7GHz with my 4770K easily, and I bet it can still be pushed further if I delid my processor.
For the newbies who doesn’t want to tinker with the BIOS settings, you can still tweak and overclock your system via AI Suite III. Of course, I will have to encourage you to tinker with the UEFI BIOS since you can do a lot of things that you can’t from the Windows-based AI Suite III. You don’t have to worry if your system crashes or won’t boot up due to improper overclocking, you can simply clear the CMOS and reset everything back to default settings.
The Asus Maximus VII Gene currently retails for $209.99, making it the most expensive Z97 micro ATX motherboard. In some retailer/stores it’s equally priced with the Maximus VII Hero, and I would not encourage that you upgrade to this one if you are coming from Maximus VI Gene. However if you are coming from a different motherboard, or you are building a new system with a micro ATX motherboard, I find no reason why you should not consider getting the Maximus VII Gene. It’s one of the best, if not the best, mATX Z97 motherboards currently available on the market, and it surely deserves the PC Enthusiast’s Highly Recommended Award.
