The ASUS SABERTOOTH packaging looks sleek and industrious, selling that heavy duty factor and backing it up with th at fantastic 5 year warranty.
The rear side reveals a whole load of information about the ASUS technologies used in this motherboard, notably we get to take another look at the RGB AURA lighting which is nice as the AMD board doesn't quite get the same full treatment as the Intel SABERTOOTH motherboards in regards to its aesthetics.
Inside we get everything needed to get the board running, including the ever hand manual, SATA cables, rear IO shield, a TUF case sticker, and EZ connect plug, M2 mount and screw and an SLI bridge.
The SABERTOOTH 990FX R3.0 not only has updated the technology, but has reinvigorated the aesthetics over the older (much older) SABERTOOTH 990FX. Though not quite getting the same treatment as the Intel motherboards, it is hard to deny that this is one sexy piece of technology.
Behind the heatsink for the 10 power phases, there is a partial shroud that contains a mount for an optional 40mm fan for direct cooling. Along the top edge there are 4x 4pin PWM fan headers.
Alongside the DIMMs we find the ASUS MemOK! button for testing your RAM. Residing beneath the DIMMs is the first of two internal USB 3.0 headers.
There are 5x SATA 6Gb/s ports, the 6th has been tied to the M2 mount on the motherboard.
The primary PCIe x16 slot has been reinforced with metal to improve its strength, dubbed ASUS 'safeslot'. The internal IO headers are placed along the bottom edge, including the front panel audio, COM, TPM, a power switch and a BIOS Flashback button, and the second USB 3.0 headset which is sat next to the front panel headers.
The rear IO has an impressive array of USB ports, including 4x USB 2.0, 4x USB 3.0, 3x USB 3.1 type A, 1x USB 3.1 type C, a RJ45 gigabit LAN port, followed by a S/PDIF optical out and 5x channel audio jacks.
The primary PCIe lanes have RGB LEDs which can be customised or you can select various effects, the LED on the south-bridge cooler however cannot.
