The ASUS ROG Maximus Z890 Hero and the Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 serve fundamentally different roles in a computer system. The motherboard provides the framework for the CPU, memory, and peripherals, while the graphics card handles demanding graphical computations. Choosing between them depends entirely on the user's primary needs: system build and connectivity versus high-end graphical performance.
| Attribute | ASUS ROG Maximus Z890 Hero | Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 |
|---|---|---|
| Chipset | Intel Z890 | GB202 |
| CPU Support | Intel Core Ultra Series 2 (Arrow Lake), LGA1851 | Not applicable |
| CUDA Cores | Not applicable | 21,760 |
| Memory | Up to 256GB DDR5 | 32 GB GDDR7 |
| Memory Bandwidth | Not applicable | ~1.8 TB/s (1792 GB/s) |
| PCIe Slots | 1 x PCIe 5.0 x16, 1 x PCIe 4.0 x16, 1 x PCIe 4.0 x1 | PCIe 5.0 x16 |
| Storage Options | 6 x M.2 slots, 4 x SATA 6Gb/s ports, 1 x SlimSAS connector | Not applicable |
| Connectivity | Wi-Fi 7, 2.5Gb Ethernet, 5Gb Ethernet, Bluetooth 5.4 | Not applicable |
| USB Ports | Rear: 2 x Thunderbolt 4, 5 x USB 10Gbps, 4 x USB 5Gbps; Front: 1 x USB 20Gbps, 1 x USB 10Gbps, 2 x USB 5Gbps headers, 2 x USB 2.0 headers | Not applicable |
| Power Consumption | 22+1+2+2 power stages (Vcore 110A) | 575 W |
| Price | $629.99 - $949.99 | $1,999 (MSRP Founders Edition) |