GIGABYTE Intros Z890 D Plus Motherboard—Leanest Feature-set for a Z890-based Board

Shortly after it announced the Z890 AORUS Elite WIFI7 Plus and Z890 Eagle WIFI7 Plus motherboards timed alongside Intel's Core Ultra 200S Plus refresh , GIGABYTE introduced what could very well be the Intel Z890 chipset-based motherboard with the leanest feature-set. The board comes with out-of-the-box support for the 250K Plus and 270K Plus. Called the GIGABYTE Z890 D Plus, this board is designed to target a very price-point, but with the top-tier Z890 chipset. It lacks any 40 Gbps USB4 or Thunderbolt 4 ports, lacks any integrated WLAN solution, and focuses on just the basics, such as wiring out up to four M.2 slots.

Built in the ATX form-factor, the GIGABYTE Z890 D Plus draws power from a combination of 24-pin ATX and two 8-pin EPS connectors, conditioning power for the CPU with a 12+1+2 phase VRM. The LGA1851 socket is wired to four DDR5 memory slots, one PCI-Express 5.0 x16 slot with an easy-eject mechanism, an M.2 Gen 5 x4 slot with heatsink, and an M.2 Gen 4 x4 slot. There are two additional M.2 Gen 4 x4 slots that are wired to the Z890 PCH. Besides the main PEG slot, there are two PCI-Express x16 slots, both of which are electrical Gen 4 x4 and wired to the PCH. Other storage features include four SATA 6 Gbps. There are no USB4/Thunderbolt 4 ports, but you get a USB 3.2 Gen 2 type-C (10 Gbps) port on the rear panel. The only networking interface is a 2.5 GbE wired LAN driven by a Realtek controller. The onboard audio solution is basic Realtek ALC887 fare. The only display output is a full-size DisplayPort. You get SMD buttons on the rear panel for power, reset, clear CMOS, and USB BIOS flashback.