High-end PC components get all the attention, but if you stop and take a good look at what some more budget-friendly hardware can do, you might be in for a pleasant surprise. Take Asrock’s B660M Steel Legend motherboard: at $149.99 it’s aimed at gamers on tight budgets, but this LGA1700 board for Intel 12th Gen “Alder Lake” CPUs has a range of features that rival some low-end Z690-based ones. motherboards. This includes modern lighting features, a USB-C 3.2 Gen 2×2 connector on the front panel, and even limited overclocking support. What more could a gamer want from a MicroATX platform? If you can find it in any shipping board, please let us know; meanwhile, we’ll be giving this one our Editors’ Choice award for Intel-based MicroATX cards.
The design: the Winter Soldier look
Asrock applied a winter camouflage aesthetic to the B660M Steel Legend. Personally, I find it a bit flashy for my taste, but it’s something you’ll barely see after you’ve completed your build, especially in a cramped case, as MicroATX will likely oblige. The heatsinks scattered around the board use a more subdued white-gray color scheme that blends in well with the camo background and is more appealing to my eye.
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(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
To add some extra flair to the board, Asrock installed RGB LEDs along the right edge. These can be controlled via software.
Since the Intel B660 chipset and motherboard itself aren’t designed for serious overclocking, it’s only natural that the board’s powerful hardware isn’t quite on par with many Z690 motherboards. But I wouldn’t say the B660M Steel Legend is lacking in this department either.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
The board has a total of nine current phases comprising 50A Dr.MOS circuits. These are cooled by fairly large heat sinks and should perfectly meet your CPU’s power requirements. The board officially supports what appears to be all of the “Alder Lake” processors released to date, including the powerful and highly power-hungry Core i9-12900KS. If the Steel Legend can handle that monster, it shouldn’t have a problem with any of the other 12th Gen Intel CPUs.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
The Asrock B660M Steel Legend uses the more familiar and affordable DDR4 memory instead of the newer and more expensive DDR5. You get a total of four RAM slots, with a maximum supported capacity of 128GB and an upload clock speed limit of 5,333MHz. We didn’t have any DDR4 on hand that hit those high marks, but the motherboard could handle our 4.133MHz Corsair DDR4 RAM just fine.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
Storage options include two M.2 Key-M slots, each with a PCI Express 4.0 x4 connection, each allowing for up to 64 Gbps of bandwidth. Only one of these is covered by a heat spreader pre-installed on the motherboard, so you may want to look for an M.2 SSD that comes with its own heat spreader for the second slot. The board also has six SATA 3.0 ports for connecting slower 2.5-inch solid-state and 2.5- and 3.5-inch platter hard drives.
A look at the audio, networking and I/O
For the audio subsystem, Asrock chose to use Realtek’s older ALC897 codec. Information about this chip is scarce, but some motherboard manufacturers refer to it as a Realtek ALC887. If accurate, that would mean that the chip supports up to 24-bit audio playback with a sample rate of 192 kHz. The DACs have a signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 97dB, which is not quite up to par with newer solutions such as the popular Realtek ALC1220/1200 or the newer Realtek ALC4080/4082. Those codecs have a nominal SNR of 120dB, which allows them to produce clearer sound.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
While this is a major feature change, it doesn’t matter much. The difference in audio quality will probably be noticeable to most people, but not earth-shattering. Many users today opt for audio passed through an HDMI or DisplayPort connection, and some types of audio equipment, such as USB or wireless headphones or S/PDIF speaker systems, will bypass the ALC897 audio chip entirely. In addition, true audiophiles will probably prefer a dedicated sound card.
In short, the Steel Legend’s lower audio controller is just a minor niggle; many people will either not use it or be quite satisfied with its short-of-symphonic performance. We’d complain more about it on a high-end motherboard, but it’s fine at this budget price.
Unlike the audio, the B660M Steel Legend’s networking hardware is top-notch for this market segment. The board has a Realtek Dragon RTL8125BG LAN controller that can handle data transfers at 2.5 Gbps, making it comparable to many midrange and even some high-end Z690 motherboards. There’s no built-in Wi-Fi, but you’ll find an M.2 Key-E slot for adding an M.2 Wi-Fi card and cutouts in the rear I/O panel for adding antennas.
Speaking of the rear I/O panel, you get six USB ports, four USB 3.2 Gen 1 and two vintage USB 2.0. These are all Type-A ports, which is a bit unusual for modern motherboards.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
In addition to the USB connections, you see an HDMI port, a DisplayPort output, an Ethernet connection, an S/PDIF connection and five 3.5 mm audio connections. There is also a legacy PS/2 connection for a keyboard or mouse and a button to flash the BIOS.
Connecting all your cables to the B660M Steel Legend is a more or less average job; items like the CPU power connector and CPU fan headers are somewhat difficult to access, but no more so than on many other motherboards. One of the CPU fan headers is a little easier to get to as it’s on the right side of the RAM slots, which helps a bit. The rest of the heads are placed along the right and bottom edges of the board in what is essentially a standard placement.
A Brief Look at the BIOS
The B660M Steel Legend boots directly into the EZ Mode BIOS when you first turn on the system and press the F2 or Delete key. Usually you don’t need to go further in the BIOS than this. You can check which hardware is recognized, adjust the boot order, enable a memory profile, and flash the BIOS.
(Credit: Asrock)
There are many more options available in Advanced Mode BIOS, but unless you want to fine-tune settings to speed up your boot time, improve IGP performance, or do something similarly specialized there is little reason to use Advanced Mode unless you want to play with overclocking.
Overclocking: yes you can!
Technically, Intel’s B660 chipset doesn’t support overclocking, but that shouldn’t stop you if you’re feeling adventurous. The Asrock B660M Steel Legend gives you two main methods to boost the processor and achieve better performance.
Starting with the 12th generation of CPUs, Intel chips contain two types of CPU cores: performance and efficient cores (also known as P-Cores and E-Cores) that do exactly what their name suggests. The former offer better overall performance and the latter are slower but more energy efficient. All “Alder Lake” processors have P-Cores, but not all E-Cores, which is an important distinction.
(Credit: Asrock)
If your CPU has P-Cores and supports Intel’s Turbo Boost technology, you can overclock it to run all CPU cores at maximum turbo speed. Let’s take a look at the Core i7-12700K as an example. It has a maximum turbo speed of 5.0GHz, but this drops to 4.9GHz when multiple cores are active. However, you can tell the CPU to run all cores at 5.0GHz no matter how many are running. This worked flawlessly in our test system, but whether you can achieve the same will depend on your hardware.
(Credit: Asrock)
Admittedly, that’s a pretty minor overclock, but if your CPU also has E-Cores, you can potentially unlock a lot more performance. Unlike the P-Cores, the clock multiplier for the E-Cores is fully unlocked and can be raised as high as you want. Sure, you’ll want to increase it slowly, adjust the power, and test for stability along the way, but this can help you get extra speed out of your CPU if your cooling solution can handle it.
The verdict: budget gaming at its finest
All in all, the Asrock B660M Steel Legend is an excellent motherboard for budget gamers. The feature set may not quite match that of the Z690 alternatives, but it’s not really lacking in large areas, while the limited overclocking capabilities are a bit of an added bonus and help set a board apart that costs just $149.99 . The RGB lighting is also a nice touch.
(Credit: Michael Justin Allen Sexton)
In this price segment, it all makes for a winner for budget buyers. The ability to use the DDR4 you already own adds to the value equation on the part of buyers trying to save money.
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