COOL DRIVING

M.2 SSDs CAN GET HOT under load, so it’s a good idea to have a decent heat spreader present. The one you’ll find on the Maximus X Formula is particularly huge, and you’ll find it as part of the large ROG eye logo, toward the bottom-right of the motherboard. Releasing the three screws on this plate enables you to remove it and reveal the M.2 connector. We were momentarily thrown by the fact that the retention screw for the drive wasn’t preinstalled, but actually in the motherboard box—it took longer than it should have for us realize this. Once found, though, securing the 1TB Samsung 970 Evo SSD was easy, and that huge cooler means that it shouldn’t be throttling anytime soon. It’s worth noting that it isn’t easy to access this drive once your graphics card is installed, but this is often the case with the location of M.2 connectors.