Asus’ high-end brand Republic of Gamers has introduced its new B250 Mining Expert motherboard that is specifically designed for the mining of cryptocurrencies. However, the product’s official release date and price are yet to be announced.
In its Twitter announcement, the gaming brand claimed that the motherboard features 3x 24-pin power connectors and can support up to 16 graphic processing units (GPU).
This is pretty mad - the ASUS B250 Mining Expert uses 3x 24-pin power connectors and supports up to 16 GPUs!
— Republic of Gamers (@ASUS_ROGUK) August 18, 2017
...but could it run Crysis? ? pic.twitter.com/hkDjW07DIR
Features of the motherboard
The new motherboard model has a total of 19 PCI-Express expansion slots, which is much greater than the 12, eight or six slots of its competitors. Since digital currency miners need lots of computing power to solve mining puzzles, they need to run as many graphics cards in their computers as possible.
The motherboard’s 19 expansion slots are divided into three groups which will allow the mining computer to be connected to three power supply units at the same time and will stabilize the rig while using multiple GPUs. The motherboard also has features that could appeal to miners such as live visual statistics.
Computer hardware industry’s focus on cryptocurrency mining
Asus’ new motherboard reflects the desire by leading hardware manufacturers to develop products that meet the demands of digital currency miners.
Other GPU makers such as Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) have been focusing on mining-related products as well due to the surge in demand.
According to Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang, the cryptocurrency market could be a long-term revenue driver for the hardware industry.
"Cryptocurrency and Blockchain are here to stay.”