Analyzing Z370 for Intel's 8th Generation Coffee Lake: A Quick Look at 50+ Motherboards
by Ian Cutress, Anton Shilov, Joe Shields & Gavin Bonshor on October 20, 2017 2:00 PM ESTMSI Z370 PC Pro and MSI Z370-A Pro
The Pro series consists of two motherboards, the Z370 PC Pro and Z370-A Pro. Both boards use the same six-phase power delivery found in the Gaming Plus. Outside of storage, USB, PCIe support, and the aesthetic differences, both Pro boards keep similar specifications.
The PC Pro goes with a jet black PCB with a silver pattern focused around the chipset heatsink. That same pattern makes its way on the black VRM heatsinks. All the slots and connectors are black with the only reinforced slot being the primary PCIe. Except for the audio separation line, all the RGB LEDs are found on the back of the board creating a glow behind the motherboard. The PC Pro does offer a single RGB header for connecting an RGB strip, enhancing the existing lights.
The Z370-A Pro, on the other hand, is more of a plain brown board with the only patterns on it being the hundreds of visible traces snaking from part to part. The VRM heatsinks, memory slots, and PCIe slots are all black. Like its bigger brother, the first slot is reinforced. The Z370-A Pro uses all white LEDs (no other colors) on the back as well as the audio line. To some users rejoicing, there are no RGB headers on this board.
Z370 PC Pro (left), Z370-A Pro (right)
Memory support on both of the boards is the same, with four memory slots up to 64GB and supported speeds up to DDR4-4000. Both boards have two full-length PCIe slots, the first one being reinforced and x16 from the processor with the second not being reinforced and x4 from the chipset. Where the Z370-A Pro has four PCIe x1 slots, the PC Pro replaces one of them and adds a legacy PCI slot at the bottom.
The Z370-A Pro and PC Pro make the full set of six SATA ports available to users, with four regular placed ports and two vertical, although the layout of where they are is slightly different. The Z370-A Pro has the vertical SATA ports above the other four, while the PC Pro slides the vertical ports between the other four, due to the support of other features.
Fan header count and location are the same on both boards with six 4-pin connectors around the board, four of which are around the chipset. All of these headers support both PWM and voltage control for greater flexibility. For audio and networking, the PC Pro has the ALC887 and Intel I219-V, while the Z370-A Pro has the ALC892 and Realtek TRL8111H. Both boards use Capicon audio caps, and the audio traces are separated from the other portions of the board in an effort to reduce interference.
Z370 PC Pro (left), Z370-A Pro (right)
The PC Pro offers users USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) capabilities through the ASM3142 chipset and offers one Type-C port and one Type-A port on the back panel, while the Z370-A Pro does not offer 10 Gbps support. Both boards offer four eight USB 3.1 (5 Gbps) Type-A ports and two USB 2.0 ports on the back panel. Both boards have a combination PS/2 connector, video outputs, Ethernet, and an audio stack, although the PC Pro uses a HDMI and 2.1 audio, while the Z370-A Pro uses DisplayPort and 7.1 audio. Both boards have D-Sub and DVI-D connectors.
Z370 PC Pro
Z370-A Pro
| MSI Z370 PC Pro and A Pro | ||
| Warranty Period | 3 Years | |
| Product Page | Link | Link |
| Size | ATX | |
| CPU Interface | LGA1151 | |
| Chipset | Intel Z370 Express | |
| Memory Slots (DDR4) | Four DDR4 Supporting 64GB Dual Channel Support DDR4 4133+ |
|
| Network Connectivity | 1 x Intel I219-V | 1 x Realtek RTL8111H |
| Onboard Audio | Realtek ALC887 | Realtek ALC892 |
| PCIe (CPU) | 2 x PCIe 3.0 x16 slots @ x16 / x4 | |
| PCIe (PCH) | 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 3 x PCIe 3.0 x1 |
1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 4 x PCIe 3.0 x1 |
| SATA | 6 x Supporting RAID 0/1/5/10 | |
| Onboard SATA Express | None | |
| Onboard M.2 | 2 x PCIe 3.0 x4 or SATA | 1 x PCIe 3.0 x4 or SATA |
| Onboard U.2 | None | |
| USB 3.1 (10 Gbps) | 1 x Type-C (ASMedia) 1 x Type-A (ASMedia) |
None |
| USB 3.1 (5 Gbps) | 4 x Rear Panel 2 x Headers |
|
| USB 2.0 | 2 x Rear Panel 2 x Headers |
|
| Power Connectors | 1 x 24-pin EATX 1 x 8-pin ATX 12V |
|
| Fan Headers | 1 x 4-pin CPU 1 x 4-pin Waterpump 4 x 4-pin System Fan (All PWM or Voltage controlled) |
|
| IO Panel | 1 x PS/2 keyboard/mouse 1 x VGA port 1 x DVI-D port 1 x HCMI Port 1 x LAN (RJ45) port 4 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports 1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A 1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-C 2 x USB 2.0 Type A Audio Jacks |
1 x PS/2 keyboard/mouse 1 x VGA port 1 x DVI-D port 1 x DisplayPort 1 x LAN (RJ45) port 4 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type A 2 x USB 2.0 ports Audio Jacks |
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carldon - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
Excellent summary and table in the last page. Good work!!!imaheadcase - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
I got a few questions:1. Why do they put USB 2.0 ports if USB 3.0 is backward compatible anyways? Why not just all USB 3.0 ports..it can't be price.
2. Why do they have such a vary in memory timings? For %99 of people memory timings are not really a big deal right? Maybe in old PC days it was.
3. Mini-ITX vs Micro-ITX..isn't it silly both exist in first place? Any reason for this..the diminsions are really close to the same. In fact, most Micro-ITX is simply removing lots of stuff from mobo that you really want to begin with.
lordsutch - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
I'd imagine they want to offer as many ports as they can without taking away too many PCIe lanes. The other option would be to embed a USB 3.x switch (or a PCIe switch) but of course now each port wouldn't simultaneously be able to operate at peak speed and 3.x switches are probably more expensive than USB 2 controllers.imaheadcase - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
Ahh didn't think about that aspect.DanNeely - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
Some USB audio and 2.4ghz wifi/bluetooth devices have had interference problems in 3.0 sockets. Dunno if they're fixed on new hardware (supposedly onboard hubs were a lot worse than chipset ports in this regard so room for QC to make it better); but even if they are there's going to be problems with once burned customers not trusting them.As pointed out elsewhere USB3 competes with PCIe lanes/SATA ports on the southbridge. Especially on full ATX boards if you go to max out the number of PCIe lanes to expansion slots and m.2 ports in addition to the lanes used on board for networking and audio you can get down to only a half dozen or so 3.0 lanes left from the chipset; but still able to hit 14 USB ports total by going USB2 with the rest.
People using older OSes (Windows 7 says hi) can't use USB3 ports to install the OS without jumping through a lot of hoops (the OS sees them as not USB2 and can't talk to them).
If any board size is at risk of going away it's probably full ATX; although for enthusiast sales I suspect it'll hold on better than mini ATX due to bigger is better irrationality.
MiniITX still has a decent capability gap vs mini ATX; but it's much smaller than it was a half dozen years ago when it only made sense if you were making a tiny box and were willing to accept major performance compromises to do so. Now as Mini ITX's capability continues to goes up and the need for expansion cards other than a single GPU goes down it's eating into an increasing chunk of Mini ATX's marketshare.
On the high side mainstream chips don't really have enough PCIe lanes to make good use of the extra 3 cards of space possible on the bigger boards/ Meanwhile multi-GPU gaming - the main reason an enthusiast would need a full size mobo is steadily going away (fewer games supporting it each year, no support for 3/4way at all in the newest cards from either company); and unless you need 2 GPUs + something else or extra space around the CPU for crazy OCing Mini ATX does almost everything that could be needed.
MadAd - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
> If any board size is at risk of going away it's probably full ATX; although for enthusiast sales I suspect it'll hold on better than mini ATX due to bigger is better irrationality.Irrationality indeed. I would have thought by now instead of a measly 5 mATX choices out of 50+ that it would be instead maybe 5 fullsize ATX with the main battleground being the two slot mATX market.
Its just laziness on the manufacturers side, with nobody steering the market to innovate on size. Theres nobody driving form factors, the CPU companies are present on all form factors so they dont need to drive change, the board partners are all set in their ways just slapping new images on mildly reworked designs so they dont have any need to innovate, weve seen video card manufacturers can shrink designs to better fit smaller factors but we still get chunky easy to produce cards for mainstream use as retooling would be an added cost, its just rolling train of new but nothing new generation after generation.
PC design is falling into mediocrity and I just wish the main players (intel+amd/board partners/nvidia+amd) would all get together to drive SFX/ITX and force retire ATX to the strictly enthusiast market, and maybe appeal to a more contemporary home user community (rather than just gamers which is where the marketing all seems to be these days) again too.
Liltorp - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
It is really true that the MSI PC Pro has a legacy PCI connector? I could use this for my TV tuner. But I thought PCI was not supported by newer boatds/CPU`s?Morawka - Saturday, October 21, 2017 - link
Has anyone noticed how cheap these new Z370 motherboards are? Most are under $180 and there are several sub $130.IGTrading - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
Tell this to the guys that already spent money on non-Z370 just a few months ago.Intel is already screwing them.
It would have been funny to sell a 250 USD motherboard to a 7700K buyer just last month, telling him his 250 USD are a good investment because of the good upgradeability.
Just 4 weeks later tell him: "Well ... Yeah ... About that upgrade ... It will cost you a minimum of 110 USD extra + the 360 USD for the new 8700 K.
775 was the last good & long lived platform from Intel.
edzieba - Sunday, October 22, 2017 - link
If people brought Z370 boards expecting them to support an additional CPU generation, they did it in spite of every Intel CPU release for the last decade: two CPU gens socket generation. There's no counter to ignoring the past.