Intel Z390 Motherboard Overview: 50+ Motherboards Analyzed
by Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on October 8, 2018 10:53 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Intel
- MSI
- Gigabyte
- ASRock
- EVGA
- Asus
- NZXT
- Supermicro
- Z390
MSI MPG Z390M Gaming Edge AC
The MSI MPG Z390M Gaming Edge AC is the smaller sibling to the ATX sized Gaming Edge AC model (mATX) and as a result, a smaller PCB means less slot space available. Like the bigger sized model, the main feature of the Gaming Edge AC range is Wi-Fi connectivity and this is provided by an Intel 9560 802.11ac 2T2R Wi-Fi adapter which is surprisingly higher spec than the one integrated (Intel 9462) onto the ATX variant.
In terms of PCIe support, the MPG Z390M Gaming Edge AC has a total of two full-length PCIe 3.0 slots with the top slot having x16 bandwidth available and the second slot only having x8. This allows users to use both two-way SLI and CrossFire multi-GPU configurations. Also included on the board are two PCIe 3.0 x1 slots. Memory capability consists of four slots with up to DDR4-4500 and a maximum capacity of 64 GB. The board has two PCIe/SATA support M.2 slots present and has a total of four SATA ports; a direct consequence of the mATX form factor.
Just like the bigger ATX sized Gaming Edge AC model, this model benefits from a Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec and Intel I219V Gigabit networking controller which handles the 8-channel audio and single LAN port on the rear panel respectively. In terms of USB, the rear panel contains a total of two USB 3.1 Gen2 (Type-A and Type-C) and four USB 3.0 Type-A ports. Users looking to use more devices can do so using the internal headers which offer a further four USB 3.0 and four USB 2.0 ports. The Z390M Gaming Edge AC is also suitable for users looking to make use of the 8th and 9th generation Intel processors with integrated iGPUs thanks to a pair of video outputs which consists of an HDMI and DisplayPort.
The MSI MPG Z390M has a suggest launch price of $180 and is primarily aimed at gamers looking to build a system with a smaller overall footprint of an ATX system. The inclusion of a 2T2R 802.11ac Wi-Fi adapter and Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec means MSI has focused on providing higher-end features to their more mid-ranged offerings.
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Valantar - Wednesday, October 10, 2018 - link
That would be pretty shocking, yeah, but the sheer size of that lump of metal still has me a bit worried. Guess that's what you get when you try to squeeze power delivery for a CPU that (likely) pulls >300W when overclocked into an ITX board (and refuse to use riser boards like before, for some reason).FXi - Monday, October 8, 2018 - link
The power feed also changed with z390 I believe at least in the Asus models it did. The power feed of the 370 was "enough" to drive the newer 9700/9900 but there is a difference there that may impact enthusiasts. I don't think it enough to warrant an upgrade but something to consider.Also people should remember that while it is still a bit of a ways off, wifi is going to change to Wifi6 or 802.11ax starting now and probably seeing much of the changeover during 2019/2020 depending on adoption choices. And there is also pci-e 4.0 to consider next year probably that should be thought about before people do "marginal" upgrades from 370 era chipsets.
FXi - Monday, October 8, 2018 - link
Silly thing posted in edit window. Sorry power delivery and other points covered by you. Would have edited if I could have found that optionDanNeely - Monday, October 8, 2018 - link
Other things to look forward to in the next few generations are: Less-hacky USB3.1 implementations (eg this articles speculation that a 10g port will need to eat 2 HSIO lanes instead of 1, and still needing an extra chip to support USB-C). Spectre/Meltdown fixes in hardware. A reduced DMI bottleneck between the CPU and chipset (either just from upgrading the link to PCIe4/5, moving some of the peripheral IO onto the CPU, or both.Valantar - Wednesday, October 10, 2018 - link
Considering that the maximum theoretical bandwidth of PCIe 3.0 x1 is 984.6MB/s, you _need_ two PCIe lanes (and thus two HSIO lanes) for a USB 3.1G2 (1.25GB/s) controller unless you want to significantly bottleneck it. That's not "hacky", that's reality, even if this leaves a lot of bandwidth "on the table" if this only powers a single port (which it rarely does, though, and given that a full load on two ports at one time is unlikely, running two 1.25GB/s ports off two .99GB/s lanes is a good solution).Moving DMI to PCIe 4.0 will be good, though, particularly for multiple NVMe SSDs and >GbE networking.
DanNeely - Wednesday, October 10, 2018 - link
Splitting the traffic over 2 HSIO lanes is a hack because it'd require something to split/combine the traffic between the chipset and usbport. That in turn has me wondering if the speculation about the implementation being done that way is correct, or if the Z390 has 6 HSIO lanes that can run 10Gbps instead of the 8 that the rest top out at for PCIe3repoman27 - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link
The implementation is absolutely not done that way. HSIO lanes are simply differential signaling pairs connected to a PCIe switch or various controllers via a mux. The PCH has a 6-port USB 3.1 Gen 2 xHCI, which can only feed 6 HSIO muxes. The back end of that xHCI is connected to an on-die PCIe switch which in turn is connected to the DMI interface. That DMI 3.0 x4 interface is already massively oversubscribed, but it is at least equivalent to a PCIe 3.0 x4 link, which is the most bandwidth that can be allotted to a single PCH connected device.Srikzquest - Monday, October 8, 2018 - link
HDMI 2.0 is available in Asus and Gigabyte's ITX boards as well.gavbon - Tuesday, October 9, 2018 - link
Thank you Srikzquest; updated the tables, obviously missed this yesterday :) - Thanks againHickorySwitch - Monday, October 8, 2018 - link
Correction:https://www.asus.com/us/Commercial-Servers-Worksta...
It says under "Specifications" that the board sports HDMI 2.0[b?]