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 MEG Z390 ACE
The MSI MEG Z390 ACE doesn't quite have as many features available as the bigger MEG Z390 GODLIKE, but the ACE variant of MSI's Enthusiast range is still pretty comprehensive all things considered. The overall design is neutral like all of MSIs MPG, MEG and MAG Z390 offerings and has an all-black matte PCB with silvery heatsinks and the board itself conforms to the standard ATX form factor. Like the GODLIKE the ACE has a total of four available RGB headers with integrated RGB LEDs within the rear IO cover being the most prominent.
There is a total of three full-length PCIe 3.0 slots which all feature MSI Steel Slot reinforcement and each slot from top to bottom operates at x16, x8 and x4. This means three-way CrossFire is supported as well as two-way SLI; the board also has three PCIe 3.0 x1 slots. Memory support comes through four RAM slots with maximum capacity allowed for 64 GB and the MEG Z390 ACE has compatibility out of the box for up to DDR4-4500.
Looking at storage support, MSI has included a total of three M.2 slots with one having support for just PCIe drives, with the other two having support for both PCIe and SATA drives. The board also makes use of six SATA ports with support for RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10 arrays.
On the rear panel, MSI has included three USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A ports as well as a single USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C. In addition to this is a further four USB 2.0 ports with the board disregarding any USB 3.0 from the rear panel, but there is the capacity to extend the USB through the use of front panel headers (four USB 3.0 and four USB 2.0. The 8-channel audio is handled by a single Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec and the single LAN port on the rear is controlled by a Killer E2500 Gigabit chip. MSI has included Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 5 capability on the Z390 ACE thanks to an integrated Intel 9560 2T2R 802.11ac wireless adapter.
The MSI MEG Z390 ACE is set to retail for $290 at launch which is reasonable given what MSI has included in terms of premium controllers such as the Realtek ALC1220, Killer E2500 Gigabit and Intel 9560 2T2R networking controllers. Like the Z390 GODLIKE, the ACE also includes an integrated rear panel IO cover.
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DanTMWTMP - Thursday, October 11, 2018 - link
Are they ALL made in China? What happened to the ones made in Taiwan from a few gens ago? :/gavbon - Friday, October 12, 2018 - link
Unfortunately, I cannot confirm this. The ASRock Z390 Taichi I have in my hands says 'designed in Taipei', but that's about it.Nagorak - Sunday, October 14, 2018 - link
Gigabyte apparently has a factory in Taiwan. It seems all the rest moved production to China.WickedMONK3Y - Friday, October 12, 2018 - link
The MEG Z390 Godlike looked like such an interesting board until I checked the MSI Specifications page and realised it actually does not have the PLX chip as suspected. The PCI Express slots on the board are configured as 16x / 4x / 8x / 4x instead of 16x / 16x / 8x / 4x or 16x / 8x / 16x / 4x. It seems after PLX sold to whomever owns them now, that the price hike stopped their usage on consumer boards completely.I really really hope somebody comes out with a board that has a PLX chip on board.
gavbon - Friday, October 12, 2018 - link
The Supermicro C9Z390-PGW has a Broadcom 8747 PLX PCIe switch :)ZioTom - Friday, October 12, 2018 - link
It would be a nice touch including in next MB review what pheriferals stop funcioning when too much PCI-E lanes are used. Some motherboards disable SATA ports when M.2 slot are used; others may require limiting bandwith to one PCI-E slot... etc. Before byuing a motherboard I would like to be warned that is not possibile to use all the features they are advertising.happyfirst - Friday, October 12, 2018 - link
I wish we would get better thunderbolt support. Only one board has it built in? I'm thinking of a Taichi board and see a Thunberbolt AIC connector in the manual, but then I can't really find enough good quality posts of people having success putting it to use. I'd like to get a new external nvme ssd thunderbolt drive to run my vms off of so I can more easily take them on the road with me and use from my notebook.ddcc - Saturday, October 13, 2018 - link
Certain Gigabyte boards, e.g. Z390 Aorus Pro WiFi, seem to be using Intel's Z390 CNVi, but aren't listed in the article.gavbon - Monday, October 15, 2018 - link
I'm going to be updating tomorrow with more information; been working on getting one of the board reviews ready for the end of the week :)gavbon - Sunday, October 21, 2018 - link
Will be adding these in tomorrow (not at a PC currently) - We didn't have the information available prior to writing