The AMD X570 Motherboard Overview: Over 35+ Motherboards Analyzed
by Gavin Bonshor on July 9, 2019 8:00 AM ESTMSI X570-A Pro
Moving along to the last of MSI's seven deep X570 product stack is the entry-level MSI X570-A Pro. For users not looking to spend the $200 + for gaming branded boards and looking for more office-based and professional use, the MSI X570-A Pro includes a decent core feature set which includes the same 8+2 power delivery as the MPG X570 Gaming Plus ($169), but with basic design. Also included is a Gigabit NIC, DDR4-4400 support, and one PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slot.
On the MSI X570-A Pro is two full-length PCIe 4.0 which operate at x16, and x8/x4, and three PCIe 4.0 x1 slots. Also featured is one PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slot, but this slot doesn't come included with a heatsink; a total of six SATA ports make up the rest of the board's storage options. This model is very resemblant of the X570 Gaming Plus, but with a more professional look with its all-black theme, but without RGB or red accented heatsinks. On the X570 chipset heatsink is a cooling fan, and the X570-A Pro also has four memory slots with support for DDR4-4400 and up to a maximum of 128 GB. It also shares the same 8+2 power delivery as the X570 Gaming Edge WIFI and X570 Gaming Plus models, and also includes an 8-pin and 4-pin pair of 12 V ATX CPU power inputs.
MSI's X570-A Pro includes one USB 3.1 G2 Type-A, one USB 3.1 G2 Type-C, two USB 3.1 G1 Type-A, and two USB 2.0 ports on its rear panel. A clear CMOS switch is present, along with an HDMI video output, and a PS/2 combo port. The single Ethernet port is controlled by a Realtek RTL8111H Gigabit NIC, while the five 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output are powered by a premium Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec.
The MSI X570-A Pro as it stands is the cheapest model from its X570 product stack with an MSRP of $159. It's solid and uniformed all-black look is very simplistic, and users not looking for NVIDIA SLI support and more than two PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slots will find this as an attractive model. This no-frills and inexpensive (compared to some others) makes this one of the cheaper entry points onto the X570 chipset for users looking to benefit from X570's features such as PCIe 4.0.
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Supercell99 - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
I also expected benchmarks and a naked woman serving me a beer.haukionkannel - Wednesday, July 10, 2019 - link
You did not get that? That is really strange... I was sure that that was the basic service in here!;)
Gastec - Wednesday, July 10, 2019 - link
I had a dream last night about a woman, she was serving me...benchmarks :)Duncan Macdonald - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
Why is the DDR4 memory speed being shown as a feature of the chipset? The memory is directly driven by the CPU not the chipset and as such the memory speed is independent of the chipset.Dug - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
The motherboard still has work to do and is what supports the faster speed memory. Just because the cpu allows it, doesn't mean it will work without the correct chipset.thomasg - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
The chipset has nothing to do with it, it has no relation to RAM clock and is exclusively driven by the PCIe clock, which is unrelated.The mainboard itself has the traces and therefore the manufacturer is expected to provide appropriate timing sequences to load into the CPU, which again, is not done on the chipset.
There's no reason a mainboard manufacturer couldn't support faster RAM on any older, compatible board (provided they do a firmware update and the board is designed well enough), a chipset upgrade is not required.
Death666Angel - Wednesday, July 10, 2019 - link
"the board is designed well enough" There is the catch. It might be that Ryzen being the first of its kind meant that many 3xx boards were designed poorly.First test I've seen is TPUs R9 3900x on a ASUS Prime B350 Plus which they claim ran at 3200CL14, but only after setting it to 2666MHz first and letting it train the memory. But it's an encouraging result.
Dug - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
I'm interested in seeing what coolers will fit on the mITX boards. Specifically ASRock X570 Phantom Gaming-ITX TB3.It looks like some of these boards might be limited due to high heatsinks and fans on the motherboards.
Mikewind Dale - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
Could we please have a comparison table? 35 pages is too many read. It would be useful to have a comparison table so that I can narrow down the several motherboards I am interested in, and then compare their prices.halcyon - Tuesday, July 9, 2019 - link
A summary table of features would indeed be very helpful. Way too many boards and pages...