The AMD TRX40 Motherboard Overview: 12 New Motherboards Analyzed
by Gavin Bonshor on November 28, 2019 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- AMD
- MSI
- Gigabyte
- ASRock
- Asus
- TRX40
- Threadripper 3000
- Castle Peak
MSI TRX40 Pro 10G & TRX40 Pro WIFI
Slightly down the pecking order and below the MSI Creator TRX40 are the MSI TRX40 Pro 10G and TRX40 Pro WIFI motherboards. Both with identical aesthetics and core feature sets, the differences between both models come down to networking support. Both motherboards come with dual Intel I211-AT Gigabit Ethernet controllers on the rear panel, but the TRX40 Pro 10G comes with an Aquantia AQC107 10 Gigabit Ethernet add-in card, while the TRX40 Pro WIFI includes an Intel AX200 Wi-Fi 6 wireless interface.
The design of the MSI TRX40 Pro 10G and TRX40 Pro WIFI follow the same black and grey design which stretches across the heatsinks and the PCB for a professional and uniformed look. The TRX40 chipset heatsink features active cooling, while just to the right hand of this is a two-digit LED debugger. Dotted around the edge of the PCB is six 4-pin headers with one designated for a CPU fan, one for a water pump, and four designed for chassis fans. The power delivery for both the MSI TRX40 Pro WIFI and TRX40 Pro 10G the CPU consists of a 12-phase design with 12 Intersil ISL99390 90 A power stages with 6 ISL6617 doublers and is controlled by an Intersil ISL69247 PWM controller. Providing power to the CPU is a pair of 8-pin 12 V ATX CPU power connectors.
Both models contain the exact same core feature set which includes four full-length PCIe 4.0 slots which run at x16/x8/x16+x8, with a single PCIe 4.0 x1 slot also included. There are two PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 with heatsinks on the board itself, while an M.2 Xpander-Z Gen4 add-on card allows users to install up to two more PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 drives into a full-length PCIe 4.0 slot. Also present is eight SATA ports which support RAID 0, 1, and 10 arrays. Memory support is exactly the same as the MSI Creator TRX40 with up to DDR4-4666 1DPC 1R, and up to DDR4-3866 2DPC 2R, with up to 256 GB supported across the eight memory slots.
MSI TRX40 Pro WIFI rear panel (Pro 10G is exactly the same, minus the Intel AX200 Wi-Fi)
The only differences between both models are the rear panel; the Pro 10G has no Wi-Fi, while the Pro WIFI includes an Intel AX200 Wi-Fi 6 wireless interface which includes BT 5.0 connectivity. On the USB side is three USB 3.1 G2 Type-A, four USB 3.1 G1 Type-A, and one USB 3.2 G2 20 Gbps Type-C port. Both rear panels have two Intel I211-AT Gigabit Ethernet controllers, while the 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output are powered by a Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec; a secondary Realtek ALC4050H audio codec powers the 3.5 mm microphone input and the front panel audio. The MSI TRX40 Pro 10G comes with an Aquantia AQC107 Ethernet controller add-on
The MSI TRX40 Pro 10 GbE has an MSRP of $500., while the MSI TRX40 Pro WIFI has a cost $470. Both models do feature identical features aside from networking. The M.2 Xpander-Z Gen4 PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slot add-on card comes with both models and is a nice touch for users looking to add extra M.2 drives, at the expense of one of the full-length PCIe 4.0 slots. Both models are aimed at professionals with the design and feature set, but both models will appeal to gamers looking to build a system with the high-core count advantage of the Threadripper 3000 series, and on AMD's latest HEDT platform.
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Bccc1 - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
My case fans are Noctua NF-S12A running at max 500rpm. CPU and GPU are watercooled with an external pump and radiator sitting a few meters away with acoustic isolation. So I'm pretty sure I would hear the chipset fans.I was expecting to shell out ~$1000 for a completly passive Gigabyte board, or even more if it had a PEX chip to use even more PCIe cards, and am very dissapointed that that doesn't exist. Any suggestions for a DIY mod?
eek2121 - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
You are nuts if you think a tiny little low RPM chipset fan is bad. Chipset fans are inevitable (though a die shrink may temporarily make this go away until PCIE5), and the fact is, the fan on your PSU, GPU, or case fans, even at low levels, will drown out any noise from a chipset fan. Even if the PSU fan is off and you have water cooling, the case fans, at even 400 rpm, make more noise than the chipset fan. Note that it's not currently possible to have every fan in a system shut off on high end platforms, except the chipset fan itself might shut off. Even with an AIO, there must be some airflow for the radiator.Sivar - Monday, December 2, 2019 - link
It's really more a matter of long-term reliability based on my past experience.If a 120mm CPU fan starts to die, get loud, burns out due to dust, or otherwise becomes damaged, it isn't an issue to replace it even 5 years from now. With a proprietary motherboard CPU/heatsink, we are at the mercy of the vendor's long-term support.
realbabilu - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
Any motherboard s TRX with ipmi? I mean it would be a workstation or a server, a nice ipmi remote will be nice.msroadkill612 - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
"the TRX40 chipset, and offers 24 PCIe 4.0 lanes to the system. That being said, eight of those are used for the CPU-to-chipset connection, leaving 16 for ports and other devices. This is on top of the 64 PCIe 4.0 lanes for the CPU: 64 + 24 = 88 PCIe 4.0 lanes total, but the x8 link in each direction between CPU and chipset gives a usable 72 PCIe 4.0 lanes for the platform."WHAT???
howsabout?:
The chipset uses 8 of the 64 lanes to create (multiplex?) 24x lanes - 8 of which are used for chipset usb & sata ports, leaving 16 lanes for various configurations of additional IO, at the discretion of the mobo maker.
sailorchou - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
As I know, some boards have the type-c USB Gen3.2 x2 (20Gbps aggregation). Totally ignored?HJay - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
The last thing an audio creator wants is some McGyvered / red-necked USB bridge hack-job of a motherboard. In this regard, the S1220 codec models are the only ones having my attention -the ASUS TRX40-Pro in particular since any Real content creator is going to stick their nose up at Wi-Fi. Does it have a secondary codec though? Thank you very much for the timely post which will, hopefully, prompt much discussion regarding the audio peculiarities.HJay - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
I suppose audio creators will want to pay close attention to which socket is better suited to their work: AM4 or TR.Bccc1 - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
Can you explain further? Why would an audio creator pay attention to the onboard audio if he will use his own audio interface? Even if it's only a cheap Focusrite Scarlett, why does the S1220 matter?Llawehtdliub - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
Because he's young and ignorant but highly opinionated.