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
ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming
Moving onto the ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming and it's the only TRX40 model currently to include the gaming tag line in its model naming. Cut from a similar cloth to the ROG Zenith II Extreme with its blend of black aluminium inspired design, ASUS has also included its LiveDash OLED into the rear panel cover, with support for DDR4-4666 and 256 GB across eight memory slots also featured. The ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming is ATX in size and is designed for the gamer in mind, with plenty of features found on most HEDT boards making it a solid all-rounder.
The design of the ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming is similar to its other gaming branded Strix models with its holographic digital colorful insignia on the rear panel cover and heatsinks; these areas are also customizable due to the integrated RGB LEDs. The power delivery consists of a 16-phase setup with 16 Infineon TDA21472 70 A power stages which are operating in teamed mode. Its heatsink includes active cooling with fans hidden between the grill and the heatsink, while the TRX40 chipset heatsink also includes a cooling fan. There are three full-length PCIe 4.0 x16 slots, with the inclusion of a PCIe 4.0 x4 slot for good measure.
On the storage front, ASUS includes three PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 slots, with eight SATA ports supporting RAID 0, 1, and 10 arrays. Memory compatibility on the ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming is competitive with support for DDR4-4666, with up to 256 GB supported across eight memory slots. Located around the edge of the board is seven 4-pin headers with two for CPU cooling fans, one for a water pump, one for an AIO pump, and three designated for chassis fans.
Looking at the rear panel and ASUS has included a whopping seven USB 3.1 G2 Type-A, one USB 3.1 G2 Type-C, and four USB 2.0 ports. Also present are five 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output driven by a SupremeFX S1220 HD audio codec with dual OP amplifiers, a pair of Ethernet ports powered by a Realtek RTL8125-CG 2.5 GbE and Intel I211-AT Gigabit controller pairing. The ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming also includes an Intel AX200 Wi-Fi 6 wireless interface with support for BT 5.0 devices.
The ASUS ROG Strix TRX40-E Gaming isn't the only gaming-focused board, and while AMD's Ryzen Threadripper 3000 processors will almost certainly be capable, the real advantages are had in multi-core optimized applications. With a price tag of $450, it combines a solid controller set with the usual ROG Strix aesthetics we come to expect from ASUS, as well as plenty of networking capability for uses outside of gaming.
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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.