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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HJay - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
Life really does begin at 50.HJay - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
Your point is valid and I'm not ready to switch from external interfaces to an internal RME unit yet. However, the performance and quality of the peculiar on-board audio arrangement is still of great interest. Experiencing AMD's AM3 FX chipset USB implementation (See: "Silicon Errata for SB950") was rather eye opening and very helpful in understanding why running USB audio across that implementation was less than optimal. The USB arrangement of AM4 seems to be an improvement over the AM3 and AM3+. But AMD's TRX40 seems to reveal a non-satisfactory level of concern for PC audio -suggesting that AM4 might be more appropriate. This motherboard review is a great start but there are still many holes to fill in regarding this, in particular with the S1220.Selecting an appropriate motherboard upfront before throwing thousands of dollars worth of audio software and hardware at it is critical. I did note compatibility issues between earlier AM4 systems and some Universal Audio cards and the desired RME card is around $900. So, I'm just not ready to ride the bleeding edge with these new boards but will eagerly listen to the experiences of others and cheer them along.
As a side note, I did recommend to my favored audio repair software vendor that they contact AnandTech to provide, or work out, some audio benchmarking tests or packages.
Bccc1 - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
I still don't get your point. I agree that the USB implementation is important, that AMD messed that up in the past (thanks for the ref to the errata list) and that the way onboard audio works on TRX40 is maybe more error prone.But why is that different / better with the S1220? And how do you define an audio creator? I was thinking of an audio engineer, someone who does tracking/mixing/mastering/sound design. I can't imagine someone in that field would ever use onboard audio, except maybe for mobility reasons on a notebook.
I will probably use my RME Madiface XT with a StarTech USB card (PEXUSB3S44V) as I don't trust any onboard USB.
Regarding the compatibilty issues, do you have links/detailed information? The only thing I found was an issue, where the card wasn't detected in PCIe slots connected to the chipset. Which is a shame, but less of a problem with TRX40 as most slots are directly connected to the CPU.
tamalero - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
I'm no expert here but could perhaps say this because of the audio problems of some cpus (crackling cutting) because of the high latency of Ryzen and the first Threadrippers?Or perhaps power issues (delivery to PCIE ports because the big power consumption of the new TR chips?)
Dug - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
I think it's time to move past USB if you are a "Real content creator"valinor89 - Friday, November 29, 2019 - link
"The TRX40 chipset is based on the 14 nm process node from Global Foundries""AMD leveraged GlobalFoundries 12nm to build the TRX40 chipset"
Is it 12 or 14?
tamalero - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
I remember that Global Foundries is 14nm while TSCM is 14+ (12nm)gavbon - Monday, December 2, 2019 - link
I have corrected it, it is Global Foundries 14 nm process. Thank you for the heads upscineram - Wednesday, December 4, 2019 - link
That's not what Ian said.PopinFRESH007 - Sunday, December 29, 2019 - link
I believe what Ian was referring to is the IO chip on the CPU package which is 12nm.