This board is sooooo close to what I want. However, a 2nd M.2 slot, for a 2nd NVMe drive is necessary. I know it's allot to ask for in an m-ITX board, but it can be done.
> Next version they add a second nvme slot "oh I wish it had 10gbit lan, almost prefect..."
To be fair, at least something >1gbit *should* have been standard on high-end boards long ago, but for whatever reason no one's integrated it in to a chipset.
Instead we get a compact desktop board that wastes precious space with WiFi. WiFi is for things that move and things that get placed in odd locations where wiring is impractical. Desktop computers are neither of those things. Even if you're one of those screwballs who refuses to plug in a cable or insists on placing your computer in some weird place it's not like WiFi is fast enough that USB would be a bottleneck, so there's no good reason for it to be taking up space on a motherboard.
Hell, actually a M.2 slot would be a win-win there, those who want WiFi can install it instead of a SSD.
No, I think he is right. Being able to stick another M.2 drive in there is super helpful, especially as if you leave it open for a cheaper/slower SSD as more of a mass storage option. Personally, I want it for two 2 TB intel drives right off the bat, then I will add another SATA drive if I need it at that point.
Your obviously have never worked with ITX or even mATX cases. An extra M.2 slot is a godsend vs. the space and cabling headaches of sata drives in SFF.
Collectively, these are some of the worst comments I’ve ever seen on AT. This is probably the best mITX motherboard board ever designed - even surpassing ASRock’s excellent X299 boards.
16 high-performance cores, nearly 4000 points in Cinebench R15, 64GB of high-speed DD4, 18TB of SSD storage (2TB at 3GB/s and 16TB at 1.5GB/s), 6 USB3 ports (two of them Gen 2), and the first full-speed Thunderbolt 3 ever on an mITX motherboard! In fact, being on AMD, I won’t be shocked if it turns out to run at 40Gbps, rather than the expected 32Gbps (on Intel ATX) or 16Gbps (on Intel mITX).
WiFi is useful on a portable form factor (at minimal expense), while 10GbE generates significant heat and adds nearly $100 to the cost. I think every complaint here can be addressed with proper system design, and Thunderbolt 3 makes all the difference, allowing one to add e.g. 10GbE and USB 3 as needed. In fact, TB3 makes this the first mITX board that can transfer files at 2/3 GB/s (in/out) and operate an eGPU with all 4 PCIe 3.0 lanes!
Ironically, the only significant drawback wasn’t mentioned yet - the lack of an iGPU on Zen 2 (useful e.g. for video encoding) which could free up the PCIe slot/lanes for other uses.
The Thunderbolt chip, out of necessity, is the same Intel Titan Ridge you'd find on Intel ATX boards or some laptops. While this motherboard is the first to integrate it, there were reports on various forums of the Gigabyte Titan Ridge card (not the Alpine Ridge) working in AMD motherboards without connecting the special header it has. There is no Titan Ridge LP so the bus speed will be 40gbps and the data speed will be 22gbps. That's the same across all TB3 controllers, except the Alpine Ridge LP where the data speed will be 16gps and the bus speed, I think even after this many years, is simply unknown. 20gbps would make sense but it could be just the 18gbps necessary to run a DisplayPort. But then again, there is no common sense where Intel and Thunderbolt is concerned, noone knows why they gimped the data speed on full speed controllers to 22gbps.
No, I agree there’s not much common sense there - even down to questions such as “why is TB3 networking limited to 10Gbps” (and reportedly not even reliable enough for production - I’ve only used it in testing scenarios).
I had not heard of the 22gbps data limit, but even if it applies here this motherboard should still be the most flexible and highest performance mITX model available, and (fortunately) could still approach 3GB/s transfer rates.
I think that's because Thunderbolt at a lower level works over individual 10Gbps lanes. You can have multiple "ports" but then you'll have multiple interfaces - perhaps you can team them at a higher level? But if it's Alpine Ridge you'll almost certainly be limited to low-power 10Gbps.
I'd settle for 2.5 or 5G ethernet, both have readily available chips that cost under $10, and Intel is about to release one (the 225V) that costs less than $2.50.
No, the M.2 is a big deal. If you're stuffing this into a small case- and plenty of people buying X570 ITX boards will- there's a big advantage to not having any 2.5" drives in the case, whether for airflow, cables, what have you.
I am so happy I am not alone with this, 16 cores and thunderbolt means one thing, content creator, not a gamer. I mean the cheapest thing you can attach to TB3 is a 10gbe (200$).
There are a lot of video makers and some colourists (who do not need to work with 6-8k raw) that own the x299 itx because it can be portable even in a backpack.
Unless they have the crazy idea of putting a threadripper on a DTX board they lost a great opportunity. This board is a compromise for everyone, too expensive due to tb3 to who is budget-wise, as a gamer I would go with gigabyte for the 2 m2 and the backplate armour (and a very respectable 8 phase vrm) or better the dtx Asus board.
This board can be good only if someone wants a very portable setup with no GPU and they need a faster (x4 PCI 3) GPU. So almost none
I think except Asus maybe, but they were not that good either, manufacturers went very wrong with PCIe 4.0 and the x570. Asrock could have used the 4x link from the chipset (like only Asus did on their pro board reviewed here) for the second m2, they could have swapped 2xUsb3 5gbs with 2 basic usb3 port for mouse and keyboard with the lanes shared with the wifi module (it will never need full bandwidth and how much data transfer is there for mouse and keyboard) so here you are the 10gbe. I cannot think the number of devices that can saturate a TB3, 2 x 10gbps usb3 and 2x5gbps. I have a Wacom tablet, 2 Eizo with 5gbps USB 3 hubs, a das, several and different external drives, HDD, SSD, and a printer. Even with one 10gbps USB, it would have been fine, we can have tb3, who needs to connect 2 nvme external drive? By the way 4 SATA ports without raid 5?
The 2080ti barely (2-3%) saturates a PCI 3 8x link, sharing the lanes between the GPU and the third m2 is not blasphemy at all, so there will be bandwidth, 12x PCIe 4, for a dual GPU card more powerful than a dual 2080ti.
So now I need to change pc and I will buy this board because of the TB3 but I hope they will understand their mistake and someone will release something better, way better
Now I have to spend 250 for the board, 300 for a thunderbolt dock with 10gbe (connected to the NAS) that I cannot use while I am using my raid das, 300+ for 64gb instead of 32gb because I cannot have a fast nvme drive for photoshop/DaVinci cache, and I still don't know how much for 2 custom water block for VRM, and other 40 for the chipset block and probably I will buy a USB DAC for headphones
So I know it is almost impossible to have a sabre and 3 m2 on an itx board but at least for me a board with that stuff and a big block for vrm and chipset, that could have saved some space for extra daughter boards, it is worth more than 900+ and still I would have saved money
I know it is insane and liquid cooling is not for everyone, but an ITX motherboard with 2 m2, tb3, 10gbe and some USB ports (maybe a second tb3) sharing the GPU link it is not unreasonable.
They probably did not do it because they want content creators going with threadripper, but 3d is not the only thing that matter, video has the largest market, and we cannot bring matx cases onset easily, especially because they are ugly and the market is accustomed to see apple products, so we get no money from it, so I will not buy threadripper even I know it is amazing
The last part is what kills this board for me. It wastes space on DP and HDMI (technically, just HDMI, since the DP is an input for the TB3), when it already has a TB3/USB-C connection to handle video output. If someone insists on using a $220 board for a 3400G (and I am being extremely generous here), let them fall on their own sword. Let them spend the extra $20-30 on a DP-->HDMI adapter. Don't waste precious space on this board with a HDMI connector.
Even worse, the Intel version of this board has all of the same outputs, PLUS two more USB ports and another M.2 slot. So no matter how I slice it, this board is down on features vs existing ASRock boards. From what I understand, ASRock didn't link the M.2 slot to the extra 4 PCIe lanes from the CPU, either, so it's sharing bandwidth from the chipset (with LAN & TB3), just like the Intel board. What a waste.
thats a major dissapointment though for sure, so whats the best option for x570 boards with thunderbolt, aside from the $1,000 white one. I don't need a certain form factor, though it would've been nice, just the best/most features and quality and price
They're not going to make a premium ITX board without WiFi - too risky in terms of lost sales. A lot of SFF PC users move their PCs around, and not all places have Ethernet available. Also, ditching SATA seems early - people have legacy devices still (though cutting it down to 2 SATA probably wouldn't be a deal breaker for many). Likely all of this could be fit on board if they went with some sort of stacked m.2 layout like the Gigabyte or the Strix.
Beyond that, I agree on faster networking though. Even one of those Realtek 2.5GB controllers would be a huge (well, 2.5x) improvement. Fitting a 10GbE controller might be too tight of a fit, sadly. But maybe on a daughterboard/some sort of vertical m.2 board like WiFi controllers?
I doubt we'll see many 2 sata boards anytime soon; but the total is dropping and starting to shift downward. Looking at newegg listings, and limiting AMD to x70 boards since the remainder of the 5xx series isn't out yet:
10 ports has disappeared as an option. 4 ports has grown from 3 to 11% of the total, and despite bouncing back a bit this year 8 port models are a minority of designs now vs the default in x370 boards.
On the intel side, and sticking to Z series boards to stay with the same general market segment as AMD:
Similar trends overall; 8 port is much less common on Intel boards because their consumer chipsets only have 6 sata ports available; 8+ requires a 3rd party controller and has been much less common for years as a result.
With both brands I suspect the transition will be slow because consumer boards suffer from feature checkboxitis and the connectors are cheap. Reducing support on the chipset would push things faster but sata controllers are relatively small/cheap compared to top of the line USB/PCIe ones and both companies are doing variations of the flexible IO port thing so it doesn't cost them much either. It'll happen eventually, but I don't expect to see much movement until the price/GB gap narrows at lot between SSD and HDDs because of people wanting to make DIY NAS/Storage servers.
Leaving the x4 m.2 PCIe link off the CPU on the table is bordering on criminal. Sure, the board is packed nonetheless, but when every single competing board has two m.2 slots, this is a no-go. Sure, TB3 would be nice, but to be realistic the only thing it would be used for would be TB3 networking when needing to do quick file transfers to a laptop. Not worth the loss of a second m.2 slot by a long shot. And sure, I could get a TB3 SSD case - and drive up the price of that second drive by 2-3x. No thank you. I'll likely go for the Gigabyte or the Strix.
Worth adding: a legitimate use case for this would be connecting the upcoming Apple monitor. Not many SFF desktop PCs capable of that. But will that even work with non-Apple hardware?
While I agree with you, I'm guessing they did it because using the x4 link on the CPU for NVMe wouldn't allow the M.2 slot to support M.2 SATA drives as well. That said, they should have run the Thunderbolt controller off that x4 link if it wasn't being used.
Because sales have imploded. The people who care about size have left for miniITX as the relevance of SLI/XFire has vanished and the price/performance penalty for the smaller size has withered away. The part of the market that doesn't care is sticking with full ATX because why not, their case holds a full size board, they might need one of the extra connectors someday, and besides the more spread out layout makes getting all the connectors in easier.
Pushing higher PCIe standards more than a few cm is going to get increasingly expensive; which is why AMD hasn't offered a 550 chipset with PCIe4 yet. Cost reasons might push mainstream PCIe4 boards out of the full ATX range. PCIe5 is much worse; to the extent that it might not become a consumer standard at all; it's looking like just reaching from the CPU to the top PCIe slot or chipset will either need expensive redriver chips or PCBs that cost a few hundred dollars for a full sized board. Assuming it happens at all, I suspect that will put a lot of price pressure towards a revival for micro ATX.
I feel they'll just have the top slot be PCIe 4/5, then all of the other slots at PCIe 3 or even 2. Depending on chipset placement, it may not even be viable for the chipset to have PCIe5.
I'll bet nobody buys micro ATX partly because all the micro ATX boards are crippled in things such as audio codec (enjoy your ALC887), Ethernet (yay Realtek), or in Asrock's case, poor VRM efficiency.
Nobody buys because there are no good boards, no good boards because nobody buys.
I remembre when there were tons of micro ATX chioces, the gigabyte snimer M.3, the asus boards, ece.
Even intel only has two good micro ATX boards, both from asus. Nothing from gigabyte, nothing good from MSI or ASrock. At least the TUF micro has a good audio chip (Realtek ALC S1200A) and intel NIC.
I would like to see tests too, but I don’t see how this motherboard “failed certification” simply by being absent from a list where the newest motherboard I could find was the 2018 Z390 Designare.
If you want to use the thunderbolt logo on your device you *have* to pass certification.
I read that even though USB 4 (or is it USB4) will integrate thunderbolt, if you wish to use the thunderbolt logo it will *still* have to pass intels certification process. This sounds a bit dodgey but if you think about it, I would rather be sure my graphics card enclosure is going to work properly.
Given The number of USB device out there which *apparently* conform to the USB standard but do not interoperate properly, I would say that USB certification might not be stringent enough.
(I say this as an Electronic Engineer who has found numerous issues getting kit to work together properly in systems I design and use as part of my job).
This is so freaking false I don't even know where to begin. To legally put the official Thunderbolt logo & branding on ANY for sale product, it MUST pass Intel's certification process. This is a certified board, regardless of what you've read. In fact, it's the major price tag that comes with this certification process for all non-Intel hardware that has kept Thunderbolt off AMD (in an officially supported capacity) until this point (Intel waives the certification fee on products w/ Intel CPU's).
This is made explicitly clear with the fact that unofficially Thunderbolt 3 works just fine (w/ the Titan Ridge PCIe card) on most all other AM4 as well as X399 boards (with the small exception of device hot swap support not working), but w/o said pricey certification this isn't an "officially" supported setup.
Agreed. If there is one absolute rule I remember from so many years of building PCs, it's "No small fans allowed, especially non-serviceable fans on motherboards. No." Yes, fans have become better, but not so much as to violate the cardinal rule of motherboard choice.
I for one use TB3 everyday for external storage. Sense this is the highlight of the motherboard it would make sense to test it. Along with networking wireless/ wired, sound, usb, etc. You know, the stuff that is on the motherboard.
IMO I am definitely for an M.2 boot drive + local storage, but I really wish for 6 sata ports or the ability to squeeze in an extra PCIEx4 slot so we can expand ourselves. You can fit a surprising amount of 2.5" hard drives in mini ITX case. I'm up to nearly 60 TB starting tomorrow.
I am surprised to see that the default setting is actually overclock to the long-term unsafe levels (every time you raise the voltage you reduce the longevity AND power efficiency).
You meant to say "4x remaining X570 chipset lanes" not CPU lanes. The 4x CPU lanes are ALWAYS connected to the primary M.2 slot on any Zen platform. Why they didn't use the spare chipset lanes for another M.2 slot though is entirely beyond me.
ITX is a board for SFF PCs yet this is incompatible with most of the strong low profile air coolers. As an example Noctua makea the L12 Ghost S1 version which provides the absolute optimal air cooling for that SFF case YET is does not fit the ASRock board, nor do most of the best coolers.
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HardwareDufus - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
This board is sooooo close to what I want. However, a 2nd M.2 slot, for a 2nd NVMe drive is necessary. I know it's allot to ask for in an m-ITX board, but it can be done.shabby - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Next version they add a second nvme slot "oh I wish it had 10gbit lan, almost prefect..."wolrah - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
> Next version they add a second nvme slot "oh I wish it had 10gbit lan, almost prefect..."To be fair, at least something >1gbit *should* have been standard on high-end boards long ago, but for whatever reason no one's integrated it in to a chipset.
Instead we get a compact desktop board that wastes precious space with WiFi. WiFi is for things that move and things that get placed in odd locations where wiring is impractical. Desktop computers are neither of those things. Even if you're one of those screwballs who refuses to plug in a cable or insists on placing your computer in some weird place it's not like WiFi is fast enough that USB would be a bottleneck, so there's no good reason for it to be taking up space on a motherboard.
Hell, actually a M.2 slot would be a win-win there, those who want WiFi can install it instead of a SSD.
DiHydro - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
No, I think he is right. Being able to stick another M.2 drive in there is super helpful, especially as if you leave it open for a cheaper/slower SSD as more of a mass storage option. Personally, I want it for two 2 TB intel drives right off the bat, then I will add another SATA drive if I need it at that point.29a - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
just buy a 4 tb samsung29a - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
or use sata ssd's for the slower cheap storagewr3zzz - Monday, October 14, 2019 - link
Your obviously have never worked with ITX or even mATX cases. An extra M.2 slot is a godsend vs. the space and cabling headaches of sata drives in SFF.DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Collectively, these are some of the worst comments I’ve ever seen on AT. This is probably the best mITX motherboard board ever designed - even surpassing ASRock’s excellent X299 boards.16 high-performance cores, nearly 4000 points in Cinebench R15, 64GB of high-speed DD4, 18TB of SSD storage (2TB at 3GB/s and 16TB at 1.5GB/s), 6 USB3 ports (two of them Gen 2), and the first full-speed Thunderbolt 3 ever on an mITX motherboard! In fact, being on AMD, I won’t be shocked if it turns out to run at 40Gbps, rather than the expected 32Gbps (on Intel ATX) or 16Gbps (on Intel mITX).
WiFi is useful on a portable form factor (at minimal expense), while 10GbE generates significant heat and adds nearly $100 to the cost. I think every complaint here can be addressed with proper system design, and Thunderbolt 3 makes all the difference, allowing one to add e.g. 10GbE and USB 3 as needed. In fact, TB3 makes this the first mITX board that can transfer files at 2/3 GB/s (in/out) and operate an eGPU with all 4 PCIe 3.0 lanes!
Ironically, the only significant drawback wasn’t mentioned yet - the lack of an iGPU on Zen 2 (useful e.g. for video encoding) which could free up the PCIe slot/lanes for other uses.
chx1975 - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
The Thunderbolt chip, out of necessity, is the same Intel Titan Ridge you'd find on Intel ATX boards or some laptops. While this motherboard is the first to integrate it, there were reports on various forums of the Gigabyte Titan Ridge card (not the Alpine Ridge) working in AMD motherboards without connecting the special header it has. There is no Titan Ridge LP so the bus speed will be 40gbps and the data speed will be 22gbps. That's the same across all TB3 controllers, except the Alpine Ridge LP where the data speed will be 16gps and the bus speed, I think even after this many years, is simply unknown. 20gbps would make sense but it could be just the 18gbps necessary to run a DisplayPort. But then again, there is no common sense where Intel and Thunderbolt is concerned, noone knows why they gimped the data speed on full speed controllers to 22gbps.DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
No, I agree there’s not much common sense there - even down to questions such as “why is TB3 networking limited to 10Gbps” (and reportedly not even reliable enough for production - I’ve only used it in testing scenarios).I had not heard of the 22gbps data limit, but even if it applies here this motherboard should still be the most flexible and highest performance mITX model available, and (fortunately) could still approach 3GB/s transfer rates.
GreenReaper - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
I think that's because Thunderbolt at a lower level works over individual 10Gbps lanes. You can have multiple "ports" but then you'll have multiple interfaces - perhaps you can team them at a higher level? But if it's Alpine Ridge you'll almost certainly be limited to low-power 10Gbps.firewrath9 - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
huh? 18TB of SSD storage?My asrock Z87 Extreme11, with its 22 sata ports can do EIGHTY-EIGHT TB OF SSD
WOAH
also if 10gbe costs 100$, why is the X470 Taichi Ultimate only 50$ more than the non-ultimate? (it also has other additonal features)
lmille16 - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
Your board is an EATX board. DCide is talking about mITX boards....siuol11 - Friday, October 11, 2019 - link
I'd settle for 2.5 or 5G ethernet, both have readily available chips that cost under $10, and Intel is about to release one (the 225V) that costs less than $2.50.masteraleph - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
No, the M.2 is a big deal. If you're stuffing this into a small case- and plenty of people buying X570 ITX boards will- there's a big advantage to not having any 2.5" drives in the case, whether for airflow, cables, what have you.Calamarian - Thursday, April 16, 2020 - link
Shabby:You could always bifurcate the slot and add a 10GB NIC!
Some cases come with!
https://www.sliger.com/products/cases/sm580/
umano - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
I am so happy I am not alone with this, 16 cores and thunderbolt means one thing, content creator, not a gamer. I mean the cheapest thing you can attach to TB3 is a 10gbe (200$).There are a lot of video makers and some colourists (who do not need to work with 6-8k raw) that own the x299 itx because it can be portable even in a backpack.
Unless they have the crazy idea of putting a threadripper on a DTX board they lost a great opportunity. This board is a compromise for everyone, too expensive due to tb3 to who is budget-wise, as a gamer I would go with gigabyte for the 2 m2 and the backplate armour (and a very respectable 8 phase vrm) or better the dtx Asus board.
This board can be good only if someone wants a very portable setup with no GPU and they need a faster (x4 PCI 3) GPU. So almost none
I think except Asus maybe, but they were not that good either, manufacturers went very wrong with PCIe 4.0 and the x570.
Asrock could have used the 4x link from the chipset (like only Asus did on their pro board reviewed here) for the second m2, they could have swapped 2xUsb3 5gbs with 2 basic usb3 port for mouse and keyboard with the lanes shared with the wifi module (it will never need full bandwidth and how much data transfer is there for mouse and keyboard) so here you are the 10gbe.
I cannot think the number of devices that can saturate a TB3, 2 x 10gbps usb3 and 2x5gbps.
I have a Wacom tablet, 2 Eizo with 5gbps USB 3 hubs, a das, several and different external drives, HDD, SSD, and a printer. Even with one 10gbps USB, it would have been fine, we can have tb3, who needs to connect 2 nvme external drive? By the way 4 SATA ports without raid 5?
The 2080ti barely (2-3%) saturates a PCI 3 8x link, sharing the lanes between the GPU and the third m2 is not blasphemy at all, so there will be bandwidth, 12x PCIe 4, for a dual GPU card more powerful than a dual 2080ti.
So now I need to change pc and I will buy this board because of the TB3 but I hope they will understand their mistake and someone will release something better, way better
Now I have to spend 250 for the board, 300 for a thunderbolt dock with 10gbe (connected to the NAS) that I cannot use while I am using my raid das, 300+ for 64gb instead of 32gb because I cannot have a fast nvme drive for photoshop/DaVinci cache, and I still don't know how much for 2 custom water block for VRM, and other 40 for the chipset block and probably I will buy a USB DAC for headphones
So I know it is almost impossible to have a sabre and 3 m2 on an itx board but at least for me a board with that stuff and a big block for vrm and chipset, that could have saved some space for extra daughter boards, it is worth more than 900+ and still I would have saved money
I know it is insane and liquid cooling is not for everyone, but an ITX motherboard with 2 m2, tb3, 10gbe and some USB ports (maybe a second tb3) sharing the GPU link it is not unreasonable.
They probably did not do it because they want content creators going with threadripper, but 3d is not the only thing that matter, video has the largest market, and we cannot bring matx cases onset easily, especially because they are ugly and the market is accustomed to see apple products, so we get no money from it, so I will not buy threadripper even I know it is amazing
FiveOhFour - Saturday, January 11, 2020 - link
you have other options come onCheapSushi - Saturday, October 12, 2019 - link
Reaallly wish ASRock and others would push for Mini-DTX! With a second PCIe slot. Put the M.2 somewhere else. :OCalamarian - Thursday, April 16, 2020 - link
With both 10GB USB 3.2 and Thunderbolt I'd bet it's more an issue of available PCIe lanes than MB space...drexnx - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
even before I knew it was a blink 182 reference, I still read it as "all the...small things"Tuxie - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
I'm still waiting for a Mini-ITX board with AM4, 2x M.2 and 10GbE. No need for WiFi, SATA, TB or onboard DP/HDMI.jeremyshaw - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
The last part is what kills this board for me. It wastes space on DP and HDMI (technically, just HDMI, since the DP is an input for the TB3), when it already has a TB3/USB-C connection to handle video output. If someone insists on using a $220 board for a 3400G (and I am being extremely generous here), let them fall on their own sword. Let them spend the extra $20-30 on a DP-->HDMI adapter. Don't waste precious space on this board with a HDMI connector.Even worse, the Intel version of this board has all of the same outputs, PLUS two more USB ports and another M.2 slot. So no matter how I slice it, this board is down on features vs existing ASRock boards. From what I understand, ASRock didn't link the M.2 slot to the extra 4 PCIe lanes from the CPU, either, so it's sharing bandwidth from the chipset (with LAN & TB3), just like the Intel board. What a waste.
umano - Friday, October 11, 2019 - link
I totally agree, let's hope in the futureFiveOhFour - Saturday, January 11, 2020 - link
i agree but the hdmi part isn't fair it makes sense given how common this form factor is for use as a home theatre pcFiveOhFour - Saturday, January 11, 2020 - link
thats a major dissapointment though for sure, so whats the best option for x570 boards with thunderbolt, aside from the $1,000 white one. I don't need a certain form factor, though it would've been nice, just the best/most features and quality and priceValantar - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
They're not going to make a premium ITX board without WiFi - too risky in terms of lost sales. A lot of SFF PC users move their PCs around, and not all places have Ethernet available. Also, ditching SATA seems early - people have legacy devices still (though cutting it down to 2 SATA probably wouldn't be a deal breaker for many). Likely all of this could be fit on board if they went with some sort of stacked m.2 layout like the Gigabyte or the Strix.Beyond that, I agree on faster networking though. Even one of those Realtek 2.5GB controllers would be a huge (well, 2.5x) improvement. Fitting a 10GbE controller might be too tight of a fit, sadly. But maybe on a daughterboard/some sort of vertical m.2 board like WiFi controllers?
DanNeely - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
I doubt we'll see many 2 sata boards anytime soon; but the total is dropping and starting to shift downward. Looking at newegg listings, and limiting AMD to x70 boards since the remainder of the 5xx series isn't out yet:x370 3x 4 ports, 29x 6 ports, 76x 8 ports, 2x 10 ports.
x470 21x 4 ports, 147x 6 ports, 19x 8 ports
x570 36x 4 ports, 181x 6 ports, 83x 8 ports.
10 ports has disappeared as an option. 4 ports has grown from 3 to 11% of the total, and despite bouncing back a bit this year 8 port models are a minority of designs now vs the default in x370 boards.
On the intel side, and sticking to Z series boards to stay with the same general market segment as AMD:
Z170: 3x 2 port boards, 20x 4 port, 68x 6 ports, 8x 8 ports.
Z270: 9x 4 port, 74x 6 port, 19x 8 ports.
Z370: 43x 4 port, 129x 6 port, 1x 8 port
Z390: 66x 4 port, 476x 6 port, 18x 8 port.
Similar trends overall; 8 port is much less common on Intel boards because their consumer chipsets only have 6 sata ports available; 8+ requires a 3rd party controller and has been much less common for years as a result.
With both brands I suspect the transition will be slow because consumer boards suffer from feature checkboxitis and the connectors are cheap. Reducing support on the chipset would push things faster but sata controllers are relatively small/cheap compared to top of the line USB/PCIe ones and both companies are doing variations of the flexible IO port thing so it doesn't cost them much either. It'll happen eventually, but I don't expect to see much movement until the price/GB gap narrows at lot between SSD and HDDs because of people wanting to make DIY NAS/Storage servers.
Heavenly71 - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Sadly this board severly lacks USB ports. And it also doesn't have an internal header for front panel USB-C.imaheadcase - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
That isn't really a issue considering all the options you can add usb to a system now-a-days.TheinsanegamerN - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Except there is no expansion do do so...oops.This is mini ITX. This stuff NEEDS to be on the board. You can tjust add it, there is nowhere to do so!
Death666Angel - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
May I introduce you to the concept of USB hubs?Valantar - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Leaving the x4 m.2 PCIe link off the CPU on the table is bordering on criminal. Sure, the board is packed nonetheless, but when every single competing board has two m.2 slots, this is a no-go. Sure, TB3 would be nice, but to be realistic the only thing it would be used for would be TB3 networking when needing to do quick file transfers to a laptop. Not worth the loss of a second m.2 slot by a long shot. And sure, I could get a TB3 SSD case - and drive up the price of that second drive by 2-3x. No thank you. I'll likely go for the Gigabyte or the Strix.Valantar - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Worth adding: a legitimate use case for this would be connecting the upcoming Apple monitor. Not many SFF desktop PCs capable of that. But will that even work with non-Apple hardware?Calamarian - Thursday, April 16, 2020 - link
As far as I know no WinPC thunderbolt 3 connection would work as apple "over-clocks" it's TB3 connections to run the Apple display... :(TheinsanegamerN - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Could it be lack of trace room? Socket AM4 is bigger, leaving less space to run traces, and you already have a LOT going through a small space.DigitalFreak - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
While I agree with you, I'm guessing they did it because using the x4 link on the CPU for NVMe wouldn't allow the M.2 slot to support M.2 SATA drives as well. That said, they should have run the Thunderbolt controller off that x4 link if it wasn't being used.TheinsanegamerN - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Why dont they put this level of effort into micro ATX boards?DanNeely - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Because sales have imploded. The people who care about size have left for miniITX as the relevance of SLI/XFire has vanished and the price/performance penalty for the smaller size has withered away. The part of the market that doesn't care is sticking with full ATX because why not,their case holds a full size board, they might need one of the extra connectors someday, and besides the more spread out layout makes getting all the connectors in easier.
Pushing higher PCIe standards more than a few cm is going to get increasingly expensive; which is why AMD hasn't offered a 550 chipset with PCIe4 yet. Cost reasons might push mainstream PCIe4 boards out of the full ATX range. PCIe5 is much worse; to the extent that it might not become a consumer standard at all; it's looking like just reaching from the CPU to the top PCIe slot or chipset will either need expensive redriver chips or PCBs that cost a few hundred dollars for a full sized board. Assuming it happens at all, I suspect that will put a lot of price pressure towards a revival for micro ATX.
jeremyshaw - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
I feel they'll just have the top slot be PCIe 4/5, then all of the other slots at PCIe 3 or even 2. Depending on chipset placement, it may not even be viable for the chipset to have PCIe5.DanaGoyette - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
I'll bet nobody buys micro ATX partly because all the micro ATX boards are crippled in things such as audio codec (enjoy your ALC887), Ethernet (yay Realtek), or in Asrock's case, poor VRM efficiency.Nobody buys because there are no good boards, no good boards because nobody buys.
TheinsanegamerN - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
I remembre when there were tons of micro ATX chioces, the gigabyte snimer M.3, the asus boards, ece.Even intel only has two good micro ATX boards, both from asus. Nothing from gigabyte, nothing good from MSI or ASrock. At least the TUF micro has a good audio chip (Realtek ALC S1200A) and intel NIC.
Jasmij - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Throughout the review I see much talk about Thunderbolt but benchmarks are missing.This board failed certification by Intel.
https://thunderbolttechnology.net/products?tid=15&...
Can we get some Thunderbolt compatablity and speed tests?
DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
I would like to see tests too, but I don’t see how this motherboard “failed certification” simply by being absent from a list where the newest motherboard I could find was the 2018 Z390 Designare.jeremyshaw - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Also, didn't Intel already open standard Thunderbolt? They may not be in charge of certification anymore.DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Yes, they did - right about the time the list appears to have stopped growing!jab701 - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
FYI, they are still in charge of certification.If you want to use the thunderbolt logo on your device you *have* to pass certification.
I read that even though USB 4 (or is it USB4) will integrate thunderbolt, if you wish to use the thunderbolt logo it will *still* have to pass intels certification process. This sounds a bit dodgey but if you think about it, I would rather be sure my graphics card enclosure is going to work properly.
Given The number of USB device out there which *apparently* conform to the USB standard but do not interoperate properly, I would say that USB certification might not be stringent enough.
(I say this as an Electronic Engineer who has found numerous issues getting kit to work together properly in systems I design and use as part of my job).
Cooe - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link
This is so freaking false I don't even know where to begin. To legally put the official Thunderbolt logo & branding on ANY for sale product, it MUST pass Intel's certification process. This is a certified board, regardless of what you've read. In fact, it's the major price tag that comes with this certification process for all non-Intel hardware that has kept Thunderbolt off AMD (in an officially supported capacity) until this point (Intel waives the certification fee on products w/ Intel CPU's).This is made explicitly clear with the fact that unofficially Thunderbolt 3 works just fine (w/ the Titan Ridge PCIe card) on most all other AM4 as well as X399 boards (with the small exception of device hot swap support not working), but w/o said pricey certification this isn't an "officially" supported setup.
andychow - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
"a DisplayPort 1.4 input for users looking to drive multiple displays with resolutions of up to 4K from a discrete graphics card". How???The DP goes from your discrete graphic card into the motherboard. Then what?
jeremyshaw - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
It is for TB3.DanaGoyette - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
Would you mind checking out the PBO power meters? There are suspicions that the boards are reading 50% of the actual power usage.https://www.reddit.com/r/ASRock/comments/clbolc/x5...
DanaGoyette - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
Oops, wrong link.https://www.reddit.com/r/ASRock/comments/cx47ql/th...
yetanotherhuman - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
I remember the days of chipset fans. No thanks. I'd rather have a B450 board. (In fact, that's exactly what I bought for my 3600)Sivar - Tuesday, October 15, 2019 - link
Agreed. If there is one absolute rule I remember from so many years of building PCs, it's "No small fans allowed, especially non-serviceable fans on motherboards. No."Yes, fans have become better, but not so much as to violate the cardinal rule of motherboard choice.
Dug - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
I for one use TB3 everyday for external storage. Sense this is the highlight of the motherboard it would make sense to test it. Along with networking wireless/ wired, sound, usb, etc. You know, the stuff that is on the motherboard.eek2121 - Sunday, October 13, 2019 - link
IMO I am definitely for an M.2 boot drive + local storage, but I really wish for 6 sata ports or the ability to squeeze in an extra PCIEx4 slot so we can expand ourselves. You can fit a surprising amount of 2.5" hard drives in mini ITX case. I'm up to nearly 60 TB starting tomorrow.Nikit - Sunday, October 13, 2019 - link
To all of you longing for 10gbe or extra m.2 slot - this board supports 8x8 bifurcation of the 16x slot.umano - Monday, October 21, 2019 - link
thank youpeevee - Monday, October 14, 2019 - link
I am surprised to see that the default setting is actually overclock to the long-term unsafe levels (every time you raise the voltage you reduce the longevity AND power efficiency).kgreen747 - Saturday, November 30, 2019 - link
Why did they not utilize the 4 remaining PCIE lanes from the CPU to drive the TB3 chip or M.2 slot?kgreen747 - Wednesday, December 4, 2019 - link
Update: An ASRock rep has stated that the M.2 slot is indeed connected to the CPU's PCIe lanes.Cooe - Thursday, December 19, 2019 - link
You meant to say "4x remaining X570 chipset lanes" not CPU lanes. The 4x CPU lanes are ALWAYS connected to the primary M.2 slot on any Zen platform. Why they didn't use the spare chipset lanes for another M.2 slot though is entirely beyond me.DanaGoyette - Tuesday, April 21, 2020 - link
If you view Device Manager in tree format, you can see that the M.2 slot is behind the chipset, not directly hanging off the CPU.dcburr - Friday, October 30, 2020 - link
ITX is a board for SFF PCs yet this is incompatible with most of the strong low profile air coolers. As an example Noctua makea the L12 Ghost S1 version which provides the absolute optimal air cooling for that SFF case YET is does not fit the ASRock board, nor do most of the best coolers.