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  • realbabilu - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Max fan size?
  • Mr Perfect - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    So the MSI trades two USB 3 ports for a weedy little VRM fan that doesn't beat a passively cooled board? A poor trade.
  • nerd1 - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Single GBE for $270 board?
  • shabby - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Less is more...
  • drexnx - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    no space on the PCB or back panel for more
  • e1jones - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Don't they both have a single 2.5G connector?
  • Luminar - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    I would only buy with 10G ethernet.
  • firewrath9 - Wednesday, August 5, 2020 - link

    I would only buy with 400gbe infiniband
  • AdditionalPylons - Wednesday, August 5, 2020 - link

    At least 2.5 GbE is finally becoming standard with this generation of motherboards!
    Personally, on bigger boards I don't mind the integrated NIC because I can easily add a 25 GbE SFP28 PCIe card for less than $100 used (or 10 GbE SFP+ for ~$30).
    On smaller boards like mITX however, with only one PCIe slot available, I would also prefer 10 GbE integrated.
    Of course these are personal preferences. I don't see 10GbE ever going mainstream because the need simply isn't there for the vast majority of people. Even most tech geeks at AT and similar sites are still fine with 1 GbE (or slower wifi). Also, because we who want faster don't mind different cables and connectors (SFP+) and therefore can buy cheap used enterprise gear, there is simply a very small market left.
    On a related note, while switches are getting cheaper (e.g. Netgear MS510TX, QNAP QSW-308-1C / QSW-1105T, Mikrotik CRS305 etc.) it would be nice to see some cheaper 5/10G external USB NIC options to cater to the laptop crowd. ($79 5GbE QNAP QNA-UC5G1T is getting close, but 10G options are all $150+.)
  • henkhilti - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Identical vrm components, both have proper vrm heatsinks.

    One vrm runs hotter and that board consumes more power (and has hotter cpu).

    Better check what the real Vcore voltage is during load with a multimeter on the back of the cpu socket and you will know why!!!!

    Always check real voltages with a multimeter when overclocking. Use Loadline calibration settings in bios (with more Vdroop) to increase stability (during transients).

    If both boards run identical Vcore during load, power consumption and cpu heat will be very similar.
  • hansip87 - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    In my country these boards are just plain expensive. Instead i went with Asrock Z490M ITX AC with 10400f. which like half the price of these boards. I know VRM not as good but for actual tiny build who really cares?
  • Beaver M. - Thursday, August 6, 2020 - link

    ASRock is pretty awesome with ITX boards. Its still sad that they dont do their ITX-E series anymore, though.
    The much bigger problem is their 10+ year old issues with long or extended USB cables losing connection from time to time or not working at all. No other manufacturer has those issues.
    Back in the day you could at least dodge it by using the extra USB chip onboard for devices that had longer or extended cables, which handled newer USB standards, but nowadays they are all integrated by Intel, and thus they all have the same issue on ASRock boards.
  • artifex - Friday, August 7, 2020 - link

    If you're not overclocking, I'll bet it's fine.
  • Tomatotech - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Nice review. But I’m not sure who in AnandTech’s readership is going to buy these boards. Intel sales to the DIY / home build sector are dropping off a cliff - most of the top selling CPUs on Amazon are now AMD.
  • Showtime - Monday, August 10, 2020 - link

    I'm sure lots of people at AT are into ITX . Intel hasn't fallen off that much. AMD simply has louder fans. You couldn't find a 10600k for months, and Intel sales are strong going by pricing. I noticed this article because I was looking at an i7 10700 over a 3700x. They trade blows with the 10700 being slightly better at gaming at basically the same overall price (CPU/Mobo/RAM). So AMD may have the 6 core, and lower covered, and the higher counts covered, but somehow that vanilla 10700, that AT did meh review on, ends up being a better buy than the very popular 3700x for me.
  • Koenig168 - Tuesday, August 4, 2020 - link

    Waited quite a while for this review. Gigabyte has done a really impressive job with VRM cooling recently. While I like the Unify for its aesthetics, I could have done without the VRM fan and would prefer instead a beefier passive cooler. Now if MSI could fix that and replace the Intel chipset with an X570 or B550, that would be perfect. :)
  • Beaver M. - Thursday, August 6, 2020 - link

    The first thing I look at especially ITX boards (since you cant just add an addon USB slot bracket) is the amount of USB ports.
    MSI fails completely at that.
    Gigabyte isnt much better though, because they messed up the audio connections.
    Also ITX boards shouldnt waste that much space with SATA ports anymore. 2 are more than enough.
    Fixed WIFI is bad too. I know its integrated nowadays in Intel chipsets, but standards change and some people dont need WIFI at all, or need to use USB WIFI anyway, because they need to position their antennas far away. Wasted space on the backplate and PCB.

    Also they are completely overpriced.
  • JlHADJOE - Friday, August 7, 2020 - link

    All I really need to know here is how MSI treats the smaller reviewers like crap, which automatically disqualifies them in my book for the next 5-10 years.
  • Oxford Guy - Saturday, August 8, 2020 - link

    The names of these products are preposterous.
  • saol - Sunday, August 9, 2020 - link

    Hope there will be the B550 mini-ITX showdown.
  • Showtime - Monday, August 10, 2020 - link

    They are overpriced. I am looking at Intel unless those B550's go on sale.

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