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In the event you’ve been excited about a brand new construct, you’ve most likely seen that top finish motherboard pricing has taken one more upward step. Although not the costliest X670E motherboard when it comes to price, there are solely a handful with a better value than the MSI MEG X670E Ace. At $699 / £849 / AU$1399, it’s eyebrow elevating irrespective of the way you take a look at it. In equity to MSI, different producers’ boards are costly too, and you actually do get loads of motherboard in your cash. However, is it well worth the asking value?
The MEG collection is MSI’s high-end product tier. The MEG X670E Ace is second solely to the far more costly MEG X670E Godlike (opens in new tab) in MSI’s motherboard vary. At a ridiculous $1,299 for the Godlike, the $699 Ace appears to be like low-cost compared. Nevertheless it nonetheless must set itself aside if it is to justify its price, and fortunately, the Ace contains some wonderful options, and a few good little touches that assist to justify that hefty value.
The very first thing I seen when taking the board out of its field was simply how heavy it’s. It’s coated in stable heavy metallic together with a full cowl backplate. It’s an E-ATX board, so that you’ll want to ensure your case helps it. MSI retained the gold highlights which can be frequent to earlier Ace boards. Key highlights embody as much as six M.2 slots, with 4 slots on the board and one other two PCIe 5.0 slots on an add-in card.
Add to that in depth connectivity choices, a powerful VRM with wonderful cooling capability and excessive spec audio and also you’ve received a board that ought to see you thru Zen 5, Zen 6 and perhaps even Zen 7 upgrades. You may ensure that the Ace can have years of BIOS updates forward of it.
MSI MEG X670E Ace specs
Socket: AMD Socket AM5
CPU compatibility: AMD Ryzen 7000 desktop processors
Type issue: E-ATX
Reminiscence assist: As much as DDR5-6666 (OC), As much as 128GB
Storage: 4+2 M.2, 6x SATA
USB: As much as 3x USB 3.2 Gen2x2, 10x USB 3.2 Gen 2, 4x USB 3.1 Gen 1, 4x USB 2.0
Show: 1x Sort-C DP
Networking: AMD RZ616 Wi-Fi 6E; Aquantia 10G LAN
Audio: Realtek ALC4082 7.1 Channel HD Audio
Value: $699/ £849 / AU$1399
Wanting across the board, MSI has clearly gone with a much less is extra theme. The period of peak RGB is clearly behind us. I for one am pleased with that, although if you happen to do love RGB, the dragon adjoining to the I/O space together with the Ace and triangle logos on the backside of the board have RGB lighting. The general design has a type of understated class and subtlety, although if you wish to go all out on RGB, there are three ARGB headers and one RGB header on board.
The board comes with 4 onboard M.2 slots and 6 SATA ports, however there’s an extra PCIe 5.0 add-in card that offers you a complete of six M.2 slots, with three of them supporting PCIe 5.0. The Xpander-Z card incorporates a stable heatsink and cooling fan. If this factor doesn’t hold subsequent gen NVMe drives cool, nothing will. It’s even received a six pin PCIe energy enter. An indication of issues to return?
The onboard major M.2 slot sits adjoining to the reminiscence slots. It’s an amazing thought to position it there. It sits within the path of air incoming from the entrance of the case and away from a warmth blasting graphics card. Moreover – admittedly it’s a comparatively small factor – however MSI deserves credit score for the masterful M.2 cooling mechanism for this slot. It depends on a easy latch mechanism, whereas nonetheless offering high quality cooling for a subsequent gen drive. It’s one of the best M.2 mounting configuration I’ve seen on any motherboard.
The board has eight fan headers, a entrance USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 type-C header and one other type-C header that may ship 60W of energy. To make use of this functionality, a 6-pin PCIe energy connector must be related to the adjoining port.
Issues like twin BIOS, energy and reset buttons and debug LED are current, although very a lot anticipated on this value vary.
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The Ace features a 22+2+1 section VRM with 90A energy levels. Another boards have 110A levels, however make no mistake, the facility supply capabilities of high-end X670E boards are greater than sufficient to energy a liquid nitrogen cooled Ryzen 9 7950X CPU (opens in new tab). Even when future Zen 5 or Zen 6 processors by some means find yourself consuming double the facility, the Ace received’t even break a sweat.
I’ve usually praised Gigabyte for its finned heatsink designs. They’re proof that type and performance can mix collectively. MSI constructed the Ace with a finned heatsink design. It provides it a a lot bigger floor space that means cooling is way much less of a problem. In our testing, when looping a totally loaded 7950X, it was barely heat, with a studying of solely 45c. That’s wonderful.
The rear I/O is spectacular, although notably it does lack USB4, which the Asus Crosshair X670E Hero (opens in new tab) and cheaper Asrock X670E Taichi each have. You do get a pair of Sort-C 3.2 Gen 2×2 ports although, considered one of which helps DP 1.4 with HBR3. There are a minimum of 9 3.2 Gen 2 ports, which is nice to see. The Ace comes with 10G LAN. Although maybe high-speed LAN is dropping some desirability with the appearance of quicker Wi-Fi 6E, it’s a godsend for customers with issues like NAS or pre-wired houses.
There’s additionally an fascinating button that MSI calls the Sensible Button. It may be programmed within the BIOS to reset the system, flip the Mystic Mild RGB on or off, boot into protected mode or set all of the followers to run at full or default pace. Fairly useful that, although it is perhaps of restricted use for a lot of until you will have simple accessibility to the rear I/O.
System Efficiency
Gaming Efficiency
As is nearly all the time the case, until there is a main drawback, most boards with the identical CPU and chipset will carry out very equally to at least one one other, more often than not inside a margin of error, and that is once more the case right here.
Take a look at rig
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 7950X
Graphics: Zotac GeForce RTX 3080 Ti AMP Holo
RAM: 2x 16GB G.Talent Trident Z5 DDR5-6000 C30
Storage: 2TB Seagate FireCuda 530
Cooling: Cooler Grasp PL360 Flux 360mm AIO
PSU: Corsair AX1000
MSI’s BIOS has modified little in recent times, and why would it not? Its format is historically person pleasant whereas remaining absolutely featured.
Reasonably than spend time on overclocking, which is 100% CPU cooling restricted, I examined ECO mode, which works effectively on the X670E Ace. In the event you don’t like the concept of a 7950X pulling over 200W, you’ll be able to set it a lot decrease. Heck you’ll be able to set it to 65W if you need.
For all of the speak of accelerating energy consumption and TDPs, experimenting with these instruments can considerably scale back cooling necessities and energy consumption.
Just a few years in the past, a $500 motherboard was thought of ridiculous, however now it’s no laughing matter. In equity to MSI although, it is not alone.
I just like the X670E Ace quite a bit. It’s received the whole lot you’d realistically want other than USB4. It runs cool, it’s received some intelligent, revolutionary design options and it is received 10G LAN, however it’s additionally $699/ £849 / AU$1399 and that’s going to cease most consumers from even contemplating it when respectable non -E boards, Together with MSI’s personal X670-P could be had for half the value.
Although {the electrical} complexities of PCIe 5.0 and DDR5 add expense to new motherboards, it is nonetheless dear. Just a few years in the past, a $500 motherboard was thought of ridiculous, however now it’s no laughing matter. In equity to MSI although, it is not alone. Each different producer has boards on this value vary, give or take.
However I’ve the sensation that top pricing will not be round without end. Financial and provide chain points will subside (hopefully) and a board just like the X670E Ace could be anticipated to final for a few years although a number of CPU upgrades.
The Ace is Ace. It is a elegant and have wealthy product, however it’s not for everybody. When you have equally excessive finish components to match with it, and you may make use of its storage capabilities, 10G LAN and many quick non USB4 ports, you may be joyful, even when your pockets is not a lot.
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