Introduction

MSI MEG Z390 ACE review
To infinity with a new eight-core Coffee Lake-S processor

MSI is in the house with their new MSI MEG Z390 ACE, this really nice looking motherboard has been fitted with three M2 slots, a lot of connectivity, as well as pretty nice looks with a new shroud over the VRM heatsink, fitted being an Infinity Mirror RGB, LED zone.

You'll agree with me that this dawg has great looks and all the features you probably seek for a Z370/Z390 motherboard platform. The motherboard has been fitted with the usual suspects, including a Gigabit based Ethernet jack and on the board, you may house three M2 SSDs. Right, let's test the new Coffee Lake platform.

With the new Coffee Lake-S refresh you can expect three processors predominantly become popular in demand for the PC gamer, as each and every one of the processors will offer fantastic gaming performance if your graphics card is fast enough. Intel is able to boost the Turbo frequencies towards that 5 GHz domain. And that is a big advantage that Intel has over AMD, which is wedges shut at that 4.2 GHz range with Ryzen 2000 (which is overall really good, but the high per clock core is where it matters in CPU bound gaming; e.g. with super high-end graphics cards like the RTX 2080 Ti).  Intel is releasing these three 9000 series processors initially:

• Core i5-9600K (6 Core / 6 Threads)
• Core i7-9700K (8 Core / 8 Threads)
• Core i9-9900K (8 Core / 16 Threads)

That does not mean you'll only see three processors in the Core 9000 range, word out on the street is that a procs like 9100, 9400 and 9500 Core series processor will be released as well. However, this specific launch invokes three processors. For this review, we'll use the eight-core / sixteen threads Core i9 9900K through our benchmark paces. You'll be able to tweak this proc towards at least 5.0 GHz on all eight cores with this motherboard. 

In this review, we look at the MSI MEG Z390 ACE. MSI motherboards these days are sorted into four categories: the MEG series, MPG series, MAG series, and PRO series with MEG being short for 'MSI Enthusiast Gaming'. There are two Z390 MEG models, the GODLIKE and ACE. Both feature Killer (E2500) network, controllers, also proper WIFI has been embedded, 2x2 802.11ac connection with a possible 1.73 Gb/s throughput. The board as stated is positioned in that higher-end region of what is considered the mainstream desktop segment, it does look very MSI styled with the dragon logo, stuff we like of course. Also, the new board has some interesting new features, like the new Mystic light infinity LED mirror, an ESS Audio DAC and triple M2 ports. Have a peek and then let's head onwards into the review my man.