Product Showcase

 
The MSI X399 Gaming Pro Carbon AC review motherboard is to be considered a enthusiast class solution in that super-high-end segment of AMDs X399 chipset based series motherboards. The board is built using the best components, assuring high reliability and a long life-span. Some interesting features are 802.11ac Wi-Fi, triple M.2 as well as an intricate LED Lightning system and four PCIe Express x16 slots.

 
 

 
The motherboard includes all of the standardized X399 enhancements with three M.2 SSD slots and will support SLI (2-way) and Crossfire (4-way). Your PCIe lane configuration will be highly dependent on the choices you make with you purchase. However the CPU alone will deliver a nice 64 PCIe Gen 3.0 lanes. If you'd use four graphics card they would be configured at 16:8:16:8 (or a combination of that) as the chipset uses a x4 link from the processor. The board uses a regular ATX Form Factor at 12.0-in x 9.6-in, 30.5 cm x 24.3 cm.

MSI went USB crazeeeh .. the I/O panel of the mobo reveals a massive amount of USB 3.1 ports, among it a 10 Gbps type-c and type-a connector. AMD offers native USB 3.1 Gen 2 support used in combo with an ASMedia's 3142 controller:

ASMedia ASM3142 Chipset

• 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 (SuperSpeed USB 10Gbps) Type-C port on the back panel
• 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 (SuperSpeed USB 10Gbps) Type-A port on the back panel

AMD X399 Chipset

• 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 (SuperSpeed USB 10Gbps) Type-C port through the internal USB connector
• 4 x USB 3.1 Gen1 (SuperSpeed USB) ports available through the internal USB connectors
• 6 x USB 2.0 (High-speed USB) ports (2 Type-A ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB connectors)

AMD CPU

• 8x USB 3.1 Gen1 (SuperSpeed USB) Type-A ports on the back panel

I would assume that is sufficient for all your USB needs. The motherboard features four PCIe x16 Gen 3.0 expansion slots and in the middle a x1 slot. A Realtek ALC1220 audio codec is the source for audio, but is heavily enhanced with proper audio caps.

The board gets one 10/100/1000 Ethernet controller by Intel, we do sorely miss a 5 or 10 GBit from say Aquantia. There is a PS/2 combo port that can be used for either a keyboard or mouse.

• 1 x Clear CMOS button
• 1 x BIOS FLASHBACK+ button
• 1 x PS/2 keyboard/ mouse combo port
• 2 x USB 2.0 Type-A ports (1 x BIOS FLASHBACK+ port)
• 8 x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A ports
• 1 x LAN (RJ45) port
• 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A port
• 1 x USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C port
• 5 x OFC audio jacks
• 1 x Optical S/PDIF OUT connector

Memory wise the board has 8 DIMM slots for your quad-channel needs. This board is should support up to DDR4 3600 MHz memory (overclocked), you may install up-to 128 GB of it, we recommend 3200 MHz as that is the current best supported frequency.

If you look at the overview of the board you'll spot a nice black design with styled RGB elements on the heatsink plating. Included are SLI adapters (High Bandwidth), WIFI add-in card + antennas for WIFI, SATA cables and all the regular gear like manuals and driver CDs. You'll also receive some heatsink covers you can swap out for a bit of color changing.

With that rear IO chucked full with USB ports, there was no room left for a WIFI module. MSI included an really good Intel AC8265 based add-in card supporting Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac, dual band (2.4GHz, 5GHz) up to 867 Mbps speed. This unit also offer Dual Mode Bluetooth  2.1, 2.1+EDR, 3.0, 4.0, BLE, 4.2.