MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Review

[Dan_D]

Introduction

MSI is a company that’s well known throughout the industry. The company has certainly taken some hits to its reputation. One of those hits came awhile back now regarding the company’s budget offerings and its VRM’s.



In response, MSI set out to right its reputation with the MSI MEG X570 Unify and later on, its X570 Tomahawk. These motherboards do indeed come with a good VRM implementation. While we haven’t tested the latter, we have tested the former.



So, what would happen if we paired the MSI X570-A PRO with a 12 core Ryzen 9 3900X? We figured we would find out for ourselves and see if the VRM reputation holds up.



We’ve always had a good working and professional relationship with MSI. They’ve been a supporter of this website from the...

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[Space_Ranger]

Thanks Dan for the great review! Pair this MB with a 5600X for a cheap solution that'll be more than enough for gaming needs.

 

[Endgame]

This board screams “putz with the VRM cooling” based on the review. I wonder if you could just remount the heat sinks for improved performance? If not that, I have plenty of old pentium 2 slot 1 heat sinks laying around. Wonder if you could just slap one of those on for a big increase in cooling.

 

[flecom]

I've got one of these in my main desktop with a 3900x and never really had an issue... I was looking for a motherboard without all the RGB/wifi/1337 gamer nonsense and with 2x nvme slots and this was good enough... my case (corsair D4000) has good airflow though so that may be why I've never noticed an issue

 

[Dan_D]

This board screams “putz with the VRM cooling” based on the review. I wonder if you could just remount the heat sinks for improved performance? If not that, I have plenty of old pentium 2 slot 1 heat sinks laying around. Wonder if you could just slap one of those on for a big increase in cooling.

I might be able to remount the heat sinks and get some improvement, but frankly the issue isn't so much a heat sink issue as its a design issue. This board simply has fewer phases and fewer MOSFETs, chokes etc. than other boards in the segment. The MSI X570-A PRO has the most anemic VRM implementation of any X570 board that I know of.

Also, those older heat sinks probably aren't as good as you might think. Even if they were, the heat sinks have to be designed, machined and shaped to fit the specific VRM implementation in question.

I've got one of these in my main desktop with a 3900x and never really had an issue... I was looking for a motherboard without all the RGB/wifi/1337 gamer nonsense and with 2x nvme slots and this was good enough... my case (corsair D4000) has good airflow though so that may be why I've never noticed an issue

I didn't have any issues either. The only issue is that the motherboard runs hot. Way too hot for use with 12 core and 16 core CPU's in my opinion. This is especially true when overclocking. The 115c-117c temperatures David and I encountered are actually best case scenarios for this motherboard using a 12c or 16c CPU. Other reviewers reported crossing the 120c barrier and at 125c, you end up with throttling. That robs your system of performance you paid for. This is not a good motherboard for such CPU's.

Not encountering an obvious problem doesn't preclude the possibility that this happens to any given system from time to time. I'd monitor those VRM temperatures and make sure that this doesn't happen.

As I said in the article, I think this motherboard is perfectly fine for 8 and 6 core CPU's. Even with heavy usage or overclocking, I think it will be fine. I wouldn't recommend this motherboard regardless. I wouldn't pay for VRM's this limiting or this anemic. It's a shame given the board's otherwise stellar performance.

 

[Stoly]

Wow, this is gotta be the first time I've ever a review of what seems like a nice MB from a reputable vendor NOT quite recommended.

 

[Endgame]

I might be able to remount the heat sinks and get some improvement, but frankly the issue isn't so much a heat sink issue as its a design issue. This board simply has fewer phases and fewer MOSFETs, chokes etc. than other boards in the segment. The MSI X570-A PRO has the most anemic VRM implementation of any X570 board that I know of.

Also, those older heat sinks probably aren't as good as you might think. Even if they were, the heat sinks have to be designed, machined and shaped to fit the specific VRM implementation in question.

Are the VRMs not the same Z height?

 

[flecom]

The MSI X570-A PRO has the most anemic VRM implementation of any X570 board that I know of.

Dont the MSI X570 GAMING PLUS and X570 GAMING EDGE boards use the exact same VRM implementation just with a bigger heatsink? And I think the ASUS Prime X570-P uses a very similar VRM implementation also

Not encountering an obvious problem doesn't preclude the possibility that this happens to any given system from time to time. I'd monitor those VRM temperatures and make sure that this doesn't happen.

Sure, but in my usage (stock clocks, gaming and running a bunch of VMs when I'm working on stuff) I've never seen them exceed 100c... like I said though I have a good case with good airflow... if you want to overclock and for just general "enthusiast" requirements it's inadequate (although really why are you buying a $130 motherboard if you want to overclock) but as just a "whatever it works" computer it's fine ¯\_(ツ)_/¯