ASRock's Z390 Phantom Gaming-ITX/ac - A New Direction

[confusis]

For some time, ASRock has been using the Fatal1ty branding on their high end products - a tie back to the days of old, where Quake was king, and bright, flashy branding was cool. However, Fatal1ty has given way to ASRock's "Phantom Gaming" brand, with a much more subtle aesthetic. All black? Yes please! Beefy heatsinks? Yessir!

First sighted on ASRock's limited availability (unfortunately) GPU line, the Phantom Gaming brand has come to motherboards - slowly taking over the performance space within ASRock's lineup. This particular model uses the Intel Z390 chipset - what Z370 should have been, but I digress.

Let's dive in!

 

[confusis]

A heads up to the community: This marks my last review for SFFn. I'll continue posting news as it comes along, (including CES next week), as well as continue my community leadership here, but I'm moving on to a new project in the coming weeks/months. @3lfk1ng Will be taking over the lead in reviews, however, articles may not be as frequent as they have been.

 

[NeoConker]

Nice last review! Keep us posted about the new project.

Mine is on the way and I have a question, what RAM have you used?

I saw some people complaining about the ram slots proximity, especially with the G.Skill Trident Z. Did you noticed something?

 

[confusis]

I had no problem with RAM. at the moment the board is running G-Skill Flare-X memory with no issues

 

[Biowarejak]

Good read! Kinda like the look of that VRM heatsink

 

[Nanook]

Thanks for the review! This motherboard has been great so far for me.

 

[Lone]

John, thank you for all your excellent reviews!

I like the new direction ASRock is taking here and I may have to give ASRock a try for my next build. I would personally much rather have "ASRock" branding on the heatsink instead of "Phantom Gaming", or nothing at all.

 

[Arboreal]

John, thank you for all your excellent reviews!

I like the new direction ASRock is taking here and I may have to give ASRock a try for my next build. I would personally much rather have "ASRock" branding on the heatsink instead of "Phantom Gaming", or nothing at all.

Big thanks to you John, for all you've done at SFFn and for SSF - good luck with the next adventure.

I too am looking forward to trying some ASrock kit sometime, I really would like a dual M.2 ITX board like the Asus Strix family.
Ok, so Phantom Gaming may not be the greatest branding, but is does get us away from the too red Fatal1ty used until recently.
Go go ASrock!

 

[TheHig]

@confusis Best of luck in your next endeavors John!

Really like this board also. So a request for @ASRock System :

AM4 version with 2x M.2 and the beefy VRMs and heatsink. If the leaks regarding Ryzen 3000 hold 12 or more cores in itx sounds amazing!

 

[Arboreal]

@confusis Best of luck in your next endeavors John!

Really like this board also. So a request for @ASRock System :

AM4 version with 2x M.2 and the beefy VRMs and heatsink. If the leaks regarding Ryzen 3000 hold 12 or more cores in itx sounds amazing!

YESSSSSSS! this ^ sounds an epic proposal

 

[HeroXLazer]

If anyone has any questions about this board, I can help amswer, as I have one.

 

[Questors]

Like the overall looks of the board.

What I don't like:

1. built in M.2 heatsink and the limitations it presents
2. SATA ports jammed in behind the RAM slots...ugh.

These are both potential deal breakers, depending on who the system is built for and what their intended usage will be.

 

[|||]

I saw some people complaining about the ram slots proximity, especially with the G.Skill Trident Z. Did you noticed something?

I have put on EK Monarch RAM heat sinks on my memory and they fit just fine (although the EK logos need to be facing out, which isn't a big deal).

Like the overall looks of the board.

What I don't like:

1. built in M.2 heatsink and the limitations it presents
2. SATA ports jammed in behind the RAM slots...ugh.

These are both potential deal breakers, depending on who the system is built for and what their intended usage will be.

TBH, I prefer this orientation with the SATA connectors, as opposed to jamming the front panel connectors in a weird location, like what Asus did. I would rather they come up with a different solution for the BIOS header pins and ideally would have used that space for a USB-C front panel header with a last available USB 3.1 Gen 2 HSIO from the chipset.

 

[Elerek]

WiFi antenna could benefit from a magnet to stick to metal surfaces and add heft

Wouldn't this hurt signal strength?

 

[Tephnos]

Got a question - is this board compatible with the Noctua C14? The Asus Z370 barely fit - the heatpipes made contact with the VRM heatsink and I had to use electrical tape to prevent it from scuffing.

It's hard to tell if that's going to be an issue with this one too or not. These newer boards are becoming a pain for top down cooling.

 

[Nanook]

Yes I tried the C14 with this board, and everything fits.

 

[NastyNick]

Can I ask a stupid question: what was John referring to when he mentioned intel’s product stack is a nightmare? I’m new to PCs and don’t know what specifically is wrong with intels software currently. I bought this board and a 9700k for an sff build. I more I read about that chip the more I wonder if I made a mistake lol.

 

[confusis]

@NastyNick The software is fine, it's just that currently Intel has umpteen chipsets, and several hundred (slight exaggeration) CPU SKUs.


Minutiae:
Coffee lake chipsets:

1. H310
2. B360
3. H370
4. Q360
5. B365
6. Q370
7. Z310
8. Z390
9. C232
10. C236
11. C242
12. C246

Coffee lake CPU SKUs:

1. i7-9900K
2. i7-9900KF
3. i7-9700K
4. i7-9700KF
5. i7-8086K
6. i7-8700K
7. i7-8700
8. i7-8700T
9. i5-9600K
10. i5-9600KF
11. i5-9400
12. i5-9400F
13. i5-8600K
14. i5-8600
15. i5-8600T
16. i5-8500
17. i5-8500T
18. i5-8400
19. i5-8400T
20. i3-9350KF
21. i3-8350K
22. i3-8300
23. i3-8100
24. i3-8100T
25. Pentium Gold G5600
26. Pentium Gold G5500
27. Pentium Gold G5500T
28. Pentium Gold G5400
29. Pentium Gold G5400T
30. Celeron G4920
31. Celeron G4900
32. Celeron G4900T
33. Xeon 2186G
34. Xeon 2176G
35. Xeon 2146G
36. Xeon 2136
37. Xeon 2126G
38. Xeon 2174G
39. Xeon 2144G
40. Xeon 2134
41. Xeon 2124G
42. Xeon 2124
43. Xeon 2104G

Compared to AMD's current gen:
Chipsets:

1. X470
2. B450

CPUs:

1. Athlon 200GE
2. Athlon Pro 200GE
3. Athlon 220GE
4. Athlon 240GE
5. Ryzen 3 2200GE
6. Ryzen 3 Pro 2200GE
7. Ryzen 3 2200G
8. Ryzen 3 Pro 2200G
9. Ryzen 5 2400GE
10. Ryzen 5 Pro 2200GE
11. Ryzen 5 2400G
12. Ryzen 5 Pro 2400G
13. Ryzen 3 2300X
14. Ryzen 5 2500X
15. Ryzen 5 2600E
16. Ryzen 5 Pro 2600
17. Ryzen 5 2600
18. Ryzen 5 2600X
19. Ryzen 7 2700E
20. Ryzen 7 Pro 2700
21. Ryzen 7 2700
22. Ryzen 7 Pro 2700X
23. Ryzen 7 2700X

(Excluding the HEDT and server platforms.. then the lists just get stupid long)

 

[Nanook]

Can I ask a stupid question: what was John referring to when he mentioned intel’s product stack is a nightmare? I’m new to PCs and don’t know what specifically is wrong with intels software currently. I bought this board and a 9700k for an sff build. I more I read about that chip the more I wonder if I made a mistake lol.

Intel is perfectly fine, and their CPUs are great. Their main advantage is that many programs are better optimized for Intel due to their past market dominance. They just have a terrible track record of “forcing” users to upgrade chipsets (motherboard) along with every (other) generation of CPU upgrades.

 

[MPP]

Hi
I would like to buy this mainboard, I have doubts about the temperatures.
What temperature has PCH under load and idle?