If you take your custom-loop cooling seriously and have an interest in the new Z490 motherboard platform, then you might want to pay attention. In announcing the MPG Z490 Gaming Pro Carbon EK X, MSI has one of the first confirmed motherboard designs for the new Intel Comet Lake-S platform that will feature a water block cooling solution as an integrated part of the design!
MSI MPG Z490 Gaming Pro Carbon EK X
Coming in partnership with “EK Water Block” this new motherboard design will feature a liquid cooling CPU solution that, rather than just covering the processor, will also include the surrounding VRM area. A factor that, on the whole, should provide some solid performance. Particularly if you like pushing your overclocks to the RAM.
Taking the design as a whole, however, this is undoubtedly one of the best looking Z490 motherboards we’ve seen so far. There is, however, probably a pretty notable downside to this. Namely, the price tag.
What Do We Think?
While the design does look pretty amazing, it’s something of a colossal elephant in the room. Namely, that this motherboard is going to be expensive. While no exact figures have been revealed at the time of writing, we’d be very surprised if you saw much (if any) change out of £500 for this product. Why do we think this? Well, this design from MSI will likely represent one of their most premium options and the water block alone (if you were looking to purchase it separately) will set you back around £150.
So, very nice to look at, but you’re probably into kidney realms of money! Nobody ever said that performance didn’t often come at a cost though, did they?…
If you want to learn more about this (and other) MSI products, you can check out their official website via the link here!
What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!
