MSI MEG X399 Creation Threadripper Motherboard Review

A Closer Look

They say first impressions are important, and if that’s true, the MEG makes a damn good one. This motherboard looks absolutely insane. There are so many features crammed on here that there’s barely any space unused. Even more, wherever you look, there’s that stunning grey shark-tooth decal covering everything from the PCB to the heatsinks.

X399 comes with support for 8 x DDR4 DIMMs. The MEG takes full advantage of this, with four DIMMs on either side of the CPU socket, all armoured for durability.

Obviously, we have that huge X399 TR4 socket for the CPU. However, Threadripper CPUs are power hungry animals, so you’ll be glad to see a comprehensive power delivery system flanking the socket.

19 Phase!

There’s a staggering 19 phase digital power design, with a dual heatsink and bridging heat-pipe.

The CPU draws its immense power through two 8-pin headers, which combined, should delivery more than enough headroom for even the 2990WX and some overclocking too.

Extreme Storage

As far as connectivity goes, I would say refer to the specifications on the first page of this review; there are a lot of them. You’ll find plenty of USB 2, 3, and 3.1 ports surrounding the edges of the board. There are also 8 x SATA 6 Gbps ports on the right edge.

Overclockers rejoice, as you’ll find a BIOS Debug LED in the bottom corner, as well as master power controls. There’s also an OC dial for quick tuning of your system.

Along the bottom, you’ll find plenty of fan headers. There are an impressive 10 x PWM headers, and 3 x thermal sensors on this motherboard, so hooking up an impressive cooling system should be pretty easy.

High-end Audio

Down in the bottom left, you’ll find some gold capacitors and the Nahimic4 audio chipset. MSI say it’ll deliver “Studio Grade Sound Quality” and from my experience with the chipset and this motherboard, there’s no reason to doubt that claim.

So what about storage? There are more M.2 drive options on this board (out of the box) than I’ve ever seen on any motherboard to date. It’ll handle up to 7 x Turbo M.2 with M.2 XPANDER-AERO and AMD StoreMI technology. Of course, the XPander takes up a PCIe slot, but since it has a huge heatsink and fan, it’s sure to ensure incredible performance from your drives.

GPU Support

Multi-GPU configurations are no issue either, with five full-size slots all reinforced with armour. Not only do they look great, but they’ll no issues supporting the weight of bulky graphics cards. There’s an additional Molex power at the bottom too, which can help provide a more stable voltage to the PCIe lanes.

Rear I/O

The rear I/O is crammed with hardware too. At the top (left), you’ll find power and BIOS reset controls. Bellow that, there are ten high-speed USB ports, with one of them as a Type-C. For networking, you’ll find built-in WiFi, as well as dual Gigabit LAN for added stability and more complex networking options.

Finally, on the rear of the motherboard, a thick metal strip at the rear. This is used to screw down the heatsinks for the VRM/Chokes, ensuring they’re making firm contact for improved cooling performance.