AMD + ITX + TB3? It's the ASRock X570 Phantom Gaming-ITX/TB3 Motherboard Review
by Gavin Bonshor on October 9, 2019 12:00 PM ESTGaming Performance
For X570 we are running using Windows 10 64-bit with the 1903 update as per our Ryzen 3000 CPU review.
World of Tanks enCore
Albeit different to most of the other commonly played MMO or massively multiplayer online games, World of Tanks is set in the mid-20th century and allows players to take control of a range of military based armored vehicles. World of Tanks (WoT) is developed and published by Wargaming who are based in Belarus, with the game’s soundtrack being primarily composed by Belarusian composer Sergey Khmelevsky. The game offers multiple entry points including a free-to-play element as well as allowing players to pay a fee to open up more features. One of the most interesting things about this tank based MMO is that it achieved eSports status when it debuted at the World Cyber Games back in 2012.
World of Tanks enCore is a demo application for a new and unreleased graphics engine penned by the Wargaming development team. Over time the new core engine will implemented into the full game upgrading the games visuals with key elements such as improved water, flora, shadows, lighting as well as other objects such as buildings. The World of Tanks enCore demo app not only offers up insight into the impending game engine changes, but allows users to check system performance to see if the new engine run optimally on their system.
Grand Theft Auto V
The highly anticipated iteration of the Grand Theft Auto franchise hit the shelves on April 14th 2015, with both AMD and NVIDIA in tow to help optimize the title. GTA doesn’t provide graphical presets, but opens up the options to users and extends the boundaries by pushing even the hardest systems to the limit using Rockstar’s Advanced Game Engine under DirectX 11. Whether the user is flying high in the mountains with long draw distances or dealing with assorted trash in the city, when cranked up to maximum it creates stunning visuals but hard work for both the CPU and the GPU.
For our test we have scripted a version of the in-game benchmark. The in-game benchmark consists of five scenarios: four short panning shots with varying lighting and weather effects, and a fifth action sequence that lasts around 90 seconds. We use only the final part of the benchmark, which combines a flight scene in a jet followed by an inner city drive-by through several intersections followed by ramming a tanker that explodes, causing other cars to explode as well. This is a mix of distance rendering followed by a detailed near-rendering action sequence, and the title thankfully spits out frame time data.
F1 2018
Aside from keeping up-to-date on the Formula One world, F1 2017 added HDR support, which F1 2018 has maintained; otherwise, we should see any newer versions of Codemasters' EGO engine find its way into F1. Graphically demanding in its own right, F1 2018 keeps a useful racing-type graphics workload in our benchmarks.
Aside from keeping up-to-date on the Formula One world, F1 2017 added HDR support, which F1 2018 has maintained. We use the in-game benchmark, set to run on the Montreal track in the wet, driving as Lewis Hamilton from last place on the grid. Data is taken over a one-lap race.
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HardwareDufus - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
This board is sooooo close to what I want. However, a 2nd M.2 slot, for a 2nd NVMe drive is necessary. I know it's allot to ask for in an m-ITX board, but it can be done.shabby - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Next version they add a second nvme slot "oh I wish it had 10gbit lan, almost prefect..."wolrah - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
> Next version they add a second nvme slot "oh I wish it had 10gbit lan, almost prefect..."To be fair, at least something >1gbit *should* have been standard on high-end boards long ago, but for whatever reason no one's integrated it in to a chipset.
Instead we get a compact desktop board that wastes precious space with WiFi. WiFi is for things that move and things that get placed in odd locations where wiring is impractical. Desktop computers are neither of those things. Even if you're one of those screwballs who refuses to plug in a cable or insists on placing your computer in some weird place it's not like WiFi is fast enough that USB would be a bottleneck, so there's no good reason for it to be taking up space on a motherboard.
Hell, actually a M.2 slot would be a win-win there, those who want WiFi can install it instead of a SSD.
DiHydro - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
No, I think he is right. Being able to stick another M.2 drive in there is super helpful, especially as if you leave it open for a cheaper/slower SSD as more of a mass storage option. Personally, I want it for two 2 TB intel drives right off the bat, then I will add another SATA drive if I need it at that point.29a - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
just buy a 4 tb samsung29a - Thursday, October 10, 2019 - link
or use sata ssd's for the slower cheap storagewr3zzz - Monday, October 14, 2019 - link
Your obviously have never worked with ITX or even mATX cases. An extra M.2 slot is a godsend vs. the space and cabling headaches of sata drives in SFF.DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
Collectively, these are some of the worst comments I’ve ever seen on AT. This is probably the best mITX motherboard board ever designed - even surpassing ASRock’s excellent X299 boards.16 high-performance cores, nearly 4000 points in Cinebench R15, 64GB of high-speed DD4, 18TB of SSD storage (2TB at 3GB/s and 16TB at 1.5GB/s), 6 USB3 ports (two of them Gen 2), and the first full-speed Thunderbolt 3 ever on an mITX motherboard! In fact, being on AMD, I won’t be shocked if it turns out to run at 40Gbps, rather than the expected 32Gbps (on Intel ATX) or 16Gbps (on Intel mITX).
WiFi is useful on a portable form factor (at minimal expense), while 10GbE generates significant heat and adds nearly $100 to the cost. I think every complaint here can be addressed with proper system design, and Thunderbolt 3 makes all the difference, allowing one to add e.g. 10GbE and USB 3 as needed. In fact, TB3 makes this the first mITX board that can transfer files at 2/3 GB/s (in/out) and operate an eGPU with all 4 PCIe 3.0 lanes!
Ironically, the only significant drawback wasn’t mentioned yet - the lack of an iGPU on Zen 2 (useful e.g. for video encoding) which could free up the PCIe slot/lanes for other uses.
chx1975 - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
The Thunderbolt chip, out of necessity, is the same Intel Titan Ridge you'd find on Intel ATX boards or some laptops. While this motherboard is the first to integrate it, there were reports on various forums of the Gigabyte Titan Ridge card (not the Alpine Ridge) working in AMD motherboards without connecting the special header it has. There is no Titan Ridge LP so the bus speed will be 40gbps and the data speed will be 22gbps. That's the same across all TB3 controllers, except the Alpine Ridge LP where the data speed will be 16gps and the bus speed, I think even after this many years, is simply unknown. 20gbps would make sense but it could be just the 18gbps necessary to run a DisplayPort. But then again, there is no common sense where Intel and Thunderbolt is concerned, noone knows why they gimped the data speed on full speed controllers to 22gbps.DCide - Wednesday, October 9, 2019 - link
No, I agree there’s not much common sense there - even down to questions such as “why is TB3 networking limited to 10Gbps” (and reportedly not even reliable enough for production - I’ve only used it in testing scenarios).I had not heard of the 22gbps data limit, but even if it applies here this motherboard should still be the most flexible and highest performance mITX model available, and (fortunately) could still approach 3GB/s transfer rates.