MSI MAG Z390 Tomahawk LGA1151 (Intel 8th and 9th Gen) M.2 USB 3.1 Gen 2 DDR4 HDMI DP CFX Dual Gigabit LAN ATX Z390 Gaming Motherboard

This was easy to install and is built solidly. The NVMe thermal cooling bar is an awesome touch. I like the steel reinforced PCIE slot for the primary video card as well.Overclocking my memory was a snap with XMP. Updating the BIOS was just as easy using their built-in flashing tool.It has all the headers I could ever need and the RGB lights are a nice touch if you’re into that sort of thing. This board doesn’t come with built-in AC wireless although it has the slot to add it if you want that. The two onboard Ethernet ports are definitely a nice touch. I also like the IO shield being a part of the motherboard. Neat!I’m running an Intel 9600k and GeForce 2070 for reference. I haven’t overclocked the CPU yet but it of course has all the options to do that if you want.If I had to complain about one thing it would be that MSI’s website has very poor English and is difficult to navigate but I’m not too worried about that. I care about the hardware more than a website I’ll only visit once. Make sure you go to your product page on MSI’s website to download the RGB color application. MSI has multiple apps for this on their website and most of them won’t work. Their website is an absolute mess but everything on the Tomahawk Z390 page works properly. I found updating the BIOS was easier using a flash drive and the BIOS tool than using their terrible Dragon app to do it.Highly recommended. The hardware is fantastic and works flawlessly. You’ll be satisfied.

I have generally entrusted my PC experience to MSI in the past and this motherboard upheld my expectations of MSI. It's a great quality motherboard with a very easy to understand manual to help you with the ins and outs of anything you need to know while installing any other hardware. The diagram showing the different configurations for storage you could have is especially helpful (So if you have an m.2 sata ssd installed in one or both of the m.2 slots it shows which sata 3 ports you cannot use, same with m.2 nvme ssd (PCIe ssd) it shows you which ports you can or cannot use). I chose this motherboard because I have always had a good experience with MSI products as I have owned their laptops, keyboards, mice, and monitors in the past and have always had a good experience so I decided to use their products for my new PC build and it works like a charm and looks awesome. RGB is quite nice as well, and the mystic light software is easy to use and syncs with a lot of different components, including Gskill Trident Z ram and rosewill RGB fans. If you're considering this motherboard I say you should go for it, its definitely a good value for you money and a very sturdy product.

So over on Tom's Hardware there is a 2.5 star technical review of this board that might be off-putting. Their basic issue is that this board can't effectively handle a I9-9900K but will throttle clock speed when pushed on that processor (this is argued as not-true by a commenter who couldn't kill it with Prime95). And they have a point in that if you are spending over $500 on a processor then you might want to pair it with a higher end board. But this is like saying a pair of tires is of poor quality because they don't bring out the best in a Ferrari. They might be excellent tires for any other car. But for my I7-9700K it is a great pairing (even Tom's admits that) and the BIOS is easy to use and the board was easy to install and is well constructed and appealing in appearance. To me - coming from a very old system - it has many great features that were new (to me) and everything worked flawlessly. I suppose if you are a system builder you'd be much more picky, but having Wake-On-LAN work effortlessly from the get-go was like a wow, for example. Probably showing my age here.One thing to note: the left most memory slot might have clearance issues depending on your CPU cooler. I just have two slots populated right now so it isn't an issue for me, but it looks very close with my Cooler-Master Hyper 212. If you are populating all 4 slots I'd install the memory before the CPU cooler. Although if you have your CPU fan as a pull (left side) rather than a push (right side), you won't have any issues (with that cooler).ONE WARNING: do not disable USB detection at boot (enable MSI FastBoot) without also enabling GO2BIOS - I did that and could not get back into BIOS with my USB keyboard - I had to buy a PS/2 keyboard in order to get back in. I could have reset CMOS and started over, but I chose to spend $16 on the keyboard over here at Amazon instead rather than kick a healthy dog. And the board did not come with the reset jumper and paper clips make me nervous.

After doing a lot of research I finally bought and assembled my gaming PC, and the MAG Z390 was what I built it around. This specific model requires 8th gen and 9th gen Processors, and has a lot of room for expansion. Plenty of fan hook ups, built in RGB, a USB C port in the back, and great M.2 and SATA support are a few of the things that caught my eye. Aside from that... it looks great and was a breeze to install. The I/O is solidly built, slides right into the case, and does not jam up against the top PCIe slot--something i have encountered in past builds. All of the heat sinks and shields feel very durable, and one of the M.2 slots comes with it's own cooling shield. Great price point, great looks, and MSI has always had a reputation for being solid in my books. I would highly recommend this MOBO to anyone who is trying to make a killer system without breaking the bank.(Case shown in picture is a NZXT H500 ATX Computer Case)