MSI MPG Z490 Carbon Gaming WiFi Review

MSI MPG Z490 Carbon Gaming WiFi Preview

Introduction

Firstly we hope you’re all doing well, and those of you who have been stuck indoors for the last six weeks or so are not straining at the leash too badly to get out the door. Whatever you do don’t drive 260 miles on a jolly. Stay safe out there. We love you all.

If you’ve been keeping up with the Z490 releases then it can’t have escaped your notice that, despite being free from the expense of the PCI Express 4.0 architecture, the Z490 products have seen a fairly significant price hike when compared to their Z390 predecessors. However much we might desire a new 10 core system the realities of the entry cost, particularly in the current financial climate, is perhaps a little steep for many of us.

One model that has often been a good compromise between the connectivity options on a high end motherboard and the needs of our bank manager is the MSI Carbon range. Here in rather lengthily named MPG Z490 Carbon Gaming WiFi format. Sporting all the high speed, high bandwidth technologies upon which we’ve come to rely, and marrying them up to the freedom of wireless networking and some pretty attractive looks, it could prove to be a trump card in the Z490 setup. Let’s find out if that is the case.

Technical Specifications and Cooling

MSI MPG Z490 Carbon Gaming WiFi Preview We always mention the fan headers available on each motherboard as we move through the pictures, and we’ve always felt that if you’re looking to spend a fortune on a motherboard you might take a moment to look closely at what you’re getting. However, we get asked if we could highlight all the fan headers in one single image, so for those of you too lazy to click through a dozen images or so, here are the fan headers highlighted with our logo.

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