MSI’s Upcoming MEG Z890 Unify-X Motherboard Leaks Ahead of Launch

Controller Master


Detailed specifications and a somewhat blurry slide showing off all the details of MSI’s upcoming high-end MEG Z890 Unify-X motherboard has leaked courtesy of @ChamberTech_ on X/Twitter. The motherboard is likely to appeal to those looking to squeeze every extra bit of performance out of their new Ultra 200K series CPU when they launch next month, as the board could support memory speeds of up to 10,000 MT/s and with only two DIMM slots, it might be able to go even higher with the latest DDR5 CUDIMM’s. The board also sports a 110 Ampere 20+1+1+1 VRM design on an eight layer PCB and it also ships with what MSI calls an OC Tuning Controller, suggesting the board is targeting overclockers.

The board appears to sport a pair of PCIe 5.0 x16 slots for GPUs that presumably operates in dual x8 mode when both slots are in use, as well as a third PCIe 4.0 x16 slot that operates in x4 mode, as well as a single PCIe 4.0 x1 slot. There’s also no less than six M.2 slots, of which two are PCIe 5.0 and our PCIe 4.0, as well as six SATA ports. Where things get a bit interesting is in the network connectivity, as the slide claims that the board features a 5 Gbps Intel Killer Ethernet interface, which is the first we’ve heard of such a thing, as well as an Intel Killer WiFi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 module for wireless connectivity.

Connectivity doesn’t stop there though, as the board also has a pair of Thunderbolt 4 ports, one front USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 (20 Gbps) USB-C header with 60 W USB PD support and 10 USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) USB port, of which two are USB Type-C. The board also features a Realtek ALC4080 audio codec and a pair of old school PS/2 ports for a keyboard and mouse. Other niceties are a full set of buttons around the rear for flashing and resetting the BIOS, as well as a debug LED display, which MSI seems to prefer to place right next to the power connector, just as we’ve seen on the previous leak of upcoming MSI boards. Also present is the somewhat mysterious ATX 3.1 power connector for additional power to the GPU, which MSI so far is the only motherboard manufacturer to have added to its boards.