Intel Core i9-10980XE CPU / MSI X299 Creator Motherboard
2019Type
Processor / MotherboardPrice
$979 US / $539 USMSI X299 Creator Motherboard- Unboxing
The MSI X299 Creator motherboard comes inside a large, rectangular-shaped box. This package is very heavy compared to other boards but it shows that MSI has packed a lot of goodies aside from the motherboard inside the box. The other noteworthy thing about the package is the whole white color scheme which gives it a very minimalistic and clean look.
As with the color choice, the marketing material and logos featured on the box are very simple. It features a large Creator X299 product name on the front coupled with an MSI dragon logo. Intel's Core, X299 Chipset & Optane Memory logos can be spotted too along with NVIDIA SLI, AMD CFX & MSI Mystic Light RGB logos.
The back of the box contains all the marketing details along with product specifications. Some of the highlighted features include Intel Wi-Fi 6, Lightning USB, 10G SUPER LAN, M.2 XPANDER AERO, Extended heatsink design, M.2 Shield Frozr, and Thunderbolt M3.
The motherboard and accessories are packed in separate containers. The accessories box includes three compartments, each of which has different accessories. The cables and antenna mount can be found in the MSI bag which is a good touch rather than spreading them inside the box. The two other accessories include the M.2 Xpander Aero and the Thunderbolt M3 add-in cards.
All of the accessories featured in the MSI bag include:
- - Quick Installation Guide
- - 4 x SATA Data Cables
- - 1 x MSI Case Badge
- - 2 x Fan Headers
- - 2 x ARGB Extenders
- - 2 x MSI WiFi 2.4/5 GHz Antennas
- - 3 x Screws for M.2 Sockets
The MSI M.2 Xpander Aero card bundled with the X299 Creator is a really good accessory. It offers up to four full-length M.2 devices to be featured on it while getting cooled off by a large heatsink that is cooled by MSI's GPU-grade Aero fan design. The card comes in a dual-slot design & receives power through a single 6-pin connector. The more interesting thing about this AIC is that it is rated to operate at up to PCIe 4.0 bandwidth which means you can also use it with a PCIe 4.0 compliant motherboard.
The other highlighted accessory of the MSI X299 Creator is the Thunderbolt M3. This AIC offers two DisplayPort outputs and two Thunderbolt 3 outputs. You can also daisy chain for up to a total of 6 Thunderbolt devices.
Out of the box, the motherboard has a very unique design and layout. The motherboard sticks to the larger E-ATX form factor but comes with a very neat layout that I am super excited about. Let's see how this board really performs!
Contents
You can find additional information about our hardware review process and ethics policy here.
About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
