For a single CPU this is plenty of power. Just behind the VRM heat sink, we find two 8-pin CPU power connectors. This is one way that it enables high clock speeds. EVGA says that this platform holds a number of world records due to its overclocking prowess. If you compare this to a Xeon VRM, even for higher-TDP CPUs, you typically see a small VRM set and small VRM heatsink. The power VRM heat sink is large and comes with two fans to aid in cooling. We really like this feature which keeps the installation clean. The pre-installed IO shield can be removed and the supplied optional IO shield can be used for more traditional cases. This platform is built for speed, but the networking and connectivity has room for improvement. Conspicuously absent are features such as WiFi 6 and Bluetooth. With costs of switches and even SFP+ to Nbase-T adapters falling, switching to 2.5/5/10GbE even in small deployments is very reasonable. We do wish that EVGA used an Intel i225 NIC at least for 2.5Gbps Ethernet. ![]() Overall, this is quite a bit of connectivity. We also removed the U cover to show the M.2 NVMe SSD drive slots which have an interesting arrangement: EVGA X299 Dark NVMe M2 PortsĪt the rear of the X299 Dark motherboard, we find the IO ports which are: ![]() Many of the 3rd generation AMD Threadripper platforms that have come out do not include native U.2 connectivity even at the $850 level. Storage connections at the motherboard edge are 8x SATA 3 6.0Gbs ports (6 from the X288 PCH, 2x from ASMedia) and 2x U.2 ports for NVMe SSDs. EVGA X299 Dark CPU Socket And Memory Slots That is the type of feature that makes this platform very attractive for some users, but less attractive to those who need memory capacity. The Core i9 platform supports up to 4 channel memory and 2 DIMMs per channel so one is getting half of the memory capacity as a trade-off for this large VRM array. EVGA has such a large VRM array and dual fan heatsink, that it can only fit two DIMMs to either side of the socket. This is actually a notable configuration. Just to the top of the Socket LGA 2066 is centered between 4x DDR4 memory slots with the large 16 phase VRM heat sink at the edge. This is one to check the manual on when planning your CPU, motherboard, and I/O configuration. Along with the M.2 NVMe SSD slots and the different processor options for X299, there are a lot of nuances to just how much can electrical bandwidth is available. There is also a PCIe x4 mechanical slot that is located under a cover. As a result, we have two x16 and three x8 slots. The Intel X299 platform does not support 80 PCIe lanes, even the Xeon W-3275 server CPU only supports 64 lanes. ![]() There are five total PCIe 3.0 slots that are x16 mechanical. Cutouts in the motherboard at power and USB front panel connectors allow for recessed connections that should give added room in tight cases. A large U-Shaped plastic cover for the chipset directs air-flow across the M.2 storage area to aid in cooling these SSDs. EVGA X299 Dark Box FrontĪfter taking the motherboard out of the box we get our first look at the EVGA X299 Dark motherboard with its EATX 12” x 10.895” form factor. You will notice the “Optane” logo in the corner. The retail box for the EVGA X299 Dark is rather plain with few product specifications on the box. Still, one gets a reasonably priced CPU and motherboard combination. One does not get Intel Xeon and ECC memory features on this platform since it is designed for the Core i9 family. These systems appeal to users with with applications that favor high core speed and fast memory. The EVGA X299 Dark motherboard is a platform many like for its stability, features and of course its overclocking abilities. Today we will review the EVGA X299 Dark motherboard to run through our benchmarks to see how well it performs. With the release of Intel’s new Core i9-10980XE 3.0GHz (18 core/ 36 thread) processor, we wanted to test a platform using the new CPU.
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