Motherboards great and small in both size and feature set are commonplace now, but a new kind of board aims to literally turn the status quo of design on its head. Back-connect motherboards can make a truly transformative effect on the aesthetics of a system, without any cost to specifications. They typically cost a touch more, but you can pick up one of MSI’s Project Zero models right now for cheap.
MSI Z790 Project Zero
“Z790 Project Zero features a unique back-connect design that reduces the complexity of cable management, resulting in a neater and more aesthetically pleasing appearance for the system.” – MSI
In the US, you can grab MSI Z790 Project Zero for for $199 on Amazon, netting you a welcome saving of 29% ($80). This is the lowest ever price the motherboard’s been available for from the storefront, making it an especially great and timely buy.
Sporting Intel’s Z790 chipset, this motherboard is compatible with 12th, 13th, and 14th Gen Core processors out of the box, no BIOS updates necessary. However, I’d strongly recommend updating to the latest versions to improve the stability of your CPU.
While it can’t run PCIe 5.0 SSDs at their full speed, its PCIe 4.0 slots can still handle them albeit at half speed while native drives will go full throttle. Better still, all M.2 slots run at PCIe 4.0 and have their own heatsinks to better manage thermals and drive performance further.
Meanwhile, Z790 Project Zero is ready for the latest graphics cards including Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 thanks to its PCIe 5.0 x16 expansion slot. There’s room for additional add-in cards too, with another two x16 ports and a single x1.
MSI doesn’t skimp on wired connectivity, with a whopping eight USB ports round the back and support for up to another nine round front. Networking is plenty speed too, either via a 2.5Gb/s LAN connection or Wi-Fi 7.
The only caveat that comes with picking up Z790 Project Zero is case compatibility. While most modern chassis accommodate back-connect designs with no problems, it’s worth double-checking if yours is on the older side.
If you want some idea of what it’s like to build and live with a back-connect motherboard, check out my Pro Z890-S WiFi PZ review and B650M Project Zero review. For more deals, make sure to follow Club386 on Google News so you don’t miss out on a single discount.
