Custom PC - UK (2020-02)

VERDICT

Not the fastest or the best specification, but the Trident A

packs a decent amount of gaming power into a tiny, well-

designed and quiet chassis.

OVERALLSCORE

80 %%

PERFORMANCE

20 / 25

DESIGN

23 / 25

HARDWARE

18 / 25

VALUE

19 / 25

AQUAMAN

+Solid1080p

gamingspeeds

+Smartmini-ITX

design

+Extremelycool

andquiet

BLACKMANTA

• Notasfastasrivals


• Middling
  upgraderoom


• Only a one-year
  warranty

BENCHMARKRESULTS Performance

The RTX 2060 ran our test games at 1080p minimums

between 47fps and 74fps, even with ray tracing enabled.

There’s enough power to play single-player titles at good

speeds and handle esports games at beyond 100fps. The

RTX 2060 also played our test games at 2,560 x 1,440 with

minimums of 44fps or better. It’s solid speed, but the RTX

2060 Super is quicker. The card inside the Wired2Fire

system was nearly 10fps faster in our test titles, and you

can also get even more gaming power from the AlphaBeta

i5 RTX (see p40) for just £999.

Meanwhile, the mid-range CPU is underwhelming in a

machine at this price. Intel’s Core i5-9400F is a little slower

than AMD equivalents in our single-threaded image editing

test, and miles behind in heavily multi-threaded

benchmarks. The CPU has enough power for gaming and

everyday computing, but you can get much more CPU power

for this money elsewhere. The SSD’s read and write speeds

of 3,552MB/sec 1,530MB/sec are good too, although again,

you really want at least a 500GB drive for a gaming machine

these days.

On the plus side, the MSI is an excellent thermal

performer. It’s virtually silent when idle and only produces

modest fan noise when gaming – the noise is barely

noticeable, and it’s quieter than any full-sized PC we’ve

tested at this price. The CPU and GPU delta Ts of 64°C and

50°C are modest as well.

Conclusion

You can definitely get more CPU and GPU power for your

money elsewhere, but the MSI Trident A is still a well-

designed mini-ITX gaming machine. It has enough power to

play single-player games at solid frame rates and esports

games on high refresh-rate panels, and the CPU is a fine

everyday chip. More importantly for a mini-ITX rig, it’s quiet

and easy to transport. Of course, more powerful

specifications with more versatile cases can be found for this

price, and those rigs will usually have better warranties too.

However, if your main priority is getting a gaming rig that’s

small, quiet and portable, the Trident A is a great example.

MIKE JENNINGS

GIMPIMAGE

EDITING

49,461

HEAVYMULTI-

TASKING

172,246

HANDBRAKEH.264

VIDEO ENCODING

332,440

SYSTEM

SCORE

140,919

LUXMARK

OPENCL

96,751

BATTLEFIELDV

1,920x1,080,Ultrasettings,DX12,HighDXR,DLSS

0

MSITridentA 47fps 66fps

2,560x1,440,Ultrasettings,DX12,HighDXR,DLSS

0

MSITridentA 44fps 50fps

50 100 150 200

50 100 150 200

Minimum Average

SHADOWOFTHETOMBRAIDER

1,920x1,080,HighestDetail,TAA

0 50 100 150 200

MSITridentA 74fps 97fps

2,560x1,440,HighestDetail,TAA

0 50 100 150 200

MSITridentA 50fps 63fps

TOTALWAR:WARHAMMERII

1,920x1,080,UltraDetail,DX11

0 50 100 150 200

50 100 150 200

MSI Trident A 68fps 83fps

2,560x1,440,UltraDetail,DX11

0

MSI Trident A 48fps 58fps

INTELPERFORMANCE

INDEX

123.12%