N
ope, we didn’t
accidentally include a
picture of ASRock’s Z390 mini-
ITX board here – the X570 Phantom Gaming-ITX/
TB3 does indeed have Intel LGA115x-sized cooler
mounting holes, rather than Socket AM4 mounts. The
reasoning here, ASRock explained to us at Computex
this year, is that the usual elongated Socket AM4 mount
conflicted with ASRock’s chosen design for the board’s
10-phase power circuitry.
SwitchingtothesquarerInteldesignenabledASRockto
adda secondheatsinkatthetopoftheboard.Ofcourse,if you
ownanAMD-onlywaterblockorcoolerthenthatmightposea
bitofa problem,butotherwiseit’ someadmirableout-of-the-
boxthinkingfromASRock.
Thecoolingarrangementis justas
impressiveattheotherendoftheboardtoo,
witha large,angledfan-equippedheatsink
coolingthechipset.Thisheatsinkis alsolinked
tothelargeVRMheatsinkovertheI/Opanel
tospreadtheheatloadandaidcooling.The
fanwasn’tasquietasGigabyte’soneunder
load,butthebenefitwasclear,with
significantlylowerVRMtemperaturesthat
nevertopped60°C.Thatwasaftera ten-
minute, 100 percentloadtestonourRyzen 9
3900X,andthefanremainedextremely
quietingamesandshorterbenchmarks.
UnliketheGigabyteX570-IAorusProWiFi
(seep24),theX570PhantomGaming-ITX/
TB3hasthreefanheaders,whichstillisn’t
ideal,butfarmoreusefulthantwo.It alsohas
thefullcomplementofaudioports,including
anopticaloutput,sothere’snoneedtohave
speakercablesdanglingfromyourfrontaudio
jacktopower8-channelspeakersystems.
However,a closerlookattherearI/Opanel
revealsa severelackofUSBports.Thereare
justfourincluded,whichisn’tenoughforASROCK X570
PHANTOM
GAMINGITX/TB3
/£240incVAT
SUPPLIER overclockers.co.uk
X570 MINIITX MOTHERBOARD
REVIEWS / MOTHERBOARD
SPEC
Chipset
AMD X570
CPU socket
AMD Socket AM4 (Zen+, Zen 2)
Memory support
2 slots: max 64GB DDR4
(up to 4533MHz)
Expansion slots
One 16x PCI-E 4
Sound
8-channel Realtek ALC1220
Networking
1 x Intel Gigabit LAN, Intel
802.11ax Wi-Fi
Overclocking
Base clock N/A, CPU multiplier
22-63x; max voltages, CPU 1.6V,
RAM 1.5V
Ports
4 x SATA 6Gbps, 1 x M.2 PCI-E 4, 2 x
USB 3.1 Type-A, 1 x USB 3.1 Type-C,
2 x USB 3, 3 x surround audio out
Dimensions (mm)
170 x 170modern PC enthusiasts with USB mice, keyboards, external
storage and so on. It’s enough for a bare minimum of
peripherals, but we expect better from a £240 motherboard.
The ASRock also only includes a single M.2 port, and while
many users will only need one, mini-ITX systems benefit
from the reduced cable clutter of using M.2 drives. Having
two M.2 ports is useful here, and it’s also a box that the
Gigabyte board ticks. The ASRock’s one M.2 port is also on
the underside of the board; we had to remove our SSD’s
heatsink to install it on our test bench, so we couldn’t get a
reliable temperature reading. The ASRock also has the basic
allocation of four SATA 6Gbps ports.
You get 802.11ax Wi-Fi, though, and the rear panel also
includes a Thunderbolt 3-compatible USB 3.1 Type-C port
and clear-CMOS button. As with the Gigabyte board, some of
the I/O panel is wasted on video outputs that are only useful
for people using AMD’s cheap APUs – for anyone else, more
USB ports would be far more useful.
You also get both 3-pin and 4-pin RGB LED headers, should
you wish to add lighting, and ASRock has included RGB LEDs
along the underside of the board beneath the PCI-E slot,
which add an attractive glow around your graphics card.
Heading into the EFI was a bit of a shock though. ASRock
has seemingly removed the fan control section, meaning
you’re left with the arduous task of manually setting the
speeds for each fan, or installing ASRock’s software to tweak
fan speeds more easily using fan curves. We reached out to
ASRock to get an explanation, but didn’t hear back in time to