ASUS Intros WS X299 Pro Socket LGA2066 Motherboard

[btarunr]

ASUS today rolled out the WS X299 Pro, a feature-rich socket LGA2066 motherboard designed for machines built in the gray-area between high-end desktops (HEDTs) and "real" workstations (based on the Xeon/EPYC platforms). The board is still based on the Intel X299 Express chipset, and will only support Intel Core X "Skylake-X" processors. It features the company's highest-grade electrical components. Built in the ATX form-factor, the board draws power from a combination of 24-pin ATX, a 6-pin PCIe power, and two 8-pin EPS connectors. It conditions power for the CPU using a 9-phase high-current VRM, which puts out heat on not just a primary heatsink making direct contact with the MOSFETs, but also a secondary heatsink over a heat-pipe. This heatsink occupies an area not just behind the rear I/O area, but also extends downwards, to just behind the expansion slots (while not intruding).

The LGA2066 socket is wired to eight reinforced DDR4 DIMM slots, supporting up to 128 GB of quad-channel memory, and four PCI-Express 3.0 x16 slots (x16/x16/NC/x4 or x16/x8/x8/x4 on 44-lane CPUs), and a fifth open-ended x4 slot. Storage connectivity includes two 32 Gbps M.2 slots (both of which feature heatsinks), a 32 Gbps U.2 port, and six SATA 6 Gbps ports. USB connectivity includes four 10 Gbps USB 3.1 ports, and six 5 Gbps USB 3.0 ports. Networking is care of two 1 GbE interfaces, driven by Intel i210-AT controllers. The onboard audio is based around a Realtek ALC1220A CODEC, fronted by a headphones amp, and backed by audio-grade capacitors, and ground-layer isolation. The company didn't reveal pricing or availability.



View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[hyp36rmax]

Would love to see an X299M-WS released. This would be an instant buy for me to replace my X99M-WS.

 

[adulaamin]

I like the clean simple look without the flashy heatsinks and RGB stuff. I hope they release an AMD counterpart.

 

[cocafe]

I like the clean simple look without the flashy heatsinks and RGB stuff. I hope they release an AMD counterpart.

+1 for NO RGB stuff

 

[Ferrum Master]

Would love to see an X299M-WS released. This would be an instant buy for me to replace my X99M-WS.

This one should turn you on too...

https://www.asus.com/Commercial-Servers-Workstations/WS-C621E-SAGE/

Suicidal for you wallet thou.

This board? I hate too see a gimped upper PCIE slot again... simply despise. It also means they took as a base their cheap design PCB's not the flagship Rampage...

 

[EarthDog]

What do you mean by gimped upper pcie slot?

 

[Ferrum Master]

What do you mean by gimped upper pcie slot?

Well literally... well ASUS manages to put the first upper PCIE slot only on most expensive tier motherboards, look at the placement just besides the middle ATX screw hole. It is a workstation board, adding more PCIE devices and managing your desired spacing and slot order is not a bonus, it a basic need, especially for the taxed WS type premium.

All other PRIME, TUF etc base clones doesn't have it... other makers does it too... with few exceptions thou. The lack of third PCIE also looks fishy, they gimped this WS board there too really...

History...

This a WS X79, X99

 

[EarthDog]

Ahh... that is what you mean by "gimped". Interesting.

But why is that gimping anything? I don't understand????

 

[Whilhelm]

This thing looks like a piece of crap compared to their last two HEDT WS boards. I was fully expecting to see this with 7 x16 pci-e slots and 1 or even 2 dimm.2 slots. Oh and no 10GbE and it also looks like they ditched the PLX controllers as well.

 

[efikkan]

It's nice to see Asus finally arriving with their WS products for LGA2066. Unfortunately 10 Gb/s Ethernet is still missing, which is something a workstation board deserves. I guess there will be more boards in the lineup.

 

[Assimilator]

Oh and no 10GbE

This. 10GbE should be mandatory on any board that wants to call itself "workstation".

 

[CheapMeat]

This thing looks like a piece of crap compared to their last two HEDT WS boards. I was fully expecting to see this with 7 x16 pci-e slots and 1 or even 2 dimm.2 slots. Oh and no 10GbE and it also looks like they ditched the PLX controllers as well.

Same, I mean, that's the point of ATX & ETX. M.2 slots in the PCIe region make more sense for mini-ITX and mATX. But with a full x16 slot, you could add four M.2 drives instead! No 10Gbe, or even maybe 5Gbe Aquantia
chip, is strange, like you said.

 

[Whilhelm]

Same, I mean, that's the point of ATX & ETX. M.2 slots in the PCIe region make more sense for mini-ITX and mATX. But with a full x16 slot, you could add four M.2 drives instead! No 10Gbe, or even maybe 5Gbe Aquantia
chip, is strange, like you said.

It seems like Asus has been on a strange path with its product releases. Their TUF branded boards seem like budget boards now and there is a lot of overlap between the Strix and ROG branding. They have definitely been shifting their focus to "gaming" boards. In the past the WS was always positioned as the serious flagship option above the top end ROG board. This one looks like its firmly planted in between the TUF and Strix boards and it does not really bring anything exciting to the table. I also just noticed the terrible slot spacing of the two X16 pci-e slots, I thought that would be a fundamental motherboard design consideration at this point in time.

 

[hyp36rmax]

This one should turn you on too...

https://www.asus.com/Commercial-Servers-Workstations/WS-C621E-SAGE/

Suicidal for you wallet thou.

This board? I hate too see a gimped upper PCIE slot again... simply despise. It also means they took as a base their cheap design PCB's not the flagship Rampage...

Yea!! Saw that also. If I ever considered one of those bad boys they would definitely go into a Caselabs Magnum chassis.