AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Review: An Ideal CPU For PC Gamers

We used the MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi and some G.SKILL memory to evaluate the Ryzen 7 98000X3D for this review, which represent the current top-end offerings for the Ryzen 9000 platform. Like most of the other motherboards in MSI’s MPG line-up, this board targets hardcore-enthusiasts, and has a ton of features, over and above what’s offered by the AMD X870E chipset itself.

The MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi

The MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi is one of the company's top-end socket AM5 motherboard, eclipsed only by the MSI X870E Godlike. The MPG X870E Carbon WiFi will set you back about $500, and includes things like a pre-mounted IO shield, addressable lighting headers, easy-on/easy-off toolless in M.2 heatsinks, advanced digital power delivery, high-quality audio circuitry, and customizable RGB lighting across a couple sections of the board.


The MPG X870E Carbon WiFi also has built-in support for MSI's ‘Mystic light’ lighting features, which can be extended with additional lighting through headers on the board. The MPG X870E Carbon WiFi also has metal reinforcements on its expansion slots, and heavy-duty metal heat spreaders and heatsinks on the chipset and VRM. Additional shielding covers the back panel I/O and the front-end of the PCB. Another great feature on the top x16 slot is a simple push-button locking mechanism. If you've every struggled to release a GPU from a high-end motherboard, you'll appreciate MSI's locking button -- one tap locks the GPU in place, another releases it from the slot.

Like virtually all of the enthusiast-class motherboards MSI offers, the MPG X870E Carbon WiFi has a modern, mouse-friendly “Click BIOS” / UEFI that’s easy to navigate and offers an extensive array of overclocking and performance-related options. The BIOS on this board sports everything from high resolution fonts to the latest version of MSI’s hardware monitoring and fan control functionality. BIOS flashing, SSD secure erasing, and a number of additional quality-of-life features also adorn the board.


The MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi features high-end capacitors and chokes throughout its design to ensure reliable operation over the long-haul, as well as smooth, clean power delivery and clean audio. The board is outfitted with an all-digital, 18+2+1 stage PWM to optimize efficiency, and to feed the CPU, memory and add-in cards with ample power.

The MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi is compatible with AMD’s Ryzen Master tuning utility for tweaking from within Windows, as well as MSI’s own MSI Center software, but its UEFI is outfitted with all of the overclocker-friendly tools MSI is known for, and then some. This board’s BIOS is chock full of options if you like to tinker. The fan controls on the board are quite robust as well and MSI has put in additional effort to ease configuration, by offering an array of auto-tuning options and presets that can be saved to individual profiles or enabled with a single toggle. Tweaking multipliers, voltages, and timings for virtually everything is supported.


Other features of the MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi include USB 4 type-C and type-A ports (with up to 60 watts of power delivery) with 13 accessible ports on the rear IO, Realtek 5G and 2.5 Gigabit Ethernet, 802.11 Wi-Fi 7 with MU-MIMO, on-board power and reset switches, and a POST code error reporter. In addition to the aforementioned items, we should also mention that the MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi offers 8-channel audio with a Realtek ALC4080 codec and that the design also incorporates audio shielding, discrete power delivery, and high-end Japanese capacitors for clean sound, which is particularly important for integrated audio solutions.
Over and above what’s actually built into the board or available through the chipset, MSI has integrated a handful of additional controllers to enable more functionality, and the company throws in a wide array of accessories including a variety of MSI-branded decals, documentation, cables, screws, etc. 

Overall, we found the layout of the MSI MPG X870E Carbon WiFi to be very good and also really like the overall aesthetic. The board was supremely well behaved through setup and testing as well, with the sole exception being some issues when trying to overclock with Ryzen Master. We're confident that will get cleared up in good time, though.

AMD EXPO DDR5 Memory From G.SKILL

We also want to show you the memory we used for testing. We installed a 32GB G.SKILL Trident Z5 Neo RGB memory kit into our test rig, model F5-6000J3036F16GX2-TZ5NRW.


This kit consists of two matching 16GB sticks of memory, for a grand total of 32GB when configured in a dual-channel setup. It’s important to note that for optimal performance, the Ryzen 9000 series should be run with only two sticks of memory. When fully populating all four memory slots on the motherboard, the officially-supported maximum memory frequency will drop from 5,600MTs to only 4,800MT/s. That said, if you’re willing to overclock a bit, the “sweet spot” for memory performance on Ryzen 9000 series processors continues to be DDR5-6000. At that speed, the memory controller and DRAM speed are tied at 1:1 ratio. Above DDR5-6000, that ratio changes to 2:1, which will introduce some additional latency.

This G.SKILL memory is capable of running at 6,000MHz with relatively tight 30-36-36-96 timings at 1.35v. In addition, the sticks feature white, stylized heat spreaders, and they support AMD’s EXPO technology. Tweak a single option in the system BIOS, and this kit will run at its optimal frequency and timings without having to fiddle with any manual options. Throughout our testing this memory was rock-solid and stable, whether operating at DDR5-5600 or at its maximum rated frequency and timings.