VRM Phase Count Concerns

[MitchellBailey1999]

I have recently come into a lot of money and am looking to upgrade from an i3 8100 to an i9 9900k to go with my new MSI RTX 2080ti. However the motherboard I currently have is an MSI Z370 Carbon Pro AC and I have heard that the best way to run this CPU is on the MSI Z390 Godlike. Now while I have a lot of money I don’t see reason in spending £500 on the same generation of motherboard. I am unsure how many VRM Phases my current motherboard has as the new Z390 Godlike has 18. Can anyone confirm the VRM Phase Count on the Z370 Carbon Pro AC for me and tell me if it is an adequate amount as I am unable to identify the number myself. This will help me decide whether or not buying an i9 9900K is worth it or if I should go for an i7 8086K. I will be purchasing an appropriate cooler to match the CPUs listed. The end goal is to play at 240hz as I play competitively.

Motherboard: MSI Z370 Carbon Pro AC
CPU: i3 8100 @3.7GHz
GPU: MSI GTX 970 (2080ti is on its way)
RAM: 16GB Corsair Vengeance LPX 2133MHz
SSD: 512GB Samsung 850 EVO
HDD: 2TB Seagate Barracuda 7200 RPM
PSU: EVGA 550W GOLD (Upgrading to an 850W)

 

[smorizio]

https://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/8424/msi-z370-gaming-pro-carbon-ac-motherboard-review/index3.html
with the older mb the bios may limit the newer cpu to 95w max. the new cpu may run but not at max speed.

 

[panathas]

In this review => https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/msi-z370-gaming-pro-carbon-ac-motherboard,5374.html , it says that it has 11 phases. Your board can likely handle the i9 but just barely and you won't be able to overclock it. Also you may have to actively cool the VRM with an added fan if it starts to overheat during stressful CPU loads. All the i9 reviews mention that almost all the Z370 boards, can't handle the i9 overclock without active cooling. Some even limit its boost capability, so they may reduce its performance.

So as I see it you have 2 options. You don't really need the i9. You can either get an i7 8700K or an i7 9700K. The latter CPU doesn't have hyper-threading so it will consume less power (and less load on the VRM) than the i9 and it should perform similarly since both are 8-core CPUs. In fact the i7 9700K seems the better CPU overall vs the i9 9900k even without the motherboard limitation. Their price difference is just too big to justify their performance difference. However you may still not be able to overclock the i7 9700k on your board without active cooling. Good luck.

 

[ko888]

The MSI Z370 GAMING PRO CARBON AC is (8+2) phase design for the CPU and 1 phase for DIMM sockets.

 

[bmockeg]

Get an asrock taichi z390 it will work fine.