MSI MEG Z890 ACE Motherboard Review

There has been a land rush to occupy open board space no longer consumed with PCI Express slots with M.2 drive connections.  The Z890 ACE supports a total of five M.2 NVMe drives and the expansion slot layout has been modified to maximize drive support.

Expansion slots total three.  The top two 16x slots support PCI Express Gen5 from the CPU and will operate 16x or 8x/8x depending on which slot is being occupied.  The final slot operates at 4x from the chipset.

There are also options to bifurcate these slots allowing you to add even more 4x4 M.2 storage drives using expansion cards. 

The primary M.2 slot is located near the CPU and comes with an individual heatsink so it can be serviced without having to remove the graphics card. 

You will notice a set of pogo pins off to the right, that allows the heatsink to support ARGB while also keeping your drive cool.

A unique feature to MSI motherboards is the toolless design for removing the M.2 heatsinks and for installing the various M.2 drives. 

Drives are held in place with a plastic twist lock and the heatsinks use a spring-loaded clip that is both easy to remove and quick to install.  Simply align the pins and click the other side in place.