As we’ve noted before, Intel’s Coffee Lake desktop lineup was sorely under-populated until the launch of the second batch of 300-series chipsets. These include the H370, B360, and H310. The new chipsets join the existing Z370, which launched with the first round of Coffee Lake products in late 2017, to complete the Coffee Lake product stack.
As is usually the case with a platform-related launch, there’s a smorgasbord of motherboard announcements. As we’ve already done with the new Coffee Lake laptops, we’ve compiled a list of all the new 300 series motherboards.
Asrock
Asrock thought this round of motherboard launches was the right time to correct a weakness in its existing motherboard lineup--not having enough RGB lighting. Asrock’s new Fatal1ty H370, B360, and B360M motherboards are the company’s first to feature digital RGB lighting support. The boards implement Asrocks new Polychrome lighting system, which uses the three-pin header that is shared by the Asus Aura and MSI Mystic Light lighting ecosystems. The Fatal1ty boards also all feature higher-end audio, provided by an ALC1220 chip, 10-phase power circuitry, and dual M.2 slots.
Next in the lineup are the Pro boards, which include the H370, B360, and B360M Pro4. These boards are largely the same as the Fatal1ty boards, but they lack RGB lighting and use a lower-end audio solution. Following the Pro4 boards are the a group of budget-oriented mATX boards that include the B360M-HDV, H310M-HDVP, H310M-DGS, and H310M-G/M.2 boards. The H310M-G/M.2 surprisingly features Polychrome RGB lighting, but the boards are otherwise the most basic of the product stack.
Rounding off Asrock’s new motherboards are a trio of ITX boards: the H370M-, B360M-, and H310M-ITX/ac boards. They all come with Intel AC Wi-Fi solutions built-in, but they don’t use the new Intel 9560 wireless card.
Asrock had many, many new SKUs to launch:
Asus
Asus, likewise, released a truckload of new motherboards, but an H310-based board wasn’t part of the haul. The H370 boards include the new ATX ROG Strix H370-F and ITX H370-I motherboards. Both feature RGB lighting and have dual M.2 slots. The ATX TUF H370-Pro loses out on the Strix boards’ more advanced power circuitry, but it integrates Intel’s new 9560 Wi-Fi card for gigabit wireless and Bluetooth 5.0. Finally, the MATX Prime H370M-Plus rounds out Asus’ H370 lineup as the most basic choice.
Asus’ B360-based motherboards are segmented in the a similar way. There’s the ATX ROG Strix B360-F and ITX B360-I boards and the wireless-equipped TUF B360-Pro ATX board. Instead of a Prime series B360 board, Asus has the ATX ROG Strix B360-H and MATX B360-G motherboards. These are basic gaming boards that still include extensive cooling and pretty cool PCB designs.
Biostar
Biostar jumped the gun and launched its new 300-series boards early. The company didn’t launch an H370-based board. Instead, it launched three B360 and one H310 motherboard. All of the boards are fairly basic.
The ATX B360GT5S and MATX GT360GT3S both have two M.2 slots. The most basic B360MHD and H310MHD MATX boards lack any M.2 slots and also lose two RAM slots.
Colorful
Colorful is a relatively new player in the consumer motherboard market, and it brought only one motherboard to the launch party--the Battle Axe C.B360M-HD MATX motherboard. It’s a pretty basic motherboard that has only one M.2 slot and lacks wireless, USB type-C ports, or any RGB lighting capability.
EVGA
Likewise, EVGA also only launched one motherboard, the H370 Stinger ITX. It's a basic but high-quality board that has solid power delivery circuitry, dual M.2 slots, and includes Intel’s 9560 WiFi and Bluetooth solution. Unfortunately, the board lacks any USB type-C ports.
Gigabyte
As one of the big four motherboard OEMs, Gigabyte delivered H370 and B360 motherboards galore. The company’s higher-end Aorus Gaming 3 motherboards, which include the H370, H370 WiFi, B360, B360 WiFi, and B360M WiFi, all include dual M.2 slots, Gigabyte’s RGB Fusion lighting, and extensive power circuitry cooling. The WiFi motherboards use the new Intel 9560 wireless solution. There’s also the lesser B360N Gaming WiFi ITX motherboard, but it uses an older Intel 433Mb/s WiFi card.
Gigabyte’s other 300-series motherboards include less interesting, non-Aorus-branded H370, B360, and H310 motherboards. Perhaps the only two that stand out in this bunch are the H370N WiFi and the B360N WiFi. Both of these pack the newer Intel 9560 WiFi card. The former even has dual gigabit Ethernet jacks and a USB type-C port, making it a good building point for NAS/HTPC.
Here are the rest of Gigabyte's B360, H370, and H310 motherboards launching today:
MSI
Last but not least, MSI also delivered 19 new H370, B360, and H310 motherboards. The H370 Gaming Pro Carbon is the highest-end of the lot. It features dual M.2 slots, extensive cooling, and RGB back-glow. Like MSI’s other recent RGB-enabled motherboards, the Gaming Pro Carbon has both three-pin digital and tradition four-pin traditional RGB headers. There’s also a B360 Gaming Pro Carbon with similar features. At a step down from the Gaming Pro Carbon series is the Gaming Plus series, which has H370, B360, and H310M versions. These boards don’t have much RGB lighting integrated onboard directly, but they still have RGB headers. In case you don’t fancy the red and black look, there are white Arctic versions of the B360 and H310M Gaming.
The H370M and B360M Bazooka and B360M Mortar motherboards don’t really fit cleanly into any category. The Mortar, which has a titanium version, has better cooling, power circuitry, and integrates RGB lighting, but it’s limited to the lower-end B360 chipset. The Bazooka boards, on the other hand, seem to slot in above the MATX Gaming Plus boards but below the Bazooka. Finally, MSI has four consumer H310-based motherboards and two crypto-mining-focused H310 motherboards. The H310-A Pro has six PCIe x1 slots and one PCIe x16 slot. The more extreme H310-F Pro ups the PCIe x1 count to 12.
Here's the rest of MSI's fresh new lineup:
