MSI Starts X299 Motherboard Pre-Orders With Free CPU Cooler Promotion

MSI announced that its new X299 motherboards are now available for pre-order. The company's offering five models from multiple product lines, and if you buy the X299 SLI Plus or Gaming Pro Carbon AC before June 30, you'll get a free Corsair Hydro Series H75 Liquid CPU Cooler.

You don't actually have to pre-order the motherboards to take advantage of this promotion. MSI's running the offer through Newegg, which said the X299 SLI Plus and Gaming Pro Carbon AC will be released on June 26. The X299 Tomahawk and Raider will debut on the same day, and the flagship X299 Gaming M7 ACK will start to ship on June 30. Note that only the X299 SLI Plus or Gaming Pro Carbon AC come with the free cooler.

MSI's entire X299 lineup is made for Intel's upcoming X-series CPUs and their LGA2066 sockets. Four of the boards feature some degree of RGB lighting (of course); the X299 Raider is the only one that appears to be unlit. (Even though it's available for pre-order, MSI doesn't have a product page for the X299 Raider on its website.) The four motherboards for which it does have product pages all support up to 128GB of DDR4-4266 memory across eight DIMM slots, support gigabit LAN, boast eight SATA-III connections, and sport the ATX form factor.

You can find more information on the X299 SLI Plus, Gaming Pro Carbon AC, Tomahawk, and Gaming M7 ACK on their respective product pages. Besides the pre-order offering, MSI is also running an event that will reward you for reviewing its products on Newegg or Amazon. Submitting the review will get you a free "Lucky" the Dragon keychain and $25 Steam card. You'll also be entered for a chance to win the following prizes:

  • MSI RX 580 Gaming X 8G
  • MSI GeForce 1070 Aero ITX 8G OC
  • NZXT X52 Kraken Liquid Cooling
  • MSI Pillow
  • Corsair K65 Rapid Fire Keyboard
  • MSI Mini Dragon G Lightning Limited Edition
  • MSI Mini Dragon G Water Limited Edition
  • MSI Mini Dragon G Wind Limited Edition
  • MSI Mini Dragon G Fire Limited Edition

Details on the reward program can be found here, and you can find all of MSI's current X299 motherboards on Newegg. Prices range from $229 for the X299 Raider to $400 for the X299 Gaming M7 ACK. (Which, remember, doesn't come with the free cooler despite being the most expensive member of the lineup.) The pre-order offer runs until the end of June, and the reward program will continue until July 31.

Gigabyte's running an X299 motherboard pre-order event of its own, and just in case you want to know what all the hullabaloo's about, we've greeted Intel's new Skylake-X processors with a full review of the Intel Core i9-7900X.

Nathaniel Mott
Freelance News & Features Writer

Nathaniel Mott is a freelance news and features writer for Tom's Hardware US, covering breaking news, security, and the silliest aspects of the tech industry.

  • dstarr3
    Ugh, I do not like this new trend of motherboard pre-order incentives. It's a bad idea in video games, and it's a baaaaaaad idea in motherboards. Why would someone not wait until it was clear that it was, y'know, a good product first?

    Whatever. Fools and their money.
    Reply
  • mac_angel
    from what I read about the Core i9 7900X, that cooler won't be enough. The CPU will start to throttle itself under full load.
    Reply
  • 10/20 will just run too hot no matter what with anything clock speed above 4.0 Ghz. Honestly i cannot even imagine 12/14/16/18 core and its temperatures. Those CPUs won't be worth buying at all since they will end up with rather low clock speed.
    Reply
  • the nerd 389
    This seems to echo my concerns regarding these CPUs. The decision to use thermal paste seriously compromises an otherwise decent product.

    Even motherboard manufacturers seem to think that the new X-series is depending on false expectations to sell. This was a serious misstep on Intel's part. I hope motherboard companies don't end up suffering for it.
    Reply
  • beayn
    The Nerd 389
    I'm not aware of other options other than thermal paste?
    Reply
  • the nerd 389
    19843589 said:
    The Nerd 389
    I'm not aware of other options other than thermal paste?

    For the CPU's internal TIM? The other option is solder, as all prior Intel HEDT chips have used, as well as all AMD chips.

    Normally, it's an indium based alloy with a low melting point, and it's used to bond the CPU's silicon die to the copper heat spreader.
    Reply