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MB: ASUS
Prime-H310I-PLUS-R2.0/CSM

Description: Mini-ITX Coffee Lake Motherboard
Standards: Mini-ITX, H310 chipset, LGA 1151 (Socket H4), Coffee Lake Refresh (9th gen), Corporate Stable Model (CSM), ASUS Control Center, USB 3.1 Gen 1, NVMe PCIe M.2, SATA3, Certified NIST SP 800-147, TPM, UL, Blue Angel, Windows 7 and 10, UDIMM DDR4

This motherboard is the grand joining of all objectives in producing a highest-value PC for standard uses.

In short this board works with both Windows 7 & 10, both high-end and low-end markets, both desktop PC's and mobile PC's, all uses (scientific, educational, engineering, business, industrial, entertainment), and includes sufficient expansion options to satisfy all but the upper end of the extreme enthusiasts market.

What is more important than anything else is that this board delivers Coffee Lake (gen8) and Coffee Lake Refresh (gen9) CPU compatibility, along with the new uber-high-speed DDR4 RAM. And that it is an ASUS board, which is at least 5x more reliable than any other brand.

At the lower end of the Coffee Lake CPU line-up, Intel's i3-8100 delivers ultra high performance at an incredibly low price, while at the opposite end of this line-up, Intel's i9-9900 muscles its way past everything else in the world for only about $300 more. There's no sense getting anything slower than the i3-8100 because it is already super low priced, and then the fastest in the world is just $300 more. For these reasons it doesn't make any sense to go outside of Coffee Lake. You might save a few dollars dropping down to a previous platform, but you lose so much in doing so. And you can spend so much more going to cutting-edge, but why? There are so few real advantages. This is 14nm technology at its best. If concerned that AMD might have something that is higher value, then check out our PC Tips.

This is where the dream of combining advanced miniaturization, ultra reliability, and ultra capability, all at a super low price, becomes reality. It is just 6.7" x 6.7" in size, yet packs more power and more features than nearly all motherboards of all sizes up through a very short time ago. It has most of the latest capabilities that you'd expect to find in a top-of-the-line Coffee Lake LGA 1151 motherboard, it even includes two high-speed M.2 ports, one 16 lane PCIe slot, 4 SATA3 ports, and 4 USB3.1 Gen 1 ports. These are the high performance ports necessary to handle a majority of today's high speed devices.

It does not include some of the more cutting-edge ultra-high speed technologies, such as the new 40 lane PCIe, USB3.1 Gen 2, USB Type-C, all of which are only beneficial in extreme gaming and cryptomining capacities, where paying a premium for a higher bandwidth GPU and a shorter life-span computer might make sense.

The Intel H310 chipset is considered an early Coffee Lake chipset and has therefore adopted a stereotype of having fewer features. This is actually good because market response to this stereotype is to lower demand, and that pulls the price down. However, Intel's recently revised H310 chipset includes all the Coffee Lake features necessary to true value in a standard PC, while the newer chipsets really only add features specialized for extreme GPU performance and bandwidth. This is why we are convinced that the H310 chipset now holds more value than the newer chipsets.

At this super small size you gain several stacking advantages: easier to move, easier to keep out-of-the-way, easier to physically secure, less heat production, less dust collection, easier to upgrade, less freight, lower inventory costs, lower cost case, lower cost power supply, and lower power consumption.

The down-side to this size motherboard is that the cap on RAM is halved. You're limited to 32GB RAM (vs 64GB in the equivalent Micro-ATX board). But lets face it, who needs 64GB RAM?

It also includes an automatically self-recovering BIOS. Its never fun when a BIOS corrupts and you have to burn a new copy. But this BIOS is different, it recovers from a backup automatically.

Its also important to realize that because there are so many features in BIOS that it is easy to get something wrong. Well, now all you do to fix this is to select "load optimized defaults". And from there, switch on virtualization (in case you decide to use Oracle's virtual machine, which is required with more and more programs these days, including the ASUS Control Center), and switch on the USB Keyboard and Mouse Simulator (this untangles a catch-22 installing Windows 7). After that everything is exactly as it should be. Simple. (Most BIOS we've seen do not have these features; this is really cool, and quite a time-saver.)

Corporate Stable Model (CSM)

It also includes its own tech support program for the motherboard. This is the most advanced motherboard support program in the world.

Miniaturization Trend

The trend into the future is to make the computer smaller and smaller, while putting more of the devices on the outside. Following this trend, the larger boards boasting more slots seem pointless, while the smaller boards boasting more USB 3.1 paves the road towards this future. Once you can fit a high-end CPU along with uber-fast memory, then the future is here. We are convinced that this motherboard is proof of this point, and serves as a gateway into the super high value PC's of the future.

Amazingly, this very small board is also compatible with the new Coffee Lake i9-9900 CPU. You get a blazing 8 cores and 16 hyperthreads in a 5GHz CPU, now deemed the fastest consumer CPU in the world.

All these points position this motherboard in the highest-value zone for a PC motherboard.

Windows 7?

Today there are literally millions of happy Windows 7 users out there that do not want to switch to Windows 10. There are a number of reasons for this, but rather than getting into those let's look at their predicament. Microsoft made a deal with chip manufacturers to prevent newer CPU's from working except on fully updated Windows 10 PC's. Wow, power play as that may be it is not quite omniscient, at least not for those that don't fall for it. Intel made a way around it and told a few people. And word got around. The trick is with the chipset that is used in this motherboard. Though the ASUS brochure says its for Windows 10, the claim is that it also works just fine with Windows 7.

We just had to check this out. Lo and behold, it works. Windows 7 installed in exactly the same steps that we're used to. Not a single hickup (outside the USB catch-22 that we already knew about, and is easily solved when you know what to do). And we've been using it daily for a few months without a single snag.

One of the main advantages to using this motherboard is that it allows you to keep your hardware current without being forced into Windows 10. And it is possibly the most affordable and reliable solution. And if you change your mind on Windows 7, it also works with Windows 10. Just upgrade the software.

If you're concerned about Microsoft dropping support for Windows 7, then just ask yourself how many times did you contact Microsoft for support for your Windows 7? The whole world is supporting that OS and will continue to do so because it is their best OS. You'll continue to get drivers from device manufacturers, and you'll continue to get answers to questions from tech forums and google. What you'll lose is Windows Update support. Ok, so that means that on top of going to manufacturers for driver updates, you'll need to go to your security software for security patches. Oh, wait, you're doing all that anyway.

Bottom line is that this motherboard makes possible running Windows 7 on 8th and 9th generation Intel CPU's. No longer do you have to buy outdated hardware to stick with Windows 7.

Overclocking

This motherboard is capable of overclocking. However, we leave this feature disabled because it is not part of our business philosophy. To deliver more performance for the money, a segment of the business market has been making use of gaming boards with overclocking disabled. ASUS responded by producing hybrid boards, capable of overclocking (with features like XMP and AI Tweaker), yet focused on business (with CSM). We configure it conservatively, with overclocking disabled. In this conservative mode of operation, RAM runs at a slightly slower speed, which primarily impacts complex graphical operations used in cutting-edge games. So, for business this is usually a great way to go. And if you decide you need those advanced GPU calculations and don't care about voiding warranties, then we would recommend the included XMP profile #1 (see BIOS advanced settings to enable this profile). This is an overclocking profile designed by Intel, and is considered the safest effective overclock. But be warned, experts are divided, some saying it does not shorten the lifespan of the computer, while others saying it does. In our opinion it is simple math, as voltage increases so does heat, and this shortens the lifespan of the components. And, reading all the fine print overclocking disables four warranties: motherboard, CPU, memory, and PC. Many people are confused on this point, as marketing media will make XMP seem necessary to get RAM to operate at its correct speed, when this is actually a hook to get you to make assumptions resulting in disabling the warranties. The entire industry is pulling this trick on the marketplace to enhance planned obsolescence. To get around all this we leave overclocking (including XMP) disabled. For nearly everything you do, including games, the performance difference is miniscule anyway. Its just a devilish scheme to make more money.

i9-9900 Support

ASUS designed this motherboard for both Coffee Lake and Coffee Lake Refresh, and as we all know, its Coffee Lake Refresh that delivers the high-end i9-9900 CPU. So, since the H310 chipset was created prior to the release of the i9-9900 CPU, its logical to question whether or not the motherboard is really compatible. As it turns out, all that's needed is to flash the BIOS to version 606 or higher. (And if you buy from us, then we will make sure that it is already flashed to this version for you.) This BIOS upgrade is all it takes to make this amazing motherboard compatible with the world's fastest consumer CPU: the Intel i9-9900 (non-overclocking). What a combination. The same platform supports the most sensible lowest end of the highest-value zone (the i3-8100), and the most sensible highest-end of the highest-value zone (the i9-9900). And these CPU's are only $300 apart.