Somehow I don't like the Block Diagram, is simply too bloated with third party controllers. While I don't know the C422 or X299 Flex IO capabilities for proper theorycraft about how my perfect LGA 2066 Motherboard would be, I can say the following:
The rear IO has 10 USB Ports yet ALL them are behind third party controllers. 4 are behind an
Etron EJ198 xHCI Controller, the other 4 behind a bandwidth starved
Renesas uPD720210 1-to-4 USB Hub. Finally, there are another 2 USB 3.1 behind an ASMedia ASM2142. Why the hell they didn't use Intel Alpine Ridge for that, with the added feature of supporting ThunderBolt 3 on top of USB 3.1? You just get 4 USB Ports that are coming directly from the Chipset, but they are only for the two Front Panel headers.
A thing which I don't exactly get is what the Genesys Logic GL850 (
GL850G?) is supposed to do, as it seems that the USB 3.0 Front Panel headers are simultaneously connected to both the Chipset and the GL850. Is the GL850 supposed to be used as a sort of fallback if you attach an USB 2.0 only Device? What is the point of doing that when a xHCI Controller fully supercedes UHCI/OHCI and EHCI? I know that EHCI required supplementary UHCI/OHCI Controllers, but not xHCI since it can do all them by itself...
The PCIe Slots arrangement seems a bit... overkill. The PEX 8747 PCIe Switch looks almost redundant when you already have 48 lanes. I think that 3-16x with support for 6-8x is enough and would also leave room for a Chipset slot. Another combination I would love is 5-8x + 2 U.2 coming from the Processor instead of the Chipset. I still don't get why they hate NVMe storage so much...
I love Motherboards that try to get the most out of Processor and Chipset instead of throwing extra multiplexing controllers everywhere. I think no one thinks like I do since I rarely see those...
