My son wants to build a completely new rig and I was 99% sure we would go with the Z390 dark but now I am not sure.  He wants the i9-9900ks when it is released and will eventually jump over to the 10000 series intel cpu when it releases.
 
We will do some light overclocking and it will be watercooled…..  Just really don't understand which board is the better bet.  He is a gamer so that's the main use scenario. 
 
Any guidance or advice would be appreciated.

One GPU... Sli is dead to me.... He has a evga1080ti for now and will upgrade later.

He has 2 m.2 nvme drives and that's about it.

Actually here is what he has:
Case: evga dg-86
GPU: evga 1080ti sc
Psu: evga 800w titanium
Ram: evga SSC 3200mhz (4*8gb)
Cooler : evga AIO 360 rad
Hdd: two 500gb wdblack m2 nvme
It's almost a complete evga build.

Maybe we should just wait a few months and see what the next gen looks like and go from there.

Spending $1100 on a 9900ks and z390 dark is probably a mistake today.

Off course EVGA X299 Dark and 12 cores Intel Cascade Lake-X. Even 10 cores is OK.
People you need to go on stronger CPU models no matter if 2-3% less performance in games.
That's normal action. 
Constant insist on single threaded advantage was only excuse for Intel, they didn't had other reason to offer processor to customers.
And difference is not so big as you think. 
I can't explain how guys who bought EVGA X299 Dark and i7-7820X made good decision, now upgrade of processors mean they will be competitive with AMD R9-3900X and 3950X. i9-9900K is 40% weaker CPU then AMD and 2% better in games. That's reality. 
X platform is always good choice, even if you play games on 6 cores Xeon for 1366 from 2011 it's better then mainstream 4 cores from that period.
 
If overclockers build OC Guard as for EVGA Z390 Dark I believe people who want to OC to the max will drain 4.6-4.7GHz on 12 cores CPU.
If 300MHz higher frequency on i9-9900K 4.9-5.0GHz OC is reason to buy 40% weaker processor then... no comment. 
Yes i9-9900K is best gaming CPU. If you look only games, if you have total picture it's far from best, he is best in one situation.
i9-9900K advantage in games is maybe even 10 times lower then advantage of AMD and Cascade Lake-X if all cores work. 
 
Ideal situation for i9-9900K is 1080p gaming on 120-144Hz monitors.
On higher resolution and less fps his advantage is weaker and weaker and gone completely.
 

Vlada011
This is for you


 
If other high end processors give you 55fps on max settings 4K resolution i9-9900K will not help you to reach 60fps.
His advantage is not so big.

Can't see the pictures

All depends.  Just for gaming, 9900KS is good enough but I believe that will be on a different CPU socket (1200?). 
 
The soon to be released Intel 10000 enthusiast line, X299 will be a great fit if he's not just a gamer but for streaming, Image/Video editing, content creation, etc and want's more cores than what the 9xxx line is offering. 
 
The best of the best?  i9-10980XE, X299 DARK, 2080 Ti, 32GBs of RAM, M.2 OS Drive and another M.2 for storage with a quality PSU (750/850 min)

If I remember good EVGA never launch motherboards just like that, one after another.
If I could compare with some company they behave similar like Watercool.de... always have less models of waterblocks but better quality.
 
EVGA X299 Dark will be tested with Cascade Lake-X and if everything is OK then no reason for new motherboard.
You could wait just little more to be sure. Maybe they had plans few weeks earlier to present revision X299X Dark example.
 
Yes 100$ discount is really attractive. It would be nice to someone give some information if EVGA prepare new motherboard.
This article say EVGA X299 Motherboards are build for next generation Intel X-Core 10000... that mean probably X299 Dark will stay top model.
 

 
Actually if you buy motherboard on discount then 12 cores will costs you similar as i9-9900K.
 
 

From my perspective that's even better. Can you imagine before several years in my country people who make reviews even give negative comments because they just finished review of high end ROG motherboard and ASUS send them revision...
and their comment was This make to customers feel terrible. 
Can you imagine now...
 
Rampage VI Apex X299 
ASUS Rampage VI Extreme X299
ASUS Rampage VI Extreme Omega X299
ASUS Rampage VI Extreme Encore X299
 
and that's all before Intel Cascade Lake-X. I would feel bad. 
All of them were motherboards over 600$ price and they are very similar.

Great
 
Will look for your updates or maybe a Build log Thread, in Mods Rigs section of the Forums
 
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Hey crap! Long time since we have chatted. No I am aware about the sockets and we are waiting for the x10 series CPUs I'm November. The price slash is hard to disregard.

I'm currently using the EVGA Dark with a i7 9800X. I think i'll wait until the next generation of CPU's before i upgrade again. Hopefully DDR5 RAM will be out by then alongside some PCI-E 4 slots.

Ravenmaster
I'm currently using the EVGA Dark with a i7 9800X. I think i'll wait until the next generation of CPU's before i upgrade again. Hopefully DDR5 RAM will be out by then alongside some PCI-E 4 slots.

That's nice configuration and you have time to think what to do.
You don't need to hurry.