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Our second ITX based Intel Z87 motherboard arrives. This time it comes from the folks from MSI in the form of the Z87I. Let's check it out.
We check out another motherboard using the Intel Z87 chipset. This particular one is from MSI and part of the Gaming series. Let's take a look at it.
Today we take a look at two boards which look to offer a value option in the Z87 market while maintaining as many features as possible from high end products. First up is Gigabytes Z87-D3HP and then we have the MSI Z87-G45 Gaming. Both will be tested in a selection of synthetic and real world tests which include Crysis 3, Grid 2 and the brand new PCMark 8… all with the i7-4770K on board.
Our first look at a non-Intel Z87 motherboard today is the Z87-G45 Gaming from the folks over at MSI. With a gaming focus I am really excited to see what the board is all about. At a quick glance at both the packaging and the board itself it’s clear that MSI is going with the dragon theme that we saw on a few of their notebooks this year at CES. I’m curious if the MSI Z87-G45 Gaming will be on fire, or just fizzle out. Let’s take a closer look and find out!
The MSI Z87-G43 motherboard is motherboard targeted at budget conscious individuals looking for a quality system board. The Z87-G43 comes with a wealth of features that are often pegged as being for mainstream or enthusiast level boards. These features include the UEFI Click BIOS 4, Military Class 4 components, 4K Display support, and multiple display outputs. Awhile the MSI Z87-G43 board is considered a budget board, the Military Class 4 components that the board is built with offer EMI, ESD, Humidity, and High temperatures protection. These components include super ferrite chokes and solid caps. There is one PCI-e 3.0 x16 slot to provide the fastest PCI-e interface currently available. There is also the Command Center which allows tweaking of system settings without entering the BIOS for RAID, and RAMDisk capability.
Over the last month or so we have covered Intel's latest generation of CPUs in a number of ways from the initial CPU article, through system reviews and motherboard comparisons. In that last category we looked at MSI's Z77-G45 Gaming board and it scored well against a slightly cheaper offering from another manufacturer. Having seen that MSI felt they could compete really well with their G43 board so today we have that very product on our test bench to see how it compares.
Since the launch of Haswell LGA 1150 processors and the Z87 Intel chipset back in June we've seen a tonne of motherboards come through eTeknix for review. In fact, we've still got quite a few more to come and today we take a look at another motherboard, this time from MSI. On the test bench today we have the MSI Z87-G43 motherboard which is designed to be one of MSI's most entry level motherboards sitting above only the Z87-G41 PC Mate.
The MSI Z87-G43 is as simple as you will find for an ATX Z87 motherboard and at its core is a philosophy of offering you the most bang for your buck - no frills attached. Despite that budget-minded orientation the motherboard certainly doesn't skimp out on the core features you'd expect from a motherboard that is still relatively high end. MSI equip military class components, deploy a UEFI Click BIOS and provide you with some innovative software.
Of course straight away you'll be interested to know the pricing as this is one of the most crucial aspects of this motherboard. At most retailers you will find the MSI Z87-G43 is the cheapest motherboard on offering costing around £90-95 and $120-130. The only motherboard I could find that was cheaper was the Z87-G41 PC Mate mentioned earlier. MSI is targeting budget minded enthusiasts, gamers and system integrators with this motherboard. This motherboard is for people who want the benefits of abundant SATA III, good overclocking potential and abundant PCIe connectivity, but don't need all the networking & audio extras or the fancy motherboard buttons and switches of more expensive motherboards. So let's see what the MSI Z87-G43 has to offer.
The MSI Z87-G41 motherboard is inexpensive but doesn't skimp on quality. The Z87-G41 PC Mate Motherboard may only be a piece of the puzzle when building a custom inexpensive desktop but it comes with features that are found on MSI's gamer and enthusiast class motherboards. The MSI Z87-G41 comes with Click (UEFI) BIOS, 3 onboard display outputs for multiple monitors, PCI Express Gen 3 (Crossfire Capable), OC Genie 4, and has 4K UHD support. Something you would not expect on a budget board is Military Class components. The MSI Z87-G41 PC Mate comes standard with MSI's Military Class 4 components which include Dark chokes and solid caps for added stability. With Military Class 4 comes the benefits of Humidity. ESD, EMI and High Temperature protection. Finally with Super RAID software you can set up you own array in a Windows environment.
We have nothing against expensive motherboards, to the contrary, but we don't like paying for things we're not going to use. The MSI Z87 XPower is clearly aimed at extreme overclockers using extreme forms of cooling such as liquid nitrogen. So why should they be forced to pay for features they likely won't use for overclocking, such as 10 SATA600 ports, 10x USB 3.0, a KillerNic card, WLAN, Creative audio drivers and so on. None of these have any influence on 3DMark overclocking scores, but they definitely have an influence on the price.
MSI is aiming for all-out performance with its flagship LGA 1150 motherboard - the Z87 XPower. Can the 32 phase VRM, overclocking-orientated features, host of add-on controllers, and support for 4-way graphics configurations give MSI's Z87 XPower motherboard success in the enthusiast sector?
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