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- Date:
- Monday , May 12, 2014
- Author:
- Daniel Dobrowolski
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
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MSI Z97 MPower MAX AC LGA 1150 Motherboard Review
Today we take a look at MSI’s latest entry into its "OC" series motherboards. The MSI Z97 MPower MAX AC is specifically designed with the computer hardware overclocking enthusiast in mind. This new Z97 Intel Express Chipset MSI motherboard sports a solid feature set with a host of overclocking tools that allow many avenues of attack.
Introduction
MSI is one of the most well known manufacturers in the PC industry. While MSI produces graphics cards, laptops, cases, peripherals, and other things it is still generally thought of primarily as a motherboard manufacturer. Like its contemporaries, MSI builds motherboards at a variety of price points and configurations to suit the needs of system integrators, boutique builders, office machines, enthusiasts, gamers, and hardcore overclockers. Virtually no stone is left unturned in the market. MSI has G1 Gaming, Gaming, Overclocking Series (SOC), Black Edition, and Ultra Durable branded motherboards, and the venerable MPower series. Today were lifting the hood on the latest addition to the MPower series; the Z97 MPower MAX AC.
The MSI Z97 MPower MAX AC is built on Intel’s latest generation chipset, the Z97 Express. It is a feature rich solution sporting 3-Way multi-GPU support, M.2 (NGFF), Wi-Fi 802.11AC, Bluetooth 4.0, Intel WiDI, V-Check points, USB 3.0, and 8x SATA 6Gb/s ports. Interestingly MSI chose not to leverage SATA Express on the Z97 MPower MAX AC. More than that the Z97 MPower Max AC also has a built in waterblock for cooling the MOSFETs. The audio solution features an isolated PCB with an amplifier and much more.
The Z97 MPower MAX AC is built using MSI’s "Military Class-4" components. This is marketing terminology to be sure, this means that the motherboard is built using Hi-C capacitors, Super Ferrite Chokes, and Dark Capacitors.
We will get into the nuts and bolts of these features in the various sections of this review relating to these. For now I think it’s important to state that this is a higher end offering from MSI and one that packs most of the features this generation’s hardware is going to support. The decision not to support Thunderbolt II and SATA Express is one probably born of marketing decisions. These are the two features one could say are "missing" from the check box list of features this motherboard could support. So if those are options you’re looking for you will have to look elsewhere. On the other hand from a practicality standpoint I’m not sure you are missing much opting for this rather than a motherboard that has those features. The reason I say that is because there aren’t a lot of Thunderbolt II devices in the market and there are virtually no SATA Express devices available and there won’t be for some time. We should start seeing SATA Express devices becoming more available around the end of the year but prices, capacity, and device availability are virtually unknown at this point.
Main Specifications Overview:
Detailed Specifications Overview:
Packaging
The MSI Z97 MPower MAX AC comes in a large black and yellow box with a very deep bundle. Included in the box are the following items: Wi-Fi BT module, instruction book, user guide, driver discs, case badge, OC certificate of stability, door hanger, application guide, overclocking guide, SATA cable labels, Wi-Fi antenna, SLI bridge, M-Connectors, SATA cables, v-check point probes, expansion slot I/O bracket, and an I/O shield,
Motherboard Layout
The layout of the MSI Z97 MPower MAX AC is superb with only one minor flaw I can think of. The 6-pin PCIe auxiliary power isn’t positioned well for some cases as anything with a bottom mounted PSU bay will have potential cable routing problems given the location of that plug. I’ve even run into this very issue myself in several of my own builds. Of course your mileage may vary depending on the chassis you’re using in your build. All fan headers on the PCB are of the 4-pin variety.
The CPU socket area is relatively clear. The 12-phase power design is cooled using a large heat pipe and combination water block system. The heat sinks are semi-large and could create issues for some systems running larger air cooling setups. RAM clearance is of course an ever present problem in that event. Careful choice of components ahead of time can of course mitigate these issues.
The 4x 240-pin DDR3 DIMM slots support up to 8GB modules for a total of 32GB of supported memory. Overclocking up to 3200MHz is supported officially by MSI. The motherboards onboard power, reset, OC Genie, and CMOS discharge buttons are located directly in front of the memory module slots. Note that the DIMM slots aren’t color coded, but for the enthusiast this should not be an issue.
The chipset itself is cooled using a passive heat sink with a large yellow "M" emblazoned on it. In front of the chipset you’ll find 8 SATA 6Gb/s ports. 6 of which are connected to the chipset while the others are attached to the ASM1061 controller. These aren’t marked or color coded as to which is which and thus you must refer to the manual and printed port numbers on the PCB to help determine which ports go to which controller. In this quadrant of the motherboard you will also find the LN2 slow mode switch, LED debug display, and the M.2 slot.
The expansion slot area is nicely laid out without any problems I can think of. There are three PCI-Express x16 slots supporting a variety of configurations from 16x0, 8x8 and 8x4x4. Because there is no PLX chip here to multiplex the lane configuration 3-Way SLI is not supported. 3-Way CrossFire is however supported. There are also 4 PCI-Express x1 slots located here as well. Just behind this lies the audio.
The I/O shield is packed full of USB ports and other connectivity options. There are 8x USB 3.0 ports, 2x USB 2.0 ports, 1x PS/2 keyboard and mouse combination port, 1x RJ-45 Ethernet jack, 1x HDMI ports, 1x DisplayPort, 1x optical output, and six mini-stereo jacks for analog audio.