MSI Z77 Motherboard Preview

Generation 3 of PCI Express is the biggest change we find on the new lineup of motherboards.  The next generation has huge leaps in terms of speed and bandwidth over the older second generation and thus is set ready for the next generation of graphics card such as the 7xxx series from AMD.

The next generation of PCI-e now offers us double the bandwidth that PCI-e 2.x has to offer, with a 16x link bandwidth of 32Gb/s.

On the high end motherboards, which are the most likely candidates for overclockers, there is a whole host of features will will assist them in making overclocking easier.  These include voltage check points, heatpipe technology for a more stable environment, a dual-BIOS system with debug LED and lastly a 1 second overclocking response time with real time monitoring inside Windows.

For those that are not interested in the overclocking utilities and features, there are still a number of items that have their needs in mind.  This includes a USB safeguard protecting USB devices against static discharge, a gaming device port, super charger on the USB for 3x the current – giving a shorter charge time for smartphones/iPads/iPhones. Once the super charger is setup, it will charge even when the board is asleep (S3 & S5) and there is no need wake the PC to start the charge.

Not leaving any area unattended, even the audio system has been given an upgrade.  With the THX TruStudio PRO technology, the onboard audio quality has been improved with a lower noise level, making sounds clearer and more defined.

On the higher level boards, Virtu technology will be included to give the user a higher level of onboard GPU power. This is an automatic switch that during normal use and HD video playback for example, only utilises the onboard GPU.  When the going gets tough and the extra power is required, such as when rendering a in depth 3D application, the Virtu technology will instantly switch the workload over to the 3rd party discrete GPU for rendering and then back to the onboard graphics for output to the display.

As we have seen, MSI have put a lot of thought into making sure that their new range of boards are ready to take on the demands of Intel’s third generation processors, so what array of features will be in each of their boards? Read on to find out more…