MSI Z77 Motherboard Preview

 The Z77A-GD45 follows a standard ATX design, and even though it packs a lot of features, the board is very spaced out and minimal to look at.  These spaces that are left are filled more and more by the higher models that have naturally more features crammed into them.  MSI have used the company blue and black colouring and we can see that the MOSFETS and the Z77 chipset are both topped with passive coolers. Feature wise, we will see three star Military Class III components, OC Genie II with 1 second overclocking and ClickBIOS II.

Around the CPU socket we find four DIMM sockets for upto 32Gb of DDR3 1066/1333/1600/1866 (OC)/2133 (OC)/ 2400 (OC)/ 2667 (OC) and also supporting Intel XMP modules. With the smaller socket there is more than enough room for fitting large coolers onto the board.

Around the expansion slot area we see that the x16 slots are spaced out in such a way to allow for a three way SLI or Crossfire arrangement.  On top of this there are four PCI-e x1 slots.

Down at the bottom of the board we find all of the front panel headers, including USB, audio and status LEDs.

The chipset heatsink design here has a clean and simple design and has changed a fair amount.  The deign now gives a cooler with a lower profile and is slightly longer and wider.

Beside the chipset cooler, we have the SATA headers and USB3.0 header.  The two white ports to the right are SATAIII and the four black in the middle are all of SATAII class, and all 6 of these ports are controlled by the Z77 chipset itself, each set with full RAID support.  In a change to the normal location, the USB3.0 header has been relocated here as well and has also been orientated for connection to a 90 degree angle to the board.

Moving up from here we find the 24-pin ATX power connection and one of the fan headers.  We do note that there is a series of voltage check points, however if these are to appear on the production model or not is another matter as they are not actively specified on the boards feature list.

At the top of the board we find the AUX 8-pin power connection.

Around the CPU area where all the VRM’s, Chokes and MOSFETs lie, we find two individual passive heatsinks.  Now although I mentioned earlier the there were no obvious ‘military’ type designs on the board, we do note that the end of the left hand heatsink is shaped like a barrel and what looks to be iron sights on the side.

The rear of the board gives us a whole range of connectivity options including, 4x USb2.0, 2x USB3.0, PS2 combo (mouse & keyboard), Gbit LAN and a clear CMOS button.  Audio is served via a S/PDIF and optical output and also a 7.1ch audio subsystem with THX TruStudio Pro.