MSI Z87I Gaming AC (LGA 1150) Mini-ITX Review
Audio Benchmark – Rightmark Audio Analyser
“RMAA suite is designed for testing quality of analog and digital paths of any audio devices, be it a sound card, an MP3 player, a consumer CD/DVD player or an acoustic set. The results are obtained by playing and recording test signals passed through the tested audio path by means of frequency analysis algorithms. A more common mark is also provided for those unfamiliar with measured technical parameters.” Available here. We run the RMAA test using a 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable connecting the line out to the line in to test the quality of the motherboard audio codec not any external audio devices. We run the complete playback and recording test at default settings and then get RMAA to interpret the results giving the below outputs. We sync the playback and recording audio devices to the same setting as the test for accurate results.
16bit 44.1KHz Performance
24bit 96KHz Performance
I recently cobbled a mini ITX system together for myself with spare parts I had lying about some of which included a Bitfenix Prodigy case, a MSI R9 290 GFX, i5 4670K CPU and an Asus Z87 Gryphon mobo, a reasonably decent gaming build you’ll agree. While everything worked fine (it was a pain in the ass to hide the full length PSU cables) it all ran far too hot for my liking especially the GFX which reached a toasty and cacophonous 92 deg under testing. Needless to say I disassembled it, packed everything away in their boxes again and returned to my tried and tested ATX system. Mini ITX makes sense in a lot of ways especially in the HTPC arena but it’s not everybody’s cuppa tea and definitely not mine, I’m a gamer at heart.
That’s more to do with the R9 290 being a hot card tbh… if you used GTX 780 you’;d get much better temps I think 😛
It is a very hot running card at the best of times made even worse in small enclosures, add that to the fact that my sample used a reference cooler. On an open test bench I recorded temps of ~ 83 deg. The temps could probably be improved a bit with a quality and correctly applied TIM. Don’t get me wrong, I like the mini ITX form factor but they have their limitations.
BTW. I liked the review. Thanks.
I agree the form factor is limited but what you can do with the form factor seems to be improving significantly every year…it wasn’t THAT long ago that we could only get Atom CPUs in the ITX form factor and the only cases that were available were hideous enterprise-style boxes. I think anyone building an ITX system from scratch (and out of their own money 😉 ) is likely to use an Nvidia card GTX 750Ti-GTX 780Ti depending on budget. And thanks, glad you liked it.
I run an i7-4770K, with the MSI Gaming AC Mini itx board and a EVGA GTX 760 w/ACX in a bitfenix. My temps are perfectly fine. I think its the R9 290. I’ve heard they run really hot
Amazing really, especially when you will learn it still has a fully fetched PCIe x16 slot, KillerNIC Gigabit Ethernet, WIFI, USB 3.0 and heck even four SATA 6 Gbps ports. To make things even tastier we pair it with a GeForce GTX 760 GAMING ITX graphics card, and the combo… well it’s just awesome. http://num.to/457-287-619-226