Featured

MSI Z97 Gaming 7 (LGA 1150) Motherboard Review

A Closer Look & Layout Analysis


With the perennial classic red & black theme and a beautiful matte black PCB the MSI Z97 Gaming 7 is built to seduce. For the price point the MSI Z97 Gaming 7 offers up an impressive gamer aesthetic that can rival the ASUS ROG line for substantially less. MSI have done a great job  with the layout of this motherboard: they have the 8 + 24 pin power connectors in the ideal locations and  the SATA III and USB 3.0 ports neatly clustered together and right angled for better cable management. My only concern about the layout is why the second CPU fan header is so far away from the first on the opposite side of the memory lanes. That aside I am thoroughly impressed with the layout and aesthetics of this motherboard. I’m also pleased to see SATA Express has been ditched in favour of extra SATA ports. Not that I am anti-new technology but I just find SATA Express redundant – why waste two SATA 6G ports to get 10G, AND require an additional connector AND a custom cable – did people forget about RAID? From a gamer standpoint MSI have been sensible to ditch SATA Express.

Around the CPU socket we find an impressive 12 phase VRM using MSI’s Super Ferrite Chokes (SFCs).

Along the side of the motherboard we get a debug LED and voltage read off points. These are certainly surprising additions although being a gaming motherboard you can’t help but wonder what function VCheck points serve…I am a reviewer and I don’t find a use for them so why on earth would a gamer need them?

In terms of storage connectivity there are 8 SATA III ports, ports 0-6 (starting on the right) are run through the Z97 chipset while ports 7-8 are provided by the ASMedia controller.

Along the bottom we find MSI’s famous OC Genie button as well as a power and reset switch. There’s also a dip switch to choose between two different amplifiers in your audio depending on the impedance of your headphones.

Looking closer at that audio area we can see the separated PCB, nichicon audio capacitors, dual headphone amplifiers and the EMI shielding over the ALC 1150 codec.

Interestingly the heatsinks are connected by a 6mm nickel-plated copper heat pipe which should allow for better VRM cooling.

The rear I/O has an impressive amount of USB connectivity as well as gold plated audio jacks. The red block of connections at the end are the “Gaming Device Ports” which have more optimised tracers for lower latency in addition to more gold content for higher durability.

Flipping the motherboard over and we can see that all the heatsinks are easily removable with a screw driver. We also get a closer look at the matte black PCB and audio PCB separation.

Page: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

Ryan Martin

Disqus Comments Loading...

Recent Posts

BenQ MOBIUZ EX2710Q 27″ QHD 165Hz 1ms, HDRi IPS Gaming Monitor

SpeakersSpeakersYesSpeaker amount and power output2x 2 WattDimensionsLength / Depth252.5 mmWidth614 mmHeight525.8 mmWeight7.4 kgStandards / SpecificationsAdaptive…

12 hours ago

Intel Core i7-12700KF 3.60GHz Socket LGA1700 Processor

Thermal SpecificationsMax. TDP125 WCPUCPU ManufacturerIntelCPU SeriesIntel Core i7CPU Socket1700CPU ArchitectureIntel Alder Lake-SCPU Cores12CPU Threads20Performance Cores8Efficiency…

12 hours ago

AOC 24B3HA2 24″ 1920×1080 VA 100Hz 1m Widescreen LED Multimedia Monitor 

AOC 24B3HA2 23.6 1920x1080 VA 100Hz 1m Widescreen LED Multimedia Monitor - Black High-performance clarity…

12 hours ago

Corsair Hydro Series iCUE Link H115i RGB Performance Liquid CPU Cooler

Fan SpecificationsFan Size140 mmColourPrimary ColourBlackSecondary ColourWhiteMaterialsMaterialsAluminium, Copper, RubberLightingLightingYesLighting ColourRGBLighting CompatibilityCorsair iCUEAdditional ContentsIncluded fans2x 140 mmTypeCPU…

12 hours ago

Philips Evnia 34″ 34M2C6500/00 3440×1440 QD-OLED 175Hz 1ms FreeSync Curved Ultrawide Gaming Monitor

This monitor is built with features that make incredible visuals. With VESA ClearMR 9000 and…

12 hours ago

Asus Radeon RX 7900 XTX TUF OC 24GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card

The AMD RDNA™ 3 Architecture elevated by buffed cooling and power delivery to effortlessly churn…

12 hours ago