MSI Z87 XPower Review: Our First Z87 with PLX8747
by Ian Cutress on August 12, 2013 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- MSI
- PLX
- Z87
Many thanks to...
We must thank the following companies for kindly providing hardware for our test bed:
Thank you to OCZ for providing us with 1250W Gold Power Supplies.
Thank you to G.Skill for providing us with memory kits.
Thank you to Corsair for providing us with an AX1200i PSU, Corsair H80i CLC and 16GB 2400C10 memory.
Thank you to ASUS for providing us with the AMD GPUs and some IO Testing kit.
Thank you to ECS for providing us with the NVIDIA GPUs.
Thank you to Rosewill for providing us with the 500W Platinum Power Supply for mITX testing, BlackHawk Ultra, and 1600W Hercules PSU for extreme dual CPU + quad GPU testing, and RK-9100 keyboards.
Thank you to ASRock for providing us with the 802.11ac wireless router for testing.
| Test Setup | |
| Processor |
Intel Core i7-4770K Retail 4 Cores, 8 Threads, 3.5 GHz (3.9 GHz Turbo) |
| Motherboards |
ASRock Z87 Extreme6/AC ASRock Z87 OC Formula/AC ASRock Z87M OC Formula ASUS Z87-Pro Gigabyte Z87X-UD3H MSI Z87-GD65 Gaming MSI Z87 XPower |
| Cooling |
Corsair H80i Thermalright TRUE Copper |
| Power Supply |
OCZ 1250W Gold ZX Series Corsair AX1200i Platinum PSU |
| Memory |
GSkill TridentX 4x4 GB DDR3-2400 10-12-12 Kit Corsair Vengeance Pro 2x8 GB DDR3 2400 10-12-12 Kit |
| Memory Settings | XMP (2400 10-12-12) |
| Video Cards |
ASUS HD7970 3GB ECS GTX 580 1536MB |
| Video Drivers |
Catalyst 13.1 NVIDIA Drivers 310.90 WHQL |
| Hard Drive | OCZ Vertex 3 256GB |
| Optical Drive | LG GH22NS50 |
| Case | Open Test Bed |
| Operating System | Windows 7 64-bit |
| USB 2/3 Testing | OCZ Vertex 3 240GB with SATA->USB Adaptor |
| WiFi Testing | D-Link DIR-865L 802.11ac Dual Band Router |
Power Consumption
Power consumption was tested on the system as a whole with a wall meter connected to the OCZ 1250W power supply, while in a dual 7970 GPU configuration. This power supply is Gold rated, and as I am in the UK on a 230-240 V supply, leads to ~75% efficiency > 50W, and 90%+ efficiency at 250W, which is suitable for both idle and multi-GPU loading. This method of power reading allows us to compare the power management of the UEFI and the board to supply components with power under load, and includes typical PSU losses due to efficiency. These are the real world values that consumers may expect from a typical system (minus the monitor) using this motherboard.
While this method for power measurement may not be ideal, and you feel these numbers are not representative due to the high wattage power supply being used (we use the same PSU to remain consistent over a series of reviews, and the fact that some boards on our test bed get tested with three or four high powered GPUs), the important point to take away is the relationship between the numbers. These boards are all under the same conditions, and thus the differences between them should be easy to spot.
The MSI Z87 XPower draws plenty of power in all our four test scenarios, including 60W+ at long idle and 500W+ during our gaming test. Typically with overclocking motherboards we see a very efficient power delivery mechanism which results in lower power, but as seen on the Z77X-UP7, this does not help much when 32 power phases are used.
Windows 7 POST Time
Different motherboards have different POST sequences before an operating system is initialized. A lot of this is dependent on the board itself, and POST boot time is determined by the controllers on board (and the sequence of how those extras are organized). As part of our testing, we are now going to look at the POST Boot Time - this is the time from pressing the ON button on the computer to when Windows 7 starts loading. (We discount Windows loading as it is highly variable given Windows specific features.) These results are subject to human error, so please allow +/- 1 second in these results.
At over 25 seconds to boot, the MSI takes home the wooden spoon. For a modern motherboard with two GPUs, 25 seconds is outright silly to POST – the last motherboard that took this long was booting via a device connected to an LSI chip. It would seem that MSI have not yet optimized the BIOS for boot time.
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jardows2 - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
Interesting to read about these high-end boards, but I would like to see someone build a high-end performing board without all the extra "features" that will never get used. 10 SATA ports? Really? If you are doing serious workstation computing and need that many hard drives in a RAID array, you are going to get a SAS RAID controller. If you are just using the computer as a storage server, you won't be spending $400 on the motherboard. All the USB 3.0 ports are going to collect dust for most users. I have several computers with multiple onboard USB ports that have never had anything connected. Add mediocre audio, combined with wireless add-on (practically worthless for such a high-end machine, especially when you have a high-end Ethernet controller on board) it seems like the manufacturers are subscribing to a "more is better" approach, when a "less is more" board, I think, would sell far more. Give me a motherboard with the graphics and overclocking performance that this board can offer, without all the extra stuff, and you will have a winner!529th - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
Exactly! Well said.Optimalpc - Wednesday, January 29, 2014 - link
ditto that, jardows2! Stick with what a lot of us want - Full x16 bandwidth for GPUs, Good digital Power. Better Audio, including good headphone AMP. Ability to support the fastest memory available. Overclocking with mature tools. Min 3-year warranty. Game Ports. High-end Ethernet controller (Killer). Quit wasting money and real estate on too many SATA ports, USB Ports, sub-par wireless, and crappy audio! I don't need 14 USB ports (or even 8). Hardwired to the network, why even add the cost of wireless at all, UNLESS you are providing the latest in 802.11 standards (ac)?jeffb98 - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
How's MSI when it comes to Linux? Do they test compatibility at all for at least Red Hat and SUSE enterprise targeted Linux distros? Would they look into/fix BIOS issues when it comes to Linux?I know Asus and Gigabyte tell you they don't do any Linux testing and support when it comes to their consumer motherboards even when there's clearly a Linux compatibility issue. I know most people "never had a problem" but that's most people who don't really do much and probably don't even need a high end board.
nathanddrews - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
Quad-SLI/CF benchmarks? Seeing as this board caters to people that actually do that kind of thing.IanCutress - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
My fourth 7970 is in the process of being RMA'ed.Ian
nathanddrews - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
D'oh! Sorry to hear that.I was about ready to pull the trigger on a 780, but now that the 7990 is only $699 (and with improved drivers), I'm thinking of getting on of those instead given the potential of getting a second in a year or so. Thoughts?
yasamoka - Tuesday, August 13, 2013 - link
Quad-SLi / CF does not always scale too well. Plus you're more likely to hit a CPU bottleneck if you're running any single monitor resolution and hovering above 60FPS with a target of 120FPS.Plus, this: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7990...
Not recommended except if you water-cool for the heat issues. But then you get left with the other issues. Quad uses AFR + SFR so the microstutter fix is not going to be difficult as it already exists for dual GPU SFR. Quad is similar in that respect as each 2 GPUs use SFR and the groups of 2 GPUs use AFR.
nathanddrews - Tuesday, August 13, 2013 - link
My current setup does most games maxed at 1920x1200@96Hz (at 96fps), but I'm looking to do over 120Hz (at 120fps) with a new 120Hz Lightboost LCD or try out some of the overclockable 1440/1600p displays. My FW900 is going to die someday and I need to be ready. :|rpg1966 - Monday, August 12, 2013 - link
OK, this is probably a dumb question - but as implied on the first page, if this board has an additional 2 sockets of space between the port cluster and the PCIe sockets, won't you need a case that is specifically designed for such a long (tall?) motherboard?