The MSI Z170A Gaming M7 Review: The Step Up to Skylake
by Ian Cutress on September 21, 2015 12:30 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- Gaming
- MSI
- Skylake
- Z170
CPU Performance, Short Form
For our motherboard reviews, we use our shortform testing method. These tests usually focus on if a motherboard is using MultiCore Turbo (the feature used to have maximum turbo on at all times, giving a frequency advantage), or if there are slight gains to be had from tweaking the firmware. We leave the BIOS settings at default and memory at JEDEC (DDR4-2133 C15) for these tests, making it very easy to see which motherboards have MCT enabled by default.
Video Conversion – Handbrake v0.9.9: link
Handbrake is a media conversion tool that was initially designed to help DVD ISOs and Video CDs into more common video formats. The principle today is still the same, primarily as an output for H.264 + AAC/MP3 audio within an MKV container. We test two files, one with small frame sizes (640x266 24 FPS film running for 2h20) and one with super large frame sizes (double-UHD, 3840x4320 at 30 FPS animation short) to show where certain processor designs give better boosts for large frames which might not be obvious in small frame environments.
Compression – WinRAR 5.0.1: link
Our WinRAR test from 2013 is updated to the latest version of WinRAR at the start of 2014. We compress a set of 2867 files across 320 folders totaling 1.52 GB in size – 95% of these files are small typical website files, and the rest (90% of the size) are small 30 second 720p videos.
Point Calculations – 3D Movement Algorithm Test: link
3DPM is a self-penned benchmark, taking basic 3D movement algorithms used in Brownian Motion simulations and testing them for speed. High floating point performance, MHz and IPC wins in the single thread version, whereas the multithread version has to handle the threads and loves more cores. For a brief explanation of the platform agnostic coding behind this benchmark, see my forum post here.
Image Manipulation – FastStone Image Viewer 4.9: link
FastStone is the program I use to perform quick or bulk actions on images, such as resizing, adjusting for color and cropping. In our test we take a series of 170 images in various sizes and formats and convert them all into 640x480 .gif files, maintaining the aspect ratio. FastStone does not use multithreading for this test, and thus single threaded performance is often the winner.
Rendering – POV-Ray 3.7: link
The Persistence of Vision RayTracer, or POV-Ray, is a freeware package for as the name suggests, ray tracing. It is a pure renderer, rather than modeling software, but the latest beta version contains a handy benchmark for stressing all processing threads on a platform. We have been using this test in motherboard reviews to test memory stability at various CPU speeds to good effect – if it passes the test, the IMC in the CPU is stable for a given CPU speed. As a CPU test, it runs for approximately 2-3 minutes on high end platforms.
Synthetic – 7-Zip 9.2: link
As an open source compression tool, 7-Zip is a popular tool for making sets of files easier to handle and transfer. The software offers up its own benchmark, to which we report the result.
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tygrus - Tuesday, September 29, 2015 - link
Check RAM and contact the shop you bought the MB from. You can ask for them to check the MB (and other components bought from them) and may be ask to swap the MB if you think it's the guilty component.Morawka - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
I love the motherboard but i cant get by with only that few usb ports on the back... Mouse, Keyboard, Printer, Xbox 360 wireless adapter, UPS and i'm full (and that's using every type a port on the back). Still need room for Wireless AC adapter, and a full time backup USB 3.0 External HDD. hate to use the front ports for any of the stuff i mentioned above.I guess if you don't mind having a hub taking up space on your desk, and all the cable clutter that comes with it, then this board is for you.. My monitors even have usb 3.0 hubs but i am really hesitant to use them since they don't work when the monitor goes into standby.
With all that said, this is a amazing looking board.. I love the high quality PCI Express headers, and the Red Memory wire traces. that is sick. All other i/o options look ok as long as your not rolling DVI monitors.. to this day, display port still has tons of issues related to hotplugging. when you turn your monitor off, it thinks it's totally disconnected. DVI doesn't do that. Some power saving profiles and standby settings can really screw up display port driver, causing you to have to swap ports to get the monitor back on.
Captmorgan09 - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
You could always use a front panel USB adapter like this to give you more USB options on the back. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9S...Impulses - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
You're telling me... I have a UPS, keyboard (x2 ports), backup HDD, and a display hub connected directly...Then I've got the mouse connected to that keyboard and off the one display hub I've got two other display hubs; THEN on those two there's some non essentials like desk lighting strips, webcam, Bluetooth dongle, and wireless mouse dongle.
Leaves me with one free Type C port on the back, one on the displays, and then the front ports.
Luckily the ASUS Z170 board I chose has a decent number of front headers (2x 3.0 & 1x 2.0 IIRC) despite only having 6x on the back, so I have those free for a card reader, game pads, thumb drives, etc.
Would've been nice to have at least 8 on the back in case I ever switch my DAC from optical to USB and whatnot tho.
Michael Bay - Sunday, September 27, 2015 - link
>desk lighting strips, webcam, Bluetooth dongleREMOVE
LauRoman - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
Left of the onboard power buttons, i see two usb2 headers and you could use a backplate usb adapter. If you want usb3 on the back, between the atx header and the sata connectors i see two usb3 hearders.LauRoman - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
LE i forgot to mention that boards have come with connectors such as this for at least a dozen years. Sure, some have had weird/exotic layouts, but most have had a standard set.Morawka - Monday, September 21, 2015 - link
yeah but those usb brackets demolish any hope of having a window case build with a clean look. They to short 100% of the time to route behind the motherboard.bigboxes - Tuesday, September 22, 2015 - link
LOL. I like a clean look as anyone else. However, I'm all about function over form. I have no window in my case and it sits under my desk and out of the way. Whatever the case, you do know that you can buy an extension cable or a USB card that fits in an PCIe expansion slot?Morawka - Tuesday, September 22, 2015 - link
yeah i could buy add in cards, or i could just buy a different motherboard... my point was, they should have added another x2 stack of usb ports on top of that lone HDMI connector (huge amount of wasted space)it effectively has 2 USB 3.0 ports and 1 USB 3.1 port (The type c port cant even be used for a year or two, nothing exist that you would plug in the back, and still use type c)