There’s a strange assumption among motherboard makers that red and black is the colour scheme of choice for PC gamers. Not only is it used on the majority of Z170 motherboards, but it’s also seen on many cases and even gamingfocused displays. Assuming you like this colour combo, of all the boards on test, MSI has made the best use of these two colours with the Gaming M7. The VRM and chipset heatsinks are decorated with deep red go-faster stripes, and the same even goes for some of the connections directly on the PCB. There are some LEDs on the board too – a red strip outlines the audio isolation circuit, while a bright red light enables you to diagnose any network problems with the LAN port.
In general, the build quality is excellent. A heatpipe connects the chunky VRM heatsinks, the GPU slots are reinforced, there’s plenty of space around the power connectors, and the fan headers and on-board buttons are all easily accessible. Along with the usual power and reset buttons, there’s also a Game Boost button, which provides a quick voltage and multiplier boost, and there’s a POST code error readout too.
There are the usual three 16x PCI-E slots and four 1x PCI-E slots. The top 1x PCI-E slot is also sensibly positioned above the main graphics slot, parallel with one of the two M.2 ports. Although the second and third 1x PCI-E slots will be obscured by dual-slot graphics cards used in the nearby 16x slots, it’s unlikely that any component will block the first and fourth 1x slots. The lower M.2 slot is directly beneath the second 16x graphics slot, so it’s easily accessible in most cases, although it will be obstructed by a second graphics card.
Meanwhile, the rear I/O panel sports two USB 2 ports and two USB 3 ports at the rear, along with two USB 3.1 ports with type-A and type-C connectors. An additional USB 2 port is also provided for USB firmware updating, with a button placed next to it. The SATA ports are a similarly standard offering, with six SATA 6Gbps ports and two SATA Express ports, all of which are right angled.
The Click Bios 5 EFI is pretty much identical to the one used on the MSI Z170 Titanium Edition, with a splash screen that allows easy access to the main system functions and settings, as well as the boot order. The Advanced menu is easy to navigate, with a neat layout that has six main icons to guide you around. The overclocking settings are also thorough and kept in one place, including voltage and DRAM frequency controls. A favourites system is included too, which is very simple to use. Overall MSI’s interface design is hard to fault, and certainly deserves the ‘EZ’ name for its ease of use.
Like most of the boards on test, the Z170 Gaming M7 overclocked our Core i7-6700K to 4.8GHz. However, it required a 1.44V vcore, resulting in the second highest overclocked power consumption on test at load. The Z170A Gaming M7 is a solid performer, though, pushing out decent benchmark results in all our tests.
The Z170A Gaming M7 has a solid EFI, strong performance, plenty of features, easy overclocking and a good layout. It isn’t cheap, though, and at this price, it’s up against some serious competition from Asus’ cheaper Maximus VIII Ranger, which is similarly rich in features and also a better overclocker.
VERDICT
A solid board with a decent EFI, strong performance and a good layout, but it’s up against serious competition from Asus’ ROG boards.
SPECIFICATIONS
Chipset Intel Z170
CPU socket Intel LGA1151
Memory support 4 slots, max 64GB DDR4 (3600MHz - OC)
Expansion slots Three 16x PCI-E, four 1x PCI-E
Sound Realtek ALC1150
Networking Killer E2400 Ethernet
Overclocking Base clock 70– 655.25MHz, CPU multiplier 8–83x; max voltages, CPU 2.155V, RAM 2.2V
Ports 2 x SATA Express, 6 x SATA 6Gbps, 2 x M.2, 3 x USB 2, 2 x USB 3, 2 x USB 3.1, 1 x Gigabit LAN, 8-channel surround audio out, line-in, mic, optical S/PDIF out
IGP display outputs 2 x HDMI, 1 x DisplayPort
Dimensions (mm) 305 x 244