Testing Configuration and Benchmarks Used
To verify that the motherboard works as advertised, the board was run through our standard benchmark suite. In most cases, the results are presented for the motherboard under review as well as a different similar-class motherboard for performance comparison purposes. The benchmark tests used should give you a good understanding of the board’s capabilities for both office and gaming use so that you, the reader, can make a more informed purchasing decision.
|
Test System Setup |
|
|
CPU |
Intel Core i7-4770K (3.5GHz, 35 x 100MHz Base Clock) |
|
Motherboards |
MSI Z97 Gaming 7 GIGABYTE Z97X-Gaming G1-WIFI-BK ASUS Z97-Deluxe MSI Z87 XPower |
|
Memory |
Corsair Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 modules (1600MHz, 9-10-9-27-1T) |
|
Hard Drive |
Samsung 840 EVO 250GB SSD Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA III HD |
|
Sound Card |
On-board sound |
|
Video Card |
NVIDIA GTX 570 1.25GB ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB |
|
CPU Cooling |
Corsair Hydro Series™ H100i Extreme Performance CPU Cooler |
|
Video Drivers |
NVIDIA 335.23 |
|
Power Supply |
Corsair HX750 |
|
Operating System |
Windows 7 Ultimate x64 |
Test Setup Explanation
The 64-bit Windows 7 based test bench used for Intel Z87 LGA1150 board testing includes an Intel Core i7-4770K CPU, 16GB of DDR3-1866 memory, an NVIDIA GTX 570 1.25GB video card, and a Samsung 840 EVO 250GB SSD drive. For the Z97-based board testing, an ASUS Poseidon GTX 780 3GB video card was used for testing – both it and the GTX 570 had no effect on the benchmark tests run. Using the selected components gives us the ability to demonstrate the motherboard's capabilities rather than that of the components themselves.
Benchmark Tests used for evaluation:
- SoftPerfect Research NetWorx Speed Test
- LanBench v1.1.0
- ATTO Disk Benchmark v2.47
- SiSoft Sandra 2012
- LinX Intel Linpack Benchmark v0.6.4
- Maxon Cinebench 11.5
Nice write up, Morry. I may
Nice write up, Morry. I may have missed it, but I have a question:
Can you enter and view the UEFI settings if you just plug an HDMI monitor into the motherboard? In the past, I’ve never gotten it to work so I don’t know if that’s possible now.
Thanks!
I did not try with this
I did not try with this motherboard, but have had varying success with other boards.
The trick I've found for HDMI output of the UEFI BIOS is that the HDMI cable must be the only cable plugged into the card. If any other cables are plugged in, I've never had success getting an HDMI signal. You could also try from the onboard graphics HDMI port, but you would have to remove the secondary video card for it to work…
Thanks for dedicating more
Thanks for dedicating more than half of an entire section to aftermarket CPU cooler fitting (with good pictures to boot!). I don’t often see that in motherboard reviews. +5 cool points for Morry!
Interesting that you oced
Interesting that you oced with the 166 strap. Any reason for using that strap over the 100 strap?
you get a slight performance
you get a slight performance bump using bc overclocking combined with ratio overclocking over pure ratio overclocking. And t also proves that the board is stable at the higher strap speed…
Hi Morry. I see this MSI
Hi Morry. I see this MSI board has an optical/spdif out for audio. However a number of other MSI Z97 boards do not provide this header.
Do you know, in cases like the above, how do I get optical out?
Do I get it by getting a splitter cable for the HDMI port that I can tap the optical audio from, or am I simply out of luck?
Thanks much.
Hi Morry,
I have just
Hi Morry,
I have just purchased this motherboard and built my machine with all the parts.
Unfortunately I’ve encountered a problem which I have narrowed down to the RAM slots.
With both 8GB RAM in slots 1 and 2 the machine will power itself on and off repeatedly, providing the LED Status code C0.
Once I remove the RAM from slot 2 and try again it will work perfectly. Similarly, if I switch the RAM sticks it will also work. The problem is only when both are applied.
I got the RAM as a packaged deal(Kingston 2x8GB 2400Hz) with the motherboard so I am sure it had been tested beforehand.
I am just wondering if you had encountered this error and can suggest a cause/solution or if not, please advise, could placing the RAM in slots 3 and 4 (leaving 1 and 2 blank) cause any damage or should it work?
Thanks and kind regards,
Andrew
Looking at the manual if you
Looking at the manual if you are using 2 sticks of ram they need to be in slots 2 and 4. Have you tried that? Mine works just fine with slots 2 and 4 filled.
hi,what memory do i need to
hi,what memory do i need to purchase for this MSI Z97 GAMING 7 ? I HAVE SOME G.SKILL RIPJAWS x ,F3 WILL THIS MEMORY WORK WITH THIS MOTHERBOARD and it is ddr 3 1600 cl 10-10-10-301.50v,and the memory i have is pc3-12800 8gx2 intel XMP AND AGAIN WILL IT WORK ON THIS BOARD i do hope to hear back from you soon,yours GABRIEL O CONNOR.PS this is my 1 build.
Yes, it will work fine. Get
Yes, it will work fine. Get that capslock key fixed.
Hey people, if you want to
Hey people, if you want to know what parts are compatible google PCpartpicker and then select this mother board it it will only show you parts that are compatible.
bios came right up on my
bios came right up on my 1080p tv via hdmi no problem
I have the same problem and i
I have the same problem and i dont now what to do, i have four slots filed whit corsair dominator platinium whit 16Gb at 1866Hz i already check, and they are camtible whit the MSI Gaming 7 Board, it only works whit 1 dimms in the Thirth slot or the Fourth slot, or works whit Thirth and fourth Slots, 1 and 2 not work, i reset by itself, and dont work even whit 4 slots full. I need help am about to burs this Motherboard.
u need to match the ram and
u need to match the ram and processor frequency. Also the voltage at which your ram and processor operate
To all those having ram
To all those having ram problems, I eventually found that on mine, the problem was bent CPU socket pins. Do check for those if all else fails.