The MSI Z170A Gaming M7 ATX Motherboard supports Intel's 6th-generation of processors by offering an LGA 1151 socket. It comes with four DIMM slots that hold up to 64GB of DDR4 memory. MSI has designed this motherboard with overclocking capabilities for your components. It has Click BIOS 5, OC Engine 2, and three buttons to adjust the settings for your processor, RAM, and graphics cards. You can also overclock with the MSI Gaming app. When an adjustment doesn't work, you can reset the BIOS with a clear CMOS button on the rear panel. For easily updating the BIOS, this motherboard has a Flashback button and a dedicated USB port for your flash drive with the BIOS file.
This motherboard allows you to build a PC system with high-performance components. It offers two PCIe x4 M.2 slots as well as USB 3.1 Type-C and Type-A ports. These interfaces provide faster transfer rates so you can quickly move files and boot up the system faster. Aside from these fast connections, this motherboard provides six SATA III and two SATA Express connectors. Furthermore, the Intel Z170 Express chipset offers various RAID modes for SATA based storage drives and RAID 0 or RAID 1 for M.2 SSDs.
Designed with gaming in mind, this motherboard features three PCIe 3.0 x16 slots and can link your dedicated graphics cards with SLI or CrossFire technologies. To complete the multimedia experience, it comes outfitted with Audio Boost 3 powered with Nahimic Sound technology to deliver clear sound and music through 8-channel HD audio jacks. The Killer Gigabit LAN controller has been enhanced with Advanced Stream Detect 2.0, which maximizes networking performance for online games. MSI also includes software for your mouse and keyboard to enhance them with macro combinations, which let you run multiple commands with a single click.
MSI has designed this motherboard with three USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports as well as a PS/2 combo port. For visuals, it comes with two HDMI ports along with a DisplayPort. It also provides four PCIe 3.0 x1 slots for expansion cards.
- Up to 2x faster than USB 3.0
- Up to 20x faster than USB 2.0
- Up to 10 Gb/s data transfer bandwidth
- Boost the transfer rate between your PC and external storage devices
- Easy Button 3 - allows fast and easy reset and power up/power down of your system while overclocking. The buttons light up so you can easily find them in a dark environment
- V-Check Points 2 Lite - accurately monitors your voltages while overclocking and supports legacy and modern multimeters
- Debug LED - features a 2-digit LED for easy diagnostics and CPU temperatures
- Clear CMOS Button - is located on the rear panel so you can reset the BIOS without opening the case
- Slow Mode - helps defeat booting issues when overclocking at extremely high CPU frequencies. A switch temporary decreases the CPU ratio below stock settings, letting you boot to Windows
- Titanium Choke - uses a Titanium core that has a better ability in thermal as well as higher temperature tolerances. This allows it to run at 428°F / 220°C, have a 40% higher current capacity, a 30% improvement in power efficiency, and better overclocking power stability
- Dark Caps - feature an aluminum core design as well as provide lower Equivalent Series Resistance (ESR) and over a 10-year lifespan