Need Help Picking Z97 Motherboard.

[MxPhenom 216]

In terms of boards, I can't recommend AsRock boards anymore after what happened to a buddy of mine. His Z87 OC AsRock board randomly just died, and he went to do an RMA, and they told him to pretty much F*** off and that they do not do RMA service or customer support for the consumer, and that he needs to go to where he bought it from for assistance. Mind you this was months after getting the board and usually most retailers would tell you to go to the manufacture, but he showed the email thread to Amazon and he was given a new board right away and system works without a problem now. Id go MSI or Asus at this point.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00K23BZVI/?tag=tec06d-20

The Gaming 5 has all the features you want.

Also stop being anti-MSI, they are not the same company they were like 8-10 years ago.

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

Yeah, basically the same board when it comes to it. The main differences I guess would be the slightly beefier VRM on the A (8 and fully heatsinked rather than 6 with 4 heatsinked phases) AFAIK they all use the same mosfets so overall quality should be similar, although maybe slightly lower on the E when it comes to pushing the upper limits on air/water. The E also only has one VRM for the RAM, the A has two, should not make too much of a difference though. The board layout on the A is a bit better with all the SATA ports angled and the full ATX size used so you are not left with the overhanging end. Rear I/O is quite similar apart from the A having optical audio. I think the audio chip is also better on the A, but I'm not sure.

I personally don't have much experience with MSi motherboards, but I was not particularly satisfied with my MSi GT60 gaming laptop, so I prefer Asus.

 

[newtekie1]

His Z87 OC AsRock board randomly just died, and he went to do an RMA, and they told him to pretty much F*** off and that they do not do RMA service or customer support for the consumer, and that he needs to go to where he bought it from for assistance.

Odd, every time I've had to deal with their customer support it has been very pleasant. I've had a few backs and forths with their techs via email and the one time we couldnt' fix the problem they offered to RMA it without hesitation. They did ask that I try to RMA through the retailer first, but when I told them I bought it at newegg and newegg won't deal with returns after 30 days AsRock handled the RMA without a problem. Of course I wasn't a dick about it either...

 

[MxPhenom 216]

Odd, every time I've had to deal with their customer support it has been very pleasant. I've had a few backs and forths with their techs via email and the one time we couldnt' fix the problem they offered to RMA it without hesitation. Of course I wasn't a dick about it either...

It didn't sound like he was either.

Yeah, basically the same board when it comes to it. The main differences I guess would be the slightly beefier VRM on the A (8 and fully heatsinked rather than 6 with 4 heatsinked phases) AFAIK they all use the same mosfets so overall quality should be similar, although maybe slightly lower on the E when it comes to pushing the upper limits on air/water. The E also only has one VRM for the RAM, the A has two, should not make too much of a difference though. The board layout on the A is a bit better with all the SATA ports angled and the full ATX size used so you are not left with the overhanging end. Rear I/O is quite similar apart from the A having optical audio. I think the audio chip is also better on the A, but I'm not sure.
I personally don't have much experience with MSi motherboards, but I was not particularly satisfied with my MSi GT60 gaming laptop, so I prefer Asus.

MSI Gaming 5 is 8 Phase.

Quote from @cadaveca review of the board

Between the two VRM coolers sits the VRM controller, a UPI Semiconductor product that controls the 8-phase VRM design. The DIMM VRM is a dual-phase part that is ready to provide all the power you need to push your DIMMs to the limit.

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/Z97_GAMING_5/1.html

Also VRM phase number doesn't seem to matter all the much with LGA1150 chips. You could overclock pretty well on just a 4+1 phase board. Overclocking mostly comes down to CPU and board BIOS.

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

VRM wise the MSi ones seem pretty decent. 8 ~30A mosfets is quite decent. The Z97-A is quite similar in maximum current output, but the VRM on the Msi Gaming 5 is actually a 4 phase PWM controller feeding the 8 mosfet stages through doublers. It should not make much practical difference, as the amount of ripple the VRMs make is negligible, the maximum current throughput is more important on Haswell.

That said, VRM phase count is not really a very reliable metric. The best example of this was Gigabytes Z87 boards, which were actually horrible over-engineered in the VRM department. They used 40 or 60 amp IR powerstages, which are some of the best quality driver-mosfet systems that exist for this kind of implementation. Four of the 40A parts is actually more than enough to get the most out of Haswell CPUs on air or water cooling. 4 60A parts would have been ideal in my mind, keeping the size of the VRM very small while providing a huge current throughput and good quality power. However if you look at a lot of the Z87 boards, they are all 8 or 16 phase boards, which is only going to be an advantage on LN2. Heck, the Z97-SOC force which along with the SOC are the only Z97 gigabyte boards that have IR powerstages, and the SOC Force only has 8 stages, but is a really great board under LN2.

The other Z97 boards from gigabyte are very underwhelming VRM wise. The SiRa 12 mosfets are 25A parts and they appear to overheat very easily, so they are both inefficient and suffer from poor manufacturing quality. Here a 4 phase design is nowhere near enough as even at 25A through each phase, which is quite hard to do, you are limited to 100A, which results in 180w or so of power available to the CPU. That's not nearly enough to push haswell. The 8 phase systems like the Z97X-Gaming5 (the GB not MSi one) is only just capable of similar performance to a 4 phase IR3553 VRM such as the H87-D3H and Z87-D3HP. On top of that the SiRa based VRMs appear to take up more board space than even the 8 phase IR ones, which is really crap TBH. If I was in Gigabyte's management I think I would have looked for a 4 phase with IR3550s or 6 phase with IR3553s for the Gaming5, because that seems like a better balance between performance and price.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

VRM wise the MSi ones seem pretty decent. 8 ~30A mosfets is quite decent. The Z97-A is quite similar in maximum current output, but the VRM on the Msi Gaming 5 is actually a 4 phase PWM controller feeding the 8 mosfet stages through doublers. It should not make much practical difference, as the amount of ripple the VRMs make is negligible, the maximum current throughput is more important on Haswell.

That said, VRM phase count is not really a very reliable metric. The best example of this was Gigabytes Z87 boards, which were actually horrible over-engineered in the VRM department. They used 40 or 60 amp IR powerstages, which are some of the best quality driver-mosfet systems that exist for this kind of implementation. Four of the 40A parts is actually more than enough to get the most out of Haswell CPUs on air or water cooling. 4 60A parts would have been ideal in my mind, keeping the size of the VRM very small while providing a huge current throughput and good quality power. However if you look at a lot of the Z87 boards, they are all 8 or 16 phase boards, which is only going to be an advantage on LN2. Heck, the Z97-SOC force which along with the SOC are the only Z97 gigabyte boards that have IR powerstages, and the SOC Force only has 8 stages, but is a really great board under LN2.

The other Z97 boards from gigabyte are very underwhelming VRM wise. The SiRa 12 mosfets are 25A parts and they appear to overheat very easily, so they are both inefficient and suffer from poor manufacturing quality. Here a 4 phase design is nowhere near enough as even at 25A through each phase, which is quite hard to do, you are limited to 100A, which results in 180w or so of power available to the CPU. That's not nearly enough to push haswell. The 8 phase systems like the Z97X-Gaming5 (the GB not MSi one) is only just capable of similar performance to a 4 phase IR3553 VRM such as the H87-D3H and Z87-D3HP. On top of that the SiRa based VRMs appear to take up more board space than even the 8 phase IR ones, which is really crap TBH. If I was in Gigabyte's management I think I would have looked for a 4 phase with IR3550s or 6 phase with IR3553s for the Gaming5, because that seems like a better balance between performance and price.

Haswell does not consume that much power to begin with, 180w should be enough to take a decent Haswell chip to 4.4-4.6. Which is the average for Haswell overclocking anyways.

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

180w is the theoretical maximum power, I would be surprised if you could get decent voltage stability at 70% of that. From what I've seen from boards like the Z97x-SLI that is probably a decent guess.

My 4790k draws around 130w at 4.44GHz (101x44) which needs 1.22 volts or so on the core, the Vin is the default of ~1.7v. I have not pushed the CPU past that speed yet, but to get to the upper end of 4 GHz you are looking at 1.35v. Power consumption goes as P=fCV^2 (frequency x capacitance x voltage squared). Capacitance is an arbitrary constant as the chip is the same, and we can just work off our 130w figure.

So let's say 1.35v 4.9GHz.

110% the clock speed (calculated as 4.9/4.44)
111% the voltage (calculated as 1.35/1.22)

(1.35/1.22)^2 * (4.9/4.44) = ~1.3513

So the power is approximately 135% of the original not counting potential losses in the IVR or the iGPU which was not used, although might be active in the case of rendering a stream using quicksync.

135% of 130w is 175w

Remember that this is a very artificial scenario using only theoretical numbers, but the theory works relatively well in practice, at least once you take into consideration that the benchmarks used in this case are quite artificial and do not represent a realistic workload for most usage scenarios.

The important fact that holds is that the 4 phases of SiRa12s are simply insufficient for a good overclocking board.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

The way you guys bloviate over meh boards is amusing.

Your arrogance is not amusing...

 

[Schmuckley]

Here's the boards to overclock 1150 on:
Gigabyte z97x-OC Force
AsRock z97 OCF
Maximus VII Gene

Good Luck finding one for $150 or less.
It can be done, though

 

[newtekie1]

If you aren't using extreme cooling, if your only using air or an AIO or even a custom loop with a single 120 or 240 rad, the motherboard will make pretty much no difference in the final 24/7 overclock. That is why everyone(that knows what their talking about) said the Extreme3 is just fine for overclocking. The decision after that comes down to features.

I mean, I'm using an Extreme6, which uses the exact same power delivery setup as the Extreme4, and the best I can do is 4.6GHz on my 4970K. I'm held back not by the motherboard, but by my H100i. The board is capable of more, if I run the delta fans at 100% to keep the temps in line I can easily go to 4.9GHz before I'm again held back by my H100i, but the computer sounds like a jet taking off. The OP is only using an H60, it has a thin 120 rad, and is about as good as a tower style air cooler.

That is why everyone says the motherboard doesn't really matter for overclocking Haswell. You are almost always going to be limited by cooling, not by the motherboard. The OP is using an H60, if some people would bother to actually read the OP's post and actually pay attention to his needs, they'd realize absolute maximum overclocking potential that will only make a difference under extreme cooling doesn't matter one bit in this situation.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

If you aren't using extreme cooling, if your only using air or an AIO or even a custom loop with a single 120 or 240 rad, the motherboard will make pretty much no difference in the final 24/7 overclock. That is why everyone(that knows what their talking about) said the Extreme3 is just fine for overclocking. The decision after that comes down to features.

I mean, I'm using an Extreme6, which uses the exact same power delivery setup as the Extreme4, and the best I can do is 4.6GHz on my 4970K. I'm held back not by the motherboard, but by my H100i. The board is capable of more, if I run the delta fans at 100% to keep the temps in line I can easily go to 4.9GHz before I'm again held back by my H100i, but the computer sounds like a jet taking off. The OP is only using an H60, it has a thin 120 rad, and is about as good as a tower style air cooler.

That is why everyone says the motherboard doesn't really matter for overclocking Haswell. You are almost always going to be limited by cooling, not by the motherboard. The OP is using an H60, if some people would bother to actually read the OP's post and actually pay attention to his needs, they'd realize absolute maximum overclocking potential that will only make a difference under extreme cooling doesn't matter one bit in this situation.

Not only the cooling, but quality of the chip is the main thing for Haswell.

 

[MxPhenom 216]

but..but..must have m.2 and SATA express
I wouldn't buy AsRock because they have basically no warranty.
I had one fail and it took out everything except RAM.
RMA denied.
That and I like to run 2666 CAS 9 at times.
No way Extreme 3-6 will do that.

It could if you do it right and your chip has a solid IMC.

MSI Gaming 5 has m.2 and SATA express.

 

[Eric_Cartman]

You know Schmuckley, I've asked you to either post something helpful or leave.

You have yet to even suggest a board that I can even use.

Even if I didn't want M.2 and SATA-e, the boards you suggested don't have the features that I actually do need.

So if you are just going to keep arguing just to argue, leave because you've crapped my thread enough.

 

[RCoon]

Here's the boards to overclock 1150 on:
Gigabyte z97x-OC Force
AsRock z97 OCF
Maximus VII Gene

Good Luck finding one for $150 or less.
It can be done, though

There are many many more than that. If all you're going to do is recommend those 3 boards and stonewall everything else. You're in the wrong thread and it would probably be worthwhile to move on.

 

[Schmuckley]

points I'm making:
AsRock=bad RMA
MSI..pretty much the weakest of VRM setups.
Asus good
Gigabyte good...not a fan of the BIOS.
For overclocking..I would want a strong board.
Why could you not use an Asus z87 PRO or Maximus VI Hero,or z87x-OC?
or the z97 Biostar board for that matter..
All of them will run a 4690K.
You might like the AsRock Extreme4
Asus PRO series,or Gigabyte is stronger and would overclock better though.
..even the Biostar would.

There are many many more than that. If all you're going to do is recommend those 3 boards and stonewall everything else. You're in the wrong thread and it would probably be worthwhile to move on.

Allow me to rephrase:
Those are the only boards to do any real overclocking on.
as in subzero.

 

[Tatty_Two]

Please keep things both civil and on topic, any more deliberate trolling in here will raise even my patience levels to bursting point, thank you.

 

[stevorob]

@Eric_Cartman

I'd definitely recommend looking into the Asus z97 boards... if you're looking to spend under $150, the Z97-A and Z97-E both have the features you're looking for (SLI, sata exp. and M.2), and are both solid overclockers (like I said, I'm getting 4.7 on my 4690k+Z97-E and it didn't take much work at all).

Those are the only boards to do any real overclocking on.
as in subzero.

Pretty sure that @Eric_Cartman isn't concerned with subzero OCing... doesn't appear to me that he's looking to break world records on a $150 motherboard budget.

 

[Eric_Cartman]

Update: I went with the AsRock Extreme4.

Overclocked the 4690K to 4.2GHz on all the cores.

However, I'm a little disappointed with the H60 because anything beyond 4.2GHz and the processor gets so hot it throttles.

But hey, it is way faster than my FX-6300 was.

I'm thinking I might pick up a small SSD and try the caching thing Intel has with my WD Red hard drive to try to speed up booting and game loading.

Newegg has some good deals on refurb SSDs...