Introduction

It should, if you are a regular reader of our forums, be pretty obvious to you that MSI is not my most favorite brand. That's not to say they don't make good products; rather, my personal taste differs from what they currently offer, although MSI motherboards have made their way into many different builds I have had over the years. Recently, MSI made a big departure from the standardized designs they offered by introducing the yellow and black-colored MSI Z77 MPower I covered HERE. The Z77 MPower launched during a busy time for me, when I had product samples pile up in a tower that stacked higher than my head at my office, so I wasn't, to be completely honest, too keen on reviewing the board, and did mention this to my MSI contact. What he told me was a very confident "I'll send it to you anyway. I really trust you'll like this product, and I understand you're busy, so I will send you one anyway, with no review needed". I am of course game for a free board with no strings attached, so the board was shipped to me, arriving a couple days later. What was in the box impressed me enough to conduct a full review since I saw that what MSI was offering was definitely worth covering, offering an impressive package that immediately caught my attention.

I haven't heard much from MSI since then, but my phone rang one morning a few of weeks ago and on the line was my MSI rep. He was ready with another product that breaks the traditional mold, one so secret and so special that emails just weren't enough to get things arranged. MSI has carefully been crafting a new board in secret, with a new tale of design and a completely new look, all with a careful eye towards the discriminate gamer. Today, I am only covering the first product of this new line-up, and there will be more reviews of them in the days and weeks to come.

Hide your children and your wives! A Dragon has been unleashed!

Specifications

Intel Z77 Express Chipset

Intel's launch of their latest desktop platform in the first half of April 2012 began with board products. The Intel Z77 Express platform is an incremental upgrade from previous platforms. It adds additional features and provides a wider level of functionality with full support for the 3rd Generation Core i5/i7 family of CPUs commonly called Ivy Bridge in enthusiast circles.


Ivy Bridge CPUs are made using a new 22nm process technology that lowers power consumption and gives a bit more performance-per-clock over previous Intel 2nd Generation Core i5/i7 products. Also changed is the onboard GPU that's part of the Ivy Bridge silicon, now taking up more of that slice of silicon that sits under the integrated heatspreader.


The integrated PCIe bus on the CPU has also been upgraded. It can, compared to the two devices and PCIe 2.0 connectivity that are found inside Sandy Bridge products, be split differently from Sandy Bridge CPUs, with Ivy Bridge natively supporting three devices over a single bus with 16 lanes of PCIe 3.0 connectivity. Taking advantage of that added PCIe functionality requires a motherboard design change from previous Sandy Bridge-supporting motherboards. Backward and forward component compatibility for both Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge platform products, including CPUs and chipsets, is still possible with updated firmware for older Socket 1155 board products, but using a new Ivy Bridge CPU with an older P67 Express or Z68 Express motherboard may limit PCIe functionality. PCIe functionality would, naturally, with Sandy Bridge only supporting two devices, be limited. The tertiary slot provided on some Z77 Express boards will not work with some products when a Sandy Bridge CPU is installed.

Packaging

It was very obvious that the MSI Z77A-GD65 GAMING board is truly something different as soon as I opened the shipping container that the board came in, with a large black box sitting inside and a silver dragon emblazoned across the front. With just a dash of red here and there on the packaging, as well as very simple yet fully detailed feature explanations on the rear of the box, the Z77A-GD65 GAMING board's box was a treat to my eyes. I am not sure why the colors of red and black appeal to me so much, but given that the specific color combination is pretty prevalent on the market already, there must be some animalistic appeal in such designs. Very fitting, considering this here board does be a dragon!


The majority of products MSI gives out to reviewers are pre-tested before shipping around the globe to various tech sites, and my sample is no different. I found a sticker on the box front and one sealing the board shut in such a way that I had to remove it before I could open the box. When I did get it open, I found a certificate from MSI's "MTC" denoting how they tested the board.


As you can see, MSI's "MTC" didn't push this product very far. They used a very basic configuration, only testing the board with a low overclock of 4200 MHz. The certificate lists the full configuration used, score results, and not much else, but it was nice to see all of this information written in by hand. Ultimately, this is a useless exercise to me, since I test under much higher clocks while also using other hardware, so I tossed it aside, making a mental note to check other reviews to see if they simply copied the results shown here as their own test results.


Anyway, I found the MSI Z77A-GD65 GAMING board in the top half of the box, wrapped in an anti-static bag. Underneath of that were all of the included goodies, separated from the board itself by a cardboard divider.