MSI continues its military line-up of boards
with the Z77A-GD55
Continuing on with our "Ivy Bridge
Special", we have here with us MSI's Z77A-GD55, yet another of the
Taiwanese component maker's Military Class III motherboards.
Right off the bat, there's the standard 4
SODIMM setup, capable of quad-channel memory mode, six SATA ports, two of which
are SATA III, with the rest being SATA II. Two PCIe 3.0 ports make multiple
graphics options possible, with support for SLI and CrossFireX available to
use.
At the back, the Z77A-GD55 has six USB
ports at the back, four of them being USB 2.0, whilst the other two are powered
by SuperSpeed USB3.0. In terms of display connectivity, the MSI board offers
HDMI, DVI-D and also VGA, for ease of choice, an eSATA port and 8-channel HD
Audio ports round up the ports that are hosted at the back.
The Military Class III components make a
difference here. Utilising components such as Super Ferrite Chokes (SFC), Hi-c
Caps and Solid CAPs, you can expect things here to be more durable than other
standard-fare boards.
The tougher built appeals to the enthusiast
market surely, as is its ease of overclocking. The OC Genie II overclocking
feature is back, making overclocking our Core i7-3770K from its 3.5GHz base
clock to 3.9GHz immensely easy. The UEFI system here also allows for easier
voltage settings, the big draw is that it can be accessed in Windows as well.
This probably says a lot about its
performance, which doesn't disappoint. While not a great leap in benchmark
scores, the Z77A-GD5 does indeed reach a satisfactory mark and is definitely
something enthusiasts and gamers can look forward to.
MSI
Z77A-GD55
Price TBA
Info www.msi.com
Specifications
CPU Support: Intel Core Processor
CPU Socket: LG A 1155
Chipset: Intel 7.11 chipset
Memory Type: Quad Channel Memory
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Ratings
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Features
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Performance
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Cooling
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Comment
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(+) Easy overclocking features
Good performance
Military Class III components
(-) None
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