Product Showcase
Product Showcase
The MSI Z170A XPOWER Gaming Ti follows a standard form factor (30.5x24.4cm). The motherboard is located in the XPOWER Gaming range and is a high-end product within this new Skylake desktop processor range.
Check it out first, nice huh ? Included with the motherboard are the regulars including; manuals, driver CDs, SATA cables and a rear IO plate. It also has a couple of new features which we'll talk about in-depth in this review.
- CPU support: Skylake-S class Intel Core processors
- Chipset: Intel Z170 Chipset
- 1x Gigabit Ethernet (Intel)
- Storage:
- 8x SATA 6Gb/s Intel
- 2x M.2, PCIe 32 Gb/s and shared SATA Express ports x2
- 2x Sata Express also called SATAe
- Connectivity:
- 4x PCI-E 3.0 x16 (single at x16 / dual at x8 / tripple at x8 - x8 - x4 / quad at x8/x4/x4/x4)
- 3x PCI-E 3.0 x1
- USB 3.0 / 3.1
- 8-channel Audio ALC1150 Realtek
Included in the bundle is one interesting looking motherboard and gear like SATA cables, SLI connectors and so on. Nifty is the OC dashboard, a small OC panel PCB you can place outside the chassis
The I/O back panel reveals 3.1/3.0/2.0 ports. A Realtek ALC1150 high definition audio codec is the main source for audio. The audio unit has special noise reducing capacitors and EMI shielding. You will spot one 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet jack (Intel). Included is a PS/2 combo port for either a keyboard or a mouse, optical SPDIF out port and five audio jacks. If you plan to use the integrated IGP of the processor, you can make use of a DP or one of two HDMI connectors. The button to the left is a clear CMOS button. This motherboard unfortunately this motherboard does not come with a WIFI solution.
The board has 4 x PCIe 3.0 x16 slots which can be arranged in these slot configurations with graphics cards:
- 1-way mode - x16 / x0 / x0
- 2-way mode - x8 / x8 / x0
- 3-way mode - x8 / x8 / x4
- 3-way mode - x8 / x4 / x4 / x4
As you can see these are PCI Express Gen 3.0 configurations, that's plenty for regular graphics card setups up-to even 4-way SLI/Crossfire.
The motherboard comes with an 8-pin power connector and if you want to use it, another 4-pin as well. You'll get four DIMM slots that can be used for up-to 64GB of dual-channel memory. We use a new 3200 MHz kit from G.skill which we'll feature in detail in this review.
Back Panel I/O Ports
- 1 x PS/2 keyboard/ mouse combo port
- 3 x USB 2.0 ports
- * 1 x HOTKEY port
- * 1 x BIOS FLASHBACK+ port
- 1 x Clear CMOS button
- 2 x HDMI ports
- 1 x DisplayPort
- 2 x USB 3.1 Gen2 ports
- 4 x USB 3.1 Gen1 ports
- 1 x LAN (RJ45) port
- 1 x Optical S/PDIF OUT connector
- 5 x OFC audio jacks
And yes, even the backside has that Ti coloring going on. Here you can also clearly see an audio LED (red) trace running upwards.