The MSI Z77A-G43 is one of their entry series boards based on the Intel Z77 chipset. The choice to design this version must be applauded, as usually low end range motherboards are equipped with H77 or even B75 chipsets. Nothing bad with the latter two, but they limit big time the features that the Ivy Bridge CPU's stands for. No multiplier overclocking, no high RAM clocks, no Intel Smart Response Technology supported, just to name a few.

When we look at the mainboard, it's pretty obvious that MSI had to trim down on some of the features we usually find on other far more expensive Z77 chipset equipped mainboards. Focusing at the socket area it's a nice addition to see two blue heatsinks being installed. Even though the Military Class III Components are being used and them being designed to withstand high operating temperatures, it's something that puts most consumers more at ease. Next to the top heatsink we spot the 8 pin CPU power, again a bonus instead of the more common 4-pin versions being used on low end series.

 

 

 

 

No plastic push-pin mounting system on the Z77 series, MSI uses screws all around, to secure the three cooling heatsinks. The 5 phase power circuitry might look underdesigned, but is more then suitable to provide secure voltages for a decent daily overclock.

 

 

 

 

 

The S-ATA connectivity is basic, meaning we will not find any 3rd party chipset for extra SATA, nor eSATA ports. One of the ways to go if you drastically want to reduce the cost. It's really a shame that these SATA ports are in an upright position, this again represent a cost reduction method. If only the two white S-ATA 6GB/s ports were at a 90° angle, it would have created less chance of interfering with large graphics cards.

 

 

The slot design is again basic, with support for older legacy cards via three PCI slots. Two blue coloured PCI-Express slots are installed, the top supporting PCIe 3.0 at x16, the bottom one only supports PCIe 2.0 x4 speeds. No NVidia SLI licence, but AMD/ATI Crossfire is supported.  Finally two PCIe 2.0 x1 are available.

 

 

The back panel got the most vital components onboard. A PS/2 keyboard/mouse combo port, 6x USB 2.0 and 2x USB 3.0 ports. A Gbe lan port powered by a Realtek RTL8111E chipset. The Audio chipset is also from Realtek, namely the ALC 892, supporting 8 channel audio with jack sensing. Three display ports: a HDMI, VGA and DVD-D port got you covered.

 

To summarize: you get full functionality of the Z77 chipset allowing multiplier overclocking of your K skew CPU and high RAM speed dividers. Due to the entry level class nature of the G43 board, the NVIDIA SLI functionality is disabled. Crossfire with two graphics cards ( 2 x X8 PCI-e 3.0 ) however is supported. And another advantage over the H77 chipset, is that the Z77 chipset supports the Intel Smart Response Technology for SSD caching.

MSI relies on it's Click BIOS, as an overclocker I'm not a real fan of this, but for small interventions it's quite okay. However for big voltage jumps and co the scrolling becomes annoying.

The board alike most MSI board has got three main modes to select from: ECO mode for maximum power saving. Standard mode for the user to fiddle with everything at his disposal. The OC Genie mode automatically overclocks the setup.

 

 

 

 

In the settings tab all the integrated peripherals with eg. AUDIO and LAN function, HDD modes (IDE, ACHI & RAID) and co are selectable.

 

 

   

   

In the overclock tab the various settings are available to adjust multipliers, RAM dividers and timings to boost your system performance. Sadly the voltage settings and chosen increments are sometimes a little on the minimalistic side. The latest 2.4 BIOS enhances the VCore increments drastically.

 

   

     

 

Let's see how the this entry level MSI Z77-G43 fairs against the competitors boards. Our test setup comprises out of the following hardware :

• Intel i7-3770K ES CPU at 4500Mhz
• 16Gb G.Skill RipjawsZ 2133c9-11-10-27 1T (XMP profile)
• Nvidia GTX480 290.62 drivers
• Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB HDD
• Corsair 850TX PSU

Now why run the CPU overclocked ? This is done to avoid discrepancies between board manufacturers that either stay loyal to the Intel rules regarding the Turbo function or others that trick the Turbo into a single speed for all cores. Secondly it's an extra test to see if each board can keep our ES 3770K stable at 4500Mhz during the entire test suite. The 16GB of G.Skill memory also give a little bit more strain on the IMC ( memory controller ) as the four banks are being used. For the RAM  timings, we only set the main timings of 9-11-10-27, command rate 1T at 1.65Vdimm. All the second and tertiary timings are set by the bios. This allows us to get an idea how tight or loose them timings are programmed by the bios engineers.

Note that the two listed ASUS boards have been tested with very early BIOSes and results can vary.

As usual we are starting off with two tests that are being used at HWBot. SuperPi 32M is a single threaded ram related test, that depends heavily on RAM bandwith and timings. Wprime 1024 is a raw CPU test. Stressing all the cores thoroughly. Any weaknesses in Vcore or such will be imminent visible.

 

 

The little MSI Z77A G43 isn't fastest board out of the bunch. It's in fact a tad slower then the rest of the competition. Nice to spot in synthetic benchmarks, yet in real life conditions the end user will hardly notice the half a second difference in SuperPi 32M, nor the slowest result in WPrime 1024. If we look at the AIDA bandwith test the board is settling amongst the other boards, typical behaviour when we test motherboards based on the same chipset. BIOS refinements/optimisations make or break the board in these synthetic runs.

 

 

 

AIDA Photoworxx, relying heavily on the memory subsystem shows a similar outcome as the SuperPI 32M. The G43 scores just below the expected standard performance. But as stated before, during daily usage you hardly will notice the fewer percentages in performance. Cinebench continues in the same trend, while it's younger CB11 brother shows the Z77A-G43 right where it should be.

 

 

 

 

Fritz 12 Deep Chess test and X264HD encoding test continue on the same pace. The cheapest board in the line-up scoring average in the bench suite.

 

 

 

Most low end boards are bundled with a minimalistic amount of accesoires, nor the includion of 3rd party chips on the PCB, to reduce the costs as much as possible. Usually the BIOS features are very rudimentary too. What we are especially missing are first of all the voltages for the CPU memory controller, which could be important when running high specced RAM kits. Of course you can start the discussion wether or not this is a real requirement as hardly anybody buying a cheap ass board will invest in a 400 dollar RAM kit. True, but sometimes it can be the difference between running eg. 4 DIMMS stable or not.

In our case we tested the G.Skill dual channel TridentX 8GB kit running stock at 2666MHz C11. Due to the lacking voltage settings we couldn't get these stable without loading the XMP profile. If we loaded the G.Skill XMP profile, the rig booted right up and passed the HyperPi 32M at 8 threads without any hickups.

 

 

XMP profiles have been heavily discussed between manufacturers and it's enthusiast end users. Imagine running an older kit based on PSC or BBSE rams. Your socket 1155 board dies and you opt for eg for this MSI Z7A-G43 motherboard. You might have to settle with running your 2133MHz kit at 1866 or worst case scenario at 1600MHz. It will all depend on the RAM kit, quantity ( 2-4 DIMMs ) and your CPU's IMC. My 2600K needs a small bump in voltage to stabilise it 2133MHz.

 

 

 

For our CPU overclock we didn't push hard as the board only allowed up to add with one bios version to +0,06. With latest 2.4 BIOS version we have access to +0,16 volts wich is far more acceptable. Keep in mind that the CPU Vcore voltage has a significant droop/drop. Even with the low +0,06 we were just able to keep our i7-3770K at 4500MHz. More than suitable for most demanding applications you can throw at it and the G43 has been running at them speeds for over a week now without any hickups.

The OC genie function also works on the light side. MSI opted to not go with BClocking nor RAM dividers adjustments. Just a small boost up to 39X multiplier. Once we enabled the XMP RAM profile we were stuck at 37X multiplier.

 

 

Both screenshots are done with prime95 running the small FFT test ( 8 threads ): on the left with XMP and OC Genie enabled, on the right without XMP and the setup is running a tad faster. Another thing the MSI bios team has to look into.

The MSI Z77A-G43 leaves me with a mixed feeling. It's one of, if not the the cheapest Z77 chipset based motherboards out there. Secondly it has what it takes to run a daily 4500Mhz stable clock. But the performance, especially when the CPU get's fully loaded is a bit less then other motherboards equipped with the same chipset.

When running stock, the Turbo function is not up to the same standards to what it's competitors use. However our test suite is always run overclocked to exclude such BIOS implementations. Yet the performance is sometimes very puzzling, not that it will be a big deal in daily usage. It's not like games will become unplayable because you opted to go for this MSI board. However take into consideration that the performance difference, in worst case scenario, can rise up to 10%. MSI is looking into it and hopefully a new bios version will raise the performance bar.

 

The overclocking performance for a budget minded board was more then adequate. Running an Ivy Bridge quad core CPU at 4500mhz is more than suitable and might even be overkill for the users that will buy these types of motherboards, hence why we forgive the choice of the MSI bios team to cripple the VCore adjustments.

RAM clocking is more than suitable IF your kit has got a decent pre-programmed XMP 1.3 profile. Due to the lack of some bios settings/voltages it's hard to fine tune for stability. Same remark though as for the CPU overclocking part, most end users will end up installing 1333 or even max 1600MHz DIMMs. So we have to pardon the board again.

All in all the MSI Z77A-G43 has remained a very stable board during our test period. The price is more than right at 97 euros. Especially since it has got close to full functionality of the Z77 chipset. No cutbacks have to be made regarding daily overclocking, not even at this price level.

The G43 might be the perfect choice for your budget oriented setup, being it with or without any overclocking requirements. This MSI Z77A-G43 has got you covered. If you are looking for more speed or features then it's better to opt for a more feature rich board, not only on the hardware side but also on the BIOS part. If MSI could tweak the BIOS to unleash a little extra performance then this board would be highly recommended for budget restricted computers. For now, we award the G43 board with the Madshrimps Value award.

 

PROS:

• price tag sub 100 euros
• Z77 chipset
• mild OCing potential supported

 

CONS:

• BIOS needs performance tuning
• upright S-ATA ports

 

Thanks to Koen from Mystar for the G43 review sample.