Maybe getting old :smile: but this time around I find picking up a motherboard rather confusing. There are a lot of reviews, good reviews, but at the end of the day, too technical in nature rather than utilitarian for the average Joe (me). Difficult to sort out an Asus Extreme and Sabertooth. Same in the Gigabyte or MSI lines of products ! I'm looking for a Z87 for a  4770k :

 

- easy to o/c, I will target  the 4.3/4.5 range, not interested to test the chip limits. More interested by a well defined tutorial and procedural path.

 

- easy to install a quiet cooling equipment (I'd rather have liquid, never had one and want to try)

 

- a very good sound chip to which attach a good sound system (2.1 I guess not sure to go to 5.1, I'll see)

 

I will attach one high end  Nvidia videocard (780, not going sli), one high end monitor  (maybe more if I get reasonable fluidity), at least joystick, yoke, pedals, throttle.

 

Not sure about Bluetooth (link to tablets, Smartphones and keyboard ) and integrated wifi.

 

Price is not an issue, within reason.

 

Thanks for any clues

Hi Domkie,

 

For what it's worth I'm very happy with my Z87 MSI MPower board.

 

It''s nice to deal with in bios, has plenty of features and I've been able to achieve what I set as a minimum overclock on my 4770k of 4.5Ghz fairly easily. It's also got some good BIOS fan controls too for setting up profiles you want etc.

 

It has one of the better integrated sound chips (based on alc1150) which I've been using for the time being even though I have a Xonar Essence STX. A high end dedicated sound card will always be better in my view though.

 

This board does have inbuilt wifi/bluetooth which I haven't made use of yet, but if your not interested in those features there's also the MPower-SP which as far as I can see is identical but doesn't have the bluetooth/wifi.

Once you get above a certain price point (about $139), all motherboards become very similar when it comes to pure performance and overclocking potential. With Haswell, the limit is not the motherboard, it's the chip itself and the temperature when overclocked.

 

Any extra heat-sinks on the motherboard, gaudy color schemes, Super-Duper Flux Capacitors™ with Digital Stability Control™ or endorsements by D0rk G4m3r 2000 are totally meaningless marketing gimmicks. If you're only going to run one video card, you also don't need a PLX chip, which is usually a feature of the more expensive motherboards.

 

That said, since you specially mention good on-board sound, maybe look into the MSI Z87-G45 Gaming. 

maybe this guide will help you to pick the best for your needs:

 

http://www.simforums.com/forums/the-fsx-computer-system-the-bible-by-nickn_topic46211.html

 

and for detailed safe overclocking:

http://www.simforums.com/forums/haswell-48ghz-on-air-building-a-haswell-system_topic46180.html

+1

 

I went with the SABERTOOTH Z87 for my Haswell build. I am very happy with it so far.

Almost the entire board is covered with Protective armor that also acts as a channel that small fans mounted on the board blow cool air through.

 

The author of the Guide uses the same board :lol:

I went with the ASUS Z87 Pro. Worked as advertised right out of the box.

I went with MSI's G45 Gaming board. Running 4770K, 2400 GSkill Trident X, normally at stock but stable @ 4.4. Didn't try higher ... that is enough for me. Apart from Wi-Fi this board would more than adequately meet the OP's needs. Most learned souls agree with JimmiG's precis. All Z87 motherboards seem well featured, attractive and more than capable of running HASWELL to its limits.

 

As several have concluded, including Tiny Tom Logan and Linus, buy cheaper than expected and put the savings towards a 780.

Getting back to it after some RW business a bit far away from home :rolleyes:

 

Thanks guys for the very valuable hints in the thread so far. Some more Qs. According  to your own experience :

 

Do you think that an  eSATA port is needed ?

 

How many PCIe  3.0 x16,  PCIe 2.0 x16 , PCIe 2.0 x1 are reasonably needed ? 

 

 

How many PCIe 3.0 x16, PCIe 2.0 x16 , PCIe 2.0 x1 are reasonably needed ?

 

You have to be careful here and do your homework and unless you are a tech it can be confusing. It is important to remember that certain combinations of ports share bandwidth so for example if you have a GTX 780 at 16x in one port not all boards will support another one at 16x in another so your second GTX 780 might be only running at 8x. That's just an example but you get the idea. personally I would not bother with SLI unless I was using multiple monitors.

Asrock extreme6 here. Very pleased with it. Its all about the chip, mine does 4.4 @ 1.28, not comfortable in pushing it further. All major makers have good mobos for over 130.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk 2

You have to be careful here and do your homework and unless you are a tech it can be confusing. It is important to remember that certain combinations of ports share bandwidth so for example if you have a GTX 780 at 16x in one port not all boards will support another one at 16x in another so your second GTX 780 might be only running at 8x. That's just an example but you get the idea. personally I would not bother with SLI unless I was using multiple monitors.

Thanks Dave, I was rather familiar with computers some years back  but didn't update much my knowledge in the recent 4/5 years.  

 

I've not yet decided to go SLI or not. Where do you see, in the specs, whether a board would support two 780 at x16 or one at x16 and one at x8 ? And about doing homework :wink:  do you have a link with some tutorial on that issue ?

+1

 

I went with the SABERTOOTH Z87 for my Haswell build. /.../

The author of the Guide uses the same board :lol:

 

A good point :smile:  giving an edge to the Sabertooth

Any board you are considering download the users manual form the manufactures web-site before you buy and review the detailed specs. if you are building a dedicated FSX system then forget about SLI altogether unless you intend to use multiple monitors. The is a hardware guide here on AVSIM but I took my lead for Nick Needham's guide on Simforums: http://www.simforums.com/Forums/haswell-48ghz-on-air-building-a-haswell-system_topic46180.html

 

Its a long read but well worth it.

I just recently had a new custom computer built, and went with the ASUS Z87-Deluxe motherboard: I wanted the best motherboard I could afford (it was the motherboard that failed in my previous computer); I also needed WiFi, which is on-board (instead of a separate card, along with Bluetooth), and this motherboard has better on-board audio than what you get with all but the most expensive sound cards. Even though I had to pay a special order fee, it was still much less expensive than if I had gotten the default motherboard (a Sabertooth), and added a WiFi card, and a Sound card. Here's a review of the Z87-Deluxe.

I've not yet decided to go SLI or not. Where do you see, in the specs, whether a board would support two 780 at x16 or one at x16 and one at x8 ? And about doing homework do you have a link with some tutorial on that issue ?

 

Running SLI with both slots at 8x you will not see any tangible difference in real world use to if they were both running at 16x. There may be 1-2FPS in it at most. So I wouldn't worry about this at all if I were you.

 

If you were going to be running more than two cards then it may be something to consider, but then you'd most likely be wanting to go with an X79 system in that scenario.

One thing I forgot to mention with MSI's gaming boards ... they feature an mSATA slot making for an especially neat case install if that's your thing.

 

They also feature one button overclocking via their "OC Genie" facility. Easy as.