[No More Help Needed] MSI Z97S SLI Krait Edition Motherboard - Honest Thoughts & Ownership

[Geekazoid]

Hi guys,

I've been trying to decide between two motherboards and I might end up going with the said motherboard, but I would like to know everyone's honest thoughts on it, and if you own it, how have you found it?

My reason for going with the MSI Z97S SLI Krait Edition Motherboard is because of the fact that I'm going for a black and white themed build, but I'd hazard a guess that that's quite obvious considering the colour scheme of said motherboard.

Thanks in advance for your help guys.

Geekazoid

[Fulgrim]

The only thing it has going for it is it's colour scheme.

 

It's more of a budget board tbh.

 

Ol' TinyTimLogan did a review of the ATX version of it a while back.

 

http://www.overclock3d.net/reviews/cpu_mainboard/msi_z97_sli_krait_motherboard_review/13

[1Scotty1]

I have the Krait and wouldnt change it in the world Check my log if you want

[JAKEBAB]

It looks like a decent board, the only thing that bugs me about it and is kind of a buzzkill for me at least is the legacy pci.

[Skrizzles]

Some people hate on this board for two very minor reasons 1. it isn't ASUS, 2. it is inexpensive.  I have the z97 sli plus which basically the same thing. Its great. Zero problems. MSI utilities are useful and not PIA bloat ware. PWM fan headers are well placed allowing easy access no matter where you mount fans/pumps. LGA 1150 socket kinda limits choice for cpus, but it supports haswell, and overclocks easy and stable.

 

The only difference between this board and mine is the sli plus has a third gpu slot(pci express 3.0). Which I kinda have second thoughts about, because of the law of diminishing returns. The performance increase from 2 gpus in sli to 3, is not as great as the increase from one gpu to two in sli. The only reason I didn't buy the krait is "Blue on Black" was playing while I was shopping, so, yeah....moving on.....

 

Bottom line: MSI has been making military class 4 hardware since the 90's, Asus only got on that train a few years ago. Most of the boards out there that say things like "gaming", or "hero", or "ranger" or "some other non-sense characteristic for a motherboard", really have few differences from a "value" board like this and should be renamed to "shameless money grab" edition. LMG did a video on this. Super simple bios center, one-button overclocking if you want to use it(I haven't), one button ram overclocking with xmp(i use this), and the glorious fast boot(oh yeah, i use this). Go for it, you won't be disappointed.

[Tetters]

After using a nightmarishly bad Asrock board previously, I switched to an MSI this last build and have been completely happy with it. I have found it to be well built and very dependable. The Command Centre is a little redundant and to be honest, doesnt seem to work very well (i.e. it will tell me there are newer drivers, I let it install them and then it cant see its updated the drivers. As second gripe about the CC is that it seems to have difficulty installing drivers sometimes). Other than the CC issues, I am more than happy and my next build will pretty much be on an MSI unless something horrific happens with them in the near future.

[max_n_cheese11]

I have it and it works great. I have had no problems, it has all the ports on the back I need, it looks cool, and matches my system. You should be fine, but if you have the money consider a Z97 Sabertooth because

1) It's ASUS

2) It's more white, and you can always paint the thermal shield. I wish the Krait was more white; it has too much black.

[Geekazoid]

Thanks guys, for your help, I think, though, that I've decided to not go with the MSI Z97 Krait Edition motherboard. I think that I'd rather stick with Asus motherboards since a lot of users seem to have them, Linus himself prefers them and overall I just think their motherboards are better quality, IMHO. But, once again, thank you. Your help was and is greatly appreciated.