MSI Z77A-G45 Thunderbolt LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard with UEFI BIOS

Pros: Freakin awesome looking!

Best bios setup I've ever seen

All solid cap's

Ram is overclockable to 2800mhz if needed

LED CPU phase indicators are a plus

Military Class III

Extremely well built

Cons: None as of yet!!

Other Thoughts: At first I was a bit skeptical about switching to an MSI motherboard from my usual Asus boards. I'm glad I did and plan on buying another MSI board for my upgrade in the future.


Rig

Apevia X-DREAMER4 Case
Core i7 2600k at 4.5 ghz
Cooler Master 212 Evo
16gb G.Skill ram at 1600mhz
GTX 660 Ti 3gb
1TB WD VelociRaptor 10K RPM HD
Thermaltake 600w PS

Pros: Very fast even with the free 'standard' RAM that newegg added as an incentive to buy this MB.

Good entry MB into higher RAM quantities (>4gb) plus many other features. I should be able to upgrade this gradually as I either need to or want to for years to come.

Cons: Having an issue getting my wireless Logitech Keyboard/Mouse combos (K520 and K360) to work with this MB. Using the 'front' USB ports it just behaves erratically; reads a single mouse click as two when selecting windows, shortcut icons, etc. If I switch to a wired USB mouse no issues. Also installed the drivers/software from Logitech and same issue.

I also installed a brand new AMD Radeon HD 7850 and still trying to figure out the best settings for this MB and that Vid Card.

Other Thoughts: I don't particularly care for the BIOS UI, but hey that's me, just a bit old school.

Hopefully I can return to the review and update it. I bought this in Feb 2013, built it in March, but have had little time to really test it out. Hopefully something I can get to now.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

We apologize for the issues that you are having with this product.
Please try updating the BIOS to the latest version 2.A and see if it helps with the issue.
http://www.msi.com/product/mb/Z77A-G45.html#/?div=BIOS

If problem persists, of if you have any questions, feel free to get in touch with our tech support team directly at 626.271.1004 for assistance during regular business hours from M to F, 9am to 6pm Pacific Time.
Or you can email us at usreview@msi.com, thank you.

Best Regards,
MSI Review Team | usreview@msi.com

Pros: Great board and i like the bios. I don't have the proper cooling yet but when i do i'd like to run the smart overclock that come pre-installed. Ran it once and it is very simple,but my stock cooler can't handle the heat.

Cons: none so far.

Other Thoughts: Very happy with the board. If your considering it pick it up.

Pros: Motherboard installed like any other, came with nice new sata cables turned on and ran as expected. I am using it with the Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz item number N82E16819116502, and it runs excellent, also have a nvidia 560ti video card on it with 8gb of ram item number N82E16820233218

Cons: Anyone who gave this a bad review is just naive and clearly is trying to get much more out of something that cant process miracles.

Other Thoughts: Battlefield 3 takes too long to download.

Pros: Has Thunderbolt port

Cons: Bad DIM slot, refuses to boot when there is memory in dim #3. The owners manual shows to use dim 1 and 3 for dual channel mode. It will only boot with 2 x 8gig sticks when using dim 1 and 2. Swapping memory sticks makes no difference. Boots fine with either stick in slots 1 or 2. I was planning to get 2 more sticks for a total of 32 gigs but either I'm stuck at 16gigs with no dual channel mode or go weeks without the board getting it RMA'ed.

Other Thoughts: My last MSI product, Twin Frozer card had issues with the fans failing early. had to use aftermarket cooling. This will be my last MSI buy. The quality just isn't there anymore.
Previous purchases include P6N-SLI and P7N-SLI motherboards that had no issues. But that was 5 years ago. Cost cutting quality has loss this long time buyer.

Manufacturer Response:

Dear Valued Customer,

We apologize for the issues that you are having with this product.
Can you reseat your processor? And inspect the socket pins while the processor is removed?
Please also try testing the same memory module on each slot to verify.

If you have any questions, feel free to get in touch with our tech support team directly at 626.271.1004 for assistance during regular business hours from M to F, 9am to 6pm Pacific Time.
Or you can email us at usreview@msi.com, thank you.

Best Regards,
MSI Review Team | usreview@msi.com

Pros: Works exactly as it should.

Cons: Annoying blue LED on the top, stupid BIOS interface.

Pros: Works great, plenty of slots and hookups. Running it with an i5 Ivy Bridge 3.4Ghz chip and 16 gigs of Corsair Vengeance memory and it runs everything with no issues at all. Even looks cool under the blue lights through the window. Highly recommend!

Cons: can't think of any

Pros: good motherboard and works well

Cons: Watch out for the combo case that it comes with. I did not look at and just assumed it went with the motherboard, it is the wrong one.

Pros: Price. Has all the majors that come alone with the Z77 chipset. PCIe 3.0, USB 3.0, SATA 3.0. And it all comes in at a VERY reasonable price. Looks clean, pretty good layout.

Cons: No SLi bridge comes with this board. Glad I had a few laying around but they're Asus ones so if I were a bit more picky about things I'd be mad that my bridge doesn't match the board. Also...kind of wish there were more than just 2 SATA 3.0 ports. I can set up my RAID 0 but then all I have left are SATA 2.0 ports. OC genie seems to be a little iffy on what it will remember after a restart and the in OS programs "ClickBIOS" and "Control Center" don't always want to work.

Other Thoughts: Good board. A few little things here and there but for the price I'm still satisfied

Pros: Love the UEFI BIOS. Good Price. Plenty of Ports. Great layout EXCEPT......

Cons: SATA plugs are not upright, but rather turned 45 degrees to the outside of the MOBO. Made it VERY DIFFICULT to use with my hard drive bay in place. Had to modify my HD bay and move it an inch closer to the fan :-( One egg. Other than that, great board.