# Which Motherboard?: MSI Z77A-G45 vs GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD3H



## vawrvawerawe (Nov 11, 2012)

MSI Z77A-G45 - on sale $99 normally $130
GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD3H - $165

Considering the sale, which would you buy?


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## BarbaricSoul (Nov 11, 2012)

been extremely satisfied with my GD80. Considering the price difference, most definently MSI


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## xxdozer322 (Nov 11, 2012)

i currently have the g45 and its a damn sexy board for the price, when i first got it was 165 over at frys, but the price matched newegg for 120, soo it was a steal.


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## vawrvawerawe (Nov 11, 2012)

BarbaricSoul said:


> been extremely satisfied with my GD80. Considering the price difference, most definently MSI



Thank you. What is the difference between the two in terms of features? Is there anything in the Gigabyte one that would be worth paying 65% more?


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## BarbaricSoul (Nov 11, 2012)

The Gigabyte board has one more PCI 1* slot than the MSI board. The MSI board has one mSATA connection while the Gigabyte board has none. Other than that, I don't see a difference in features.

Also, some food for though. The highest Intel IB overclock in 3dmark11 was done with the MSI MPower board.



> The latest world record by T0lsty is the highest CPU speed for any 3rd generation Intel Core CPU in 3DMark 11 @ 6213 MHz (validation).



http://www.techpowerup.com/174864/MSI-dominates-3DMark-11-Performance.html


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## xxdozer322 (Nov 11, 2012)

theyre basically the same. The 2 msi pcie slots run at 16x while the gigabytes slots run at 16x and 8x


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## vawrvawerawe (Nov 11, 2012)

From what you guys are telling me, I should basically definitely get the MSI one.
The only thing I could tell is different, is:

MSI: 2 USB 3.0
Gigabyte: 6 USB 3.0
--- verdict: Extra USB 3.0 is not important to me.

Gigabyte has one more PCI 1x slot
--- verdict: the only PCI things I will be using are the Wireless card and Graphics card. So this benefit is useless to me.

Extra Features:
Both have different names, but overall, it seems to be pretty even.
--- verdict: not enough knowledge to know if one is better than the other.

Overall, it's looking like the MSI is a steal!


@xxdozer: I looked at your system specs, and it's very similar to what I want in my system. So if you are happy with the MSI Z77A-G45, then I will be too!


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## xxdozer322 (Nov 11, 2012)

trust me you will, i went from an amd build to this, and i couldnt be happier! cheers! and for the price its THEE PERFECT deal.


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## cdawall (Nov 11, 2012)

xxdozer322 said:


> theyre basically the same. The 2 msi pcie slots run at 16x while the gigabytes slots run at 16x and 8x



If both slots are populated they will run at 8x on both motherboards.


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## xxdozer322 (Nov 11, 2012)

ahhh ok, im still new at this lol


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## vawrvawerawe (Nov 11, 2012)

cdawall said:


> If both slots are populated they will run at 8x on both motherboards.



Good to know!
Would this mean if I added also a PCI wireless-n card, that it would lower PCI graphics performance?


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## xxdozer322 (Nov 11, 2012)

nopeeee. youre good.


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## cdawall (Nov 11, 2012)

vawrvawerawe said:


> Good to know!
> Would this mean if I added also a PCI wireless-n card, that it would lower PCI graphics performance?



There is no PCI slot on the MSI board.







A PCI-E 1x or USB based card would work fine. Neither will change the performance.


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