Msi z270 sli plus review in Spanish (full analysis)

Although AMD Ryzen fashion will continue for a few weeks, we continue to review motherboards for the recent Intel Kaby Lake. This time we have had the MSI Z270 SLI Plus in hand, which seems to be one of the most appealing options thanks to its 159 euros. You want to know more? Don't miss our review!

We thank MSI Spain for trusting the product for its analysis:

MSI Z270 SLI Plus Carbon technical characteristics

Unboxing and design

The MSI Z270 SLI Plus It is presented in a very minimalist box, where a black background and silver letters stake. Is MSI already giving us a preview of where the shots will go?

On the back they indicate all the most important technical characteristics of the motherboard.

Once we open the box we find the following fairly basic bundle:

MSI Z270 SLI Plus motherboard . SATA cable set Rear hood Instruction manual and quick guide CD with software

As we can see, it is an ATX format board with dimensions of 30.5 cm x 24.4 cm for the LGA 1151 socket. The board has a silver color design and a matte black PCB. It incorporates the latest Z270 chipset that is compatible with all Intel Skylake processors and the recent Intel Kaby Lake. Specifically, it supports both Intel Core i7, i5, i3, Pentium and the basic Celeron. Another advantage is the possibility of incorporating Intel Xeon processors.

Rear view of the motherboard, for the most curious.

The MSI Z270 SLI Plus features two zones with cooling: power phases and one for the Z270 chipset. All its components are armored with Military Class technology. For the most clueless, this technology offers improved components. For example: power supply phases, chokes, capacitors of better quality than the rest of the most basic range… thus offering greater stability to the entire system.

It has a total of 10 digital power phases that will allow us to get great performance out of our processor. Not to the performance of the Xpower but to satisfy 97% of users.

The board incorporates a total of 4 64 GB compatible DDR4 RAM memory sockets with frequencies from 2133 MHz to 3800 MHz in Dual Channel and is compatible with the XMP 2.0 profile.

The MSI Z270 SLI Plus features a basic but sufficient layout of its PCI Express connections. It has three PCIe 3.0 to x16 slots and another three normal PCIe to x1. The two PCI Express 3.0 to x16 incorporate a shield that better cushions the graphics that are so heavy that they exist, while in the RAM memory sockets they help to improve the transfer.

The motherboard offers compatibility with Nvidia and AMD graphics cards . In the case of Nvidia it allows us to connect two graphics cards in SLI, while with AMD in CrossFireX up to 3 graphics cards.

As expected, it incorporates an M.2 connection to install any SSD with type 2242/2260/2280/22110 format (42/60/80 and 110 mm). As we have already discussed, these devices are very fast and have a bandwidth speed of up to 32 GB / s.

The Realtek ALC1150 integrated sound card with 7 channels. It incorporates Audio Boost 4 technology. Among its improvements we have better sound quality through the use of premium quality audio components with 8 channels.

RGB lighting takes on more importance in this new generation of motherboards. MSI specifically relies on Mystic Light technology with 16.8 million colors. What areas does it light up? Both the area of the rear connections, the sound card and the heatsink of the motherboard chipset. The result is great!

Regarding storage, it has six 6 GB / s SATA III connections with RAID 0.1, 5 and 10 support and no SATA Express connection . In the image we see a somewhat atypical design, and personally quite ugly. I don't think MSI had much trouble leaving the 6 SATAs in the same position… What do you think of this peculiar design?

Finally we detail the rear connections of the MSI Z270 SLI Plus. They are made up of:

1 x PS2.2 x USB 3.0.1 x DVI.1 X USB 3.1 Type C and Type A.1 x Gigabit LAN. 4 x USB 3.0. 7.1 channel sound output.

Test bench and tests

TESTING BENCH
Processor:	Intel i7-7700k.
Base plate:	MSI Z270 SLI Plus.
Memory:	Corsair Vengeance 32 GB DDR4.
Heatsink	Corsair H115.
HDD	Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB.
Graphic card	Nvidia GTX 1080.
Power supply	Corsair AX860i.

To check the stability of the i7-7700k processor at 4500 MHZ and the motherboard we have stressed with Prime 95 Custom and air cooling. The graphics we have used is an Nvidia GTX1080, without further delay, let's see the results obtained in our tests with a 1920 × 1080 monitor.

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BIOS

The BIOS maintains the same format as in previous generations. The modification possibilities are easy to predict and its operation is very simple. As always, it comes very complete, since it allows us to customize the speed of the fans, monitor all the connected components and change any essential equipment option. We really like this new BIOS!

Final words and conclusion about MSI Z270 SLI Plus

Although the MSI Z270 SLI Plus is not the flagship of MSI, it is one of the most interesting options that the market currently offers us. Its 10 digital power phases, its Military Class components, Audio Boost sound card and a stable BIOS are its main cover letter.

For example, we can mount 64 GB of DDR4 RAM at 3800 MHz, an i7-7700k with overclocking, a multi-GPU SLI / CrossFireX system in 2 Way (2 units) and activate its interesting Mystic lighting system with RGB lights with 16.8 millions of colors.

We recommend reading the best motherboards on the market.

We would have liked to see the M.2 Shield incorporation in one of its two M.2 NVMe connectors, but it has been reserved for the Gaming series. It also incorporates a boost in PCI Express connections and DDR4 memory modules.

The mid-range plate has rather little and the renewed design in black / white color we love. If we would have liked it to incorporate a greater number of SATA connections and its distribution is quite rare, right?

The price currently in online stores is 159 euros. A fairly attractive price and that most users will see with good eyes.

ADVANTAGE	DISADVANTAGES
+ PERFECT BLACK / SILVER DESIGN.	- IT COULD INCLUDE 8 SATA CONNECTIONS AND THE PRESENT 6 HAVE A LITTLE AESTHETIC DISTRIBUTION.
+ MILITARY CLASS COMPONENTS.
+ DOUBLE M.2 NVMe CONNECTION.
+ REINFORCEMENT IN MEMORY SLOTS AND PCI EXPRESS.
+ IMPROVED SOUND.