MSI X99A SLI Plus Motherboard Overview
79Today's video is a quick overview of my new motherboard the MSI X99A SLI Plus. I am using this motherboard for my new workstation build with a Xeon E5-2670 V3 ES plus 32gb Corsair vengeance ddr4 ram.
The board cpu and ram cost me £400, I took a slight risk buying an engineering sample processor. But I think this is less risk than buying the older E5-2670 V2, due to having to buy a four year old x79 mobo.
The x79 boards are rather expensive second hand with cheap ones having broken pins etc. When I cost both builds the x99 build was £30 more, comes with 4 more cores and much newer architecture.
Full motherboard specs:
CPU
• Supports New Intel® Core™ i7 Processor Extreme Edition for LGA2011-3 Socket.
Please refer to CPU Support for compatible CPU; the above description is for reference only.
Chipset
• Intel® X99 Express Chipset
Main Memory
• Support eight DDR4 DIMMs 2133/2200(OC)/2400(OC)/2600(OC)/2666(OC)/2750(OC)/3000(OC)/3110(OC)/3333(OC) MHz, up to 128GB Max.
- Supports Quad-Channel mode
- Supports non-ECC, un-buffered memory
- Supports Intel® Extreme Memory Profile (XMP)
Slots
• 4 x PCIe 3.0 x16 slots, support up to 3-way mode
- 1-way mode: x16/ x0/ x0/ x0
- 2-way mode: x16/ x16/ x0/ x0*, 16/ x8/ x0/ x0**
- 3-way mode: x16/ x16/ x0/ x8*, x8/ x8/ x8/ x0**
• 2 x PCIe 2.0 x1 slots
* For the CPU that supports 40 PCIe lanes
** For the CPU that supports 28 PCIe lanes
Multi-GPU Support
- Supports 3-Way NVIDIA® SLI™ Technology
- Supports 3-Way AMD® CrossFire™ Technology*
* Supports Windows 7 and Windows 8/ 8.1
On-Board SATA
• Intel® X99 Express Chipset
• 10 x SATA 6Gb/s ports (2 x ports compatible with 1 x SATA Express port)*
- SATA7~10 ports only support IDE mode and AHCI mode.
- Supports Intel® Smart Response Technology (Windows 7/ 8/ 8.1)
• 1 x SATA Express port*
• 1 x M.2 port, supports M.2 SATA 6Gb/s module* or M.2 PCIe module up to 32Gb/s speed**
- M.2 Key M Socket supports type 2280/2260/2242 storage devices in both PCIE Gen3 x4 & SATA mode
- M.2 port supports 4.2cm/ 6cm/ 8cm length module
- M.2 PCIe module does not support RAID 0, RAID1, RAID 5 and RAID 10.
* The SATA Express port or SATA5~6 ports will be unavailable when installing the M.2 (Gen2 x2 mode) module in the M.2 port.
** Intel RST does not support PCIe M.2 SSD with Legacy ROM.
USB
• Intel X99 Express Chipset
- 6 x USB 3.0 ports (2 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB 3.0 connectors*)
- 6 x USB 2.0 ports (2 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB 2.0 connectors)
• ASMedia ASM1142
- 2 x USB 3.1 ports on the back panel
• VIA VL805
- 4 x USB 3.0 ports on the back panel
* Internal JUSB1 connector supports MSI Super Charger
Audio
• Realtek® ALC892 Codec
- 7.1-Channel High Definition Audio
- Supports S/PDIF output
LAN
• 1 x Intel I218 Gigabit LAN
Internal I/O Connectors
- 1 x 24-pin AT x main power connector
- 1 x 8-pin AT x 12V power connector
- 10 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors
- 1 x SATA E xpress connector
- 1 x M.2 connector
- 2 x USB 2.0 connectors (supports additional 4 USB 2.0 ports)
- 2 x USB 3.0 connectors (supports additional 4 USB 3.0 ports)
- 2 x 4-pin CPU fan connectors
- 3 x 4-pin system fan connectors
- 1 x Front panel audio connector
- 2 x System panel connectors
- 1 x TPM module connector
- 1 x Chassis Intrusion connector
- 1 x Clear CMOS jumper
- 1 x Slow mode booting jumper
- 1 x Power button
- 1 x Reset button
- 1 x OC Genie button
- 1 x Multi-BIOS switch
Back Panel I/O Ports
- 1 x PS/2 keyboard/ mouse combo port
- 2 x USB 2.0 ports
- 1 x Clear CMOS button
- 6 x USB 3.0 ports
- 2 x USB 3.1 ports
- 1 x LAN (RJ45) port
- 1 x Optical S/PDIF OUT connector
- 5 x OFC audio jacks
BIOS
• The motherboard BIOS provides "Plug & Play" BIOS which detects the peripheral devices and expansion cards of the board automatically.
• The motherboard provides a Desktop Management Interface(DMI) function which records your motherboard specifications.
Form Factor
• 12 in. x 9.6 in. (30.5 cm x 24.4 cm) ATX Form Factor
Mounting
• 9 mounting holes