MSI MPower Max Box Shot
If you answered "yes" to those questions, MSI’s MPower Max board should be on your short list. This full-size ATX board is loaded with features that should please overclockers and system tweakers, including onboard buttons for overclocking and booting directly into the BIOS, and a second, spare BIOS, so you don’t have to worry about a bad update bringing down your system.
The MPower Max also has one of the most impressive and practical collections of accessories we’ve seen to date bundled in a motherboard box, including seven SATA cables, two expansion-card-slot plates for adding ports to your rig, and a removable wireless module and antennas that add Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0, and Intel’s WiDi wireless display technology.
The MPower Max is built around the Z87 chipset (much more on that in a moment) and supports Intel's Socket 1150. Socket 1150, for those unfamiliar with it, is the new CPU interface mandated by Intel's 4th-Generation Core i processors, which rolled out in early June. You may have heard these chips referred to by the name "Haswell," Intel's code-name for them during their development. (See our review of the first of these chips, the Intel Core i7-4770K.) Anytime a new socket emerges, the major motherboard players fire up the production lines, and whole new families of boards spring up to support the new processors.
MSI Z87 MPower Max Angle View
In MSI's case, the initial releases comprised a mix of boards built around the Z87, H87, and B85 chipsets, with the full-featured Z87 boards being the flagship models. Within the Z87 mix, MSI rolled out several mainstream-focused boards, as well as premium MPower and XPower boards and a couple of snazzy, dragon-themed Z87 Gaming boards. (You can check out the whole line of MSI U.S. board products here.) The MPower Max we're looking at here may not be MSI's top of the line, but it's an impressive board for upper-end upgraders nonetheless.
Of course, all these features don’t come cheap. When we wrote this, the MPower Max sold for about $260. Still, it's all relative, Other Z87 boards we've looked at, with arguably lesser feature sets and more limitations, such as Intel’s DZ87KLT-75K and Asus’ Z87-Deluxe, sell for about the same price or more.
That makes MSI’s MPower Max an excellent choice for high-end enthusiasts who want a kitchen-sink list of features, a comprehensive set of accessories, and a battery of overclocking tools, as well as decent value despite the enthusiast positioning. Few builders or upgraders will need or use everything this board has to offer, but it’s nice to know the features are there, especially when you don’t have to pay extra for them relative to the competition.
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