A smarter, albeit costly solution is to provide a stand-alone shielded breakout box accessory for the front headphone and microphone so the fidelity is not compromised as it is going out. The bold inclusion of a beefed up front DAC was an interesting move but the issue I had with this is that even if noise and distortion is not present in the processing and output stage on the motherboard, the front panel cable, PCB and output on typical cases are not optimized for high-quality output. This flagship gaming motherboard is more of a statement from MSI to other manufacturers and enthusiasts of how creative and cutting edge they can get. That would have been easier from a technical aspect and from a marketing aspect, but that did not seem to be the goal of the Z97 Gaming 9 AC. The safe bet would have been for MSI to make a separate audio card and bundle that with the Gaming 9 AC, which will also allow them to sell that component separately as an optional upgrade. I understand that there is also the reality of production costs and profitability when it comes to motherboard design where sometimes those compromises are a necessary act of cost-effective measure for the project to make sense economically. The downside when you try to be many things to many people however is that inevitably, compromises have be made somewhere because pleasing everyone is impossible.
Even in the software front, the bundled 6-month X-split premium license is incredible value for any gamer wishing to broadcast, especially considering other companies offering the same deal provide a month or two of premium license at most. At the same time, it also provides several overclocking features shared with its MSI OC-series cousins such as on-board buttons, voltage check points, CMOS reset, dual-BIOS switch and slow mode jumper. It is ambitious in design incorporating the most advanced non-discrete front-panel audio ever integrated into the same motherboard PCB as well as having bundled an Intel-based m.2 via PCI-E Wi-Fi AC/Bluetooth module. The MSI’s Z97 Gaming 9 AC is an all-in-one top end solution that seeks to elevate the gaming lifestyle beyond the conventions set by standard motherboards. « Sub-System Benchmarks (Audio, Storage, Network, Gaming)įinal Thoughts about the MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC Motherboard