MSI Shows Gold PCB Motherboard at CES- Plus Three Others

At CES, MSI announced four new motherboards divided between the Skylake LGA 1151 and the Haswell-E LGA 2011-3 sockets.

Three of these motherboards are targeted at enthusiasts and share many features including support for USB 3.1 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) connections, M.2 ports and steel plated PCI-E slots. These boards also feature support for Audio Boost 3 and Nahimic Audio Enhancer 2, which can simulate surround sound audio from a 2D source.

I tried try Nahimic Audio Enhancer 2 on one of the new MSI laptop and while from from a true test of the system, I found the software to be a promising tool for gamers and movie watchers.

The X99A Godlike Gaming Carbon and one of the Skylake Z170 motherboards, the Z170A Gaming Pro Carbon, also feature MSI’s Mystic Light technology that allows you to customize the color coming from the motherboard’s LED lights.

The lower-end motherboard in the group is the MSI B150M Gaming 3X, which is targeted at gamers but uses a lower-end B150 chipset and doesn’t possess an M.2 port or a third-party controller chip for USB 3.1 Gen 2. This board still stands out, however, because MSI opted to make the PCB a gold color, which is easily noticeable in the ocean of motherboards with black PCBs.

At post time there isn’t information we can share on pricing or availability for these motherboards.