Otherwise, it’s relatively basic with no shroud over
the rear I/O and very modest aluminium heatsinks
on the chipset and power delivery sections.
The I/O lacks USB Type-C, but it offers four USB
3.0 and two USB 2.0 ports. It’s also the only board
in this test to have gold-plated audio connections.
MSI makes a big deal about audio-grade capacitors
but the audio here isn’t really all that high-end.
Elsewhere there’s just one M.2 slot, and no other
significant extras of which to speak, such as a POST
readout or power button. As such, this makes for
one of the least feature-rich boards in this test.
But then, it’s cheap but still uses the Z370
chipset so it offers excellent performance and the
option of overclocking. It effortlessly overclocked
our processor to 4.9GHz, giving us a few extra FPS
in games and a significant 12% boost in Cinebench.
Other than its lighting this is about as barebones
as a Z370 motherboard gets but if you
only need the basics along with
overclocking support it’s worth a look.STACKEDUP
PRICE (£) CINEBENCH R15
Not Overclocked
OverclockedGAMING AVERAGE FPS
Not Overclocked
Overclocked5
75 %
12345NoYe sYe sNoYe sCPU overclockingESSENTIALS
56866USB Type A11010USB Type CD-Sub,
DisplayPort, HDMIDVI, HDMIDVI, HDMIDVI, DisplayPort,
HDMID-Sub, DVI,
DisplayPortVideo outputsNoYe sNoYe sNoRGB lightingHARDWARE
Group Test
5MSI Z370 GAMING PLUS
The MSI Z370 Gaming Plus is a board that opts for a
popular red and black colour scheme. Red LEDs shine out
from the underside, providing a way of illuminating not
just the board, but the whole inside of your case, too.
123454 117ASRock Fatal1ty H370 Performance14061406
114114130Asus ROG Strix H370-F Gaming14071407144Asus TUF Z370-Pro Gaming14081570
115117117Gigabyte Z370 Aorus Gaming K314071560119MSI Z370 Gaming Plus1580
1171410
113114114116117