The best mid-range Skylake motherboard (LGA 1151)

The new Skylake CPUs demand a new family of chipsets, which finally pave the lanes wide for serious I/O performance. The 170 chipset blurs the lines between Intel’s extreme and standard platforms with plenty of positive results for gamers and enthusiasts, although X99’s higher prices have rubbed off a little, too.

MSI Z170A Gaming Pro 

MSI continues its winning streak in a shocking upset victory over ASUS with the Z170A Gaming Pro, a just-right mix of style, features, and price that resets expectations for motherboards under $150. Matching the more expensive ASUS Pro Gaming in features but beating it handily in price and current firmware stability, MSI seems to have a better grip on Intel’s new chip set than the competition, at least in this segment.With a $130 street price, the Z170A Gaming Pro almost qualifies as budget hardware but delivers an experience well beyond.

With a $130 street price, the Z170A Gaming Pro almost qualifies as budget hardware but delivers an experience well beyond the modest asking price, with full-speed M.2, 14 USB ports including a pair of 10 Gb/s 3.1 connectors, enhanced ALC1150 audio, and a fully adjustable Mystic Light LED array along the right edge of the motherboard.

 Memory support tops off at a lofty 3600 MHz, but more relevant are stable, standard XMP profiles, a feat ASUS is still having trouble implementing, many BIOS revisions after the release of its competing Z170 Pro Gaming board.

Intel v219 LAN is provided for network connectivity, along with protection circuitry to prevent voltage spikes from traveling along the Ethernet line and frying the port. In fact, much of the board’s construction reflects MSI’s newfound commitment to component quality and reliability. Only time will tell in that regard, but all the visible choices such as heavy soldering, reinforced PCI slots, high-quality caps, and titanium chokes indicate improvements that should pay off down the road.

 Short Specifications

1. Supports 6th Gen Intel® Core™ / Pentium® / Celeron® processors for LGA 1151 socket
2. Supports DDR4-3600+(OC) Memory
3. DDR4 Boost: Give your DDR4 memory a performance boost
4. USB 3.1 Gen2 2X FASTER: USB 3.1 Gen2 offers performance twice as fast as a regular USB 3.0 connection
5. Turbo M.2 32Gb/s + Turbo U.2 ready + USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-A + SATA Express 10 Gb/s

Source By: http://www.pcgamer.com/the-best-gaming-motherboards/