Performance
For the most part overall performance benchmarks on a motherboard are more a formality than anything else. What we are looking for are numbers that don’t perform up to the average, in other words we are keeping an eye for any weird bugs that you might run into while using the board day to day. It’s hard to compare the numbers to any other boards because they are really based on the memory, CPU, and video card more than anything else (a little on the SSD as well in some tests). In the case of the Impact, there weren’t any of the benchmarks that stood out. Typically a Mini-ITX board will perform a little slower than the full ATX boards but as you can see this wasn’t the case with the Impact. Not only that it bested the MSI ITX board in almost every test as well. Not only that but the results below show that pairing the Impact with a GTX 780 and an i7-4770 is all it takes to put down kick ass numbers. For our LAN rig though that wasn’t enough for me. I will be running the Impact with an overclocked GTX 980 and an i7-4790K for a CPU to edge out even more performance.
3DMark |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
Overall Score 8714 Graphics Score 9784 Physics Score 11082 |
Asus Z97-A |
Overall Score 8715 Graphics Score 9777 Physics Score 11119 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
Overall Score 8578 Graphics Score 9744 Physics Score 10533 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
Overall Score 8572 Graphics Score 9726 Physics Score 10556 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
Overall Score 8660 Graphics Score 9795 Physics Score 11089 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
Overall Score 8698 Graphics Score 9836 Physics Score 11128 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
Overall Score 8690 Graphics Score 9773 Physics Score 11010 |
PCMark 8 |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
5133 |
Asus Z97-A |
5287 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
4469 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
4585 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
4712 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
4721 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
4951 |
Passmark |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
5186.1 |
Asus Z97-A |
5200.0 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
5057.8 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
5117.8 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
5064.4 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
5373.8 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
5160.0 |
Bioshock Infinite |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
106.54 |
Asus Z97-A |
110.74 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
110.28 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
111.36 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
108.35 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
110.28 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
111.02 |
Tomb Raider |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
57.1 |
Asus Z97-A |
57.2 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
58.9 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
57.3 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
56.8 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
57.1 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
57.1 |
Hitman: Absolution |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
45.8 |
Asus Z97-A |
46.7 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
47.2 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
45.6 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
47.3 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
47.1 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
47.2 |
Sleeping Dogs |
|
MSI Z97 Gaming 5 |
62.4 |
Asus Z97-A |
62 |
MSI Z97I Gaming AC |
63.2 |
MSI B85M Gaming |
62.4 |
MSI Z97M Gaming |
62.3 |
MSI Z97 Gaming 9 AC |
61.3 |
Asus Maximus VII Impact |
62.2 |