What Z97 board to buy? 1150 Socket

[MikeyyGGGGG]

I want to buy a new MoBo and a decent one at that, I want to buy a Z97 board as they can handle the new type of cpu socket as well as the old ones (if im correct). I just dont know what one to buy as i will be overclocking so it needs to have a user friendly BIOS and i am not bothered about the other features as i will never SLI cards or need more data ports, it would be nice to have about 6 USB ports as i use quite alot of external gadgets . My price range is £100 ($150) and it needs to have a 1150 socket for my i5 4690k. Thanks, Mike

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

Here are 3 good ones.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97X-Gaming 5 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£106.76 @ Scan.co.uk)
Total: £106.76
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-05 21:57 GMT+0000


or


PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Motherboard: ASRock Z97 KILLER ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£111.59 @ More Computers)
Total: £111.59
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-05 21:57 GMT+0000


or


PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Motherboard: Asus Z97-A ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£110.39 @ Aria PC)
Total: £110.39
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-05 21:58 GMT+0000

 

[George Mulligan]

Deleted due to prior post.

 

[Tradesman1]

I'd go the Z97-A, great mobo, have 7 builds on it and all love their rigs

 

[synphul]

Many have said the new gigabyte bios is confusing but once I got into it, it really wasn't. Not sure about all their 'easy' click options, all I had to do was hit f2 and it took me straight to the regular old bios they've used for the past 6+ yrs. I've had pretty good luck with their ultra durable boards.

 

[PIEapple]

I prefer to pick MSI Z97-GAMING 5.Good for overclocking , have nice quality component and have 8 onboard USB ports.Good value you should go.

Motherboard: MSI Z97-GAMING 5 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£104.99 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £104.99
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-06 01:42 GMT+0000

Motherboard: MSI Z97-GAMING 5 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($146.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $146.99
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-05 20:53 EST-0500



Motherboard tier list: Z97 chipset

Tier One-Class B: Enthusiast Level. Premium featured MoBos with SLI capability, M.2 and enough power to run any current CPUs with very high-extreme OCing capabilities. Just a step lower than Extreme Enthusiast boards, they’re no less than feature laden. Solid quality, shall serve you long.


Z97X-Gaming 5 (not to be confused with MX version)
MSI GAMING 5
EXTREME6 (AC as well)
UD5H (BK as well)
Z97-PRO (AC as well)
MAXIMUS VII HERO/ RANGER/ GENE/ IMPACT/ FORMULA (great boards for OCing)
GA-Z97X-SOC
Z97 FTW
Z97X-Gaming 7
MSI GAMING 7
PROFESSIONAL
MPOWER (MAX AC edition as well)
DELUXE (NFC&WLC edition as well)
Gaming 9 AC (ACK as well)
Z97-GD65 Gaming
OC Formula (mATX version included)
PRO GAMER
Z97X-SOC-FORCE (no M.2, but great for OCing, has SATAe)
Sabertooth Mark1/ Mark 2 (no M.2, great for OCing)
G1 SNIPER (No M.2, but this MoBo hit 5Ghz mark stable in some reviews)
Z97 Gryphon

____________________________________________

Tier Two: High end. Great MoBos, SLI capable with good enough thermals and power to take up any CPU, not the best for extreme OCing but do OC very well. Have many premium features as well. Quality is good, no known persistent issues.


Z97X-SLI
MX-Gaming 5
G55 SLI
G45 Gaming
Z97S SLI Plus
Fatal1ty Z97X Killer (mATX included)
EXTREME4
Z97X-Gaming 3
UD3H (BK as well)
Z97-A
Z97M Gaming
Z97-E
Z97-AR
Z97S SLI Krait Edition
Extreme3 (no M.2)

Oscar @MeteorsRaining said:
MSI Gaming 5 uses higher quality components (primarily the capacitors) than Z97-A. That accounts for the higher rank.