MSI X99A Tomahawk Motherboard Review

Final Thoughts
So what is the Arsenal Gaming Series from MSI all about? Well with my experience with the X99A Tomahawk it gives you everything you would want on the X99 platform without all the extras that we see on many other motherboards. This allows MSI to bring in the X99A Tomahawk at an attractive price point as well. Right now you can pickup this board at our favorite online retailer for only $226.99. That puts it in serious competition with ASRock’s X99 Taichi.

So what do you get with the X99A Tomahawk? It is a fully-featured X99 motherboard so you have support for 3-way graphics, 32 GB/s M.2 and U.2 connections, plenty of SATA ports, USB 3.1 gen 2, great overclocking features, on-board power and reset buttons, a clear CMOS button on the rear I/O and so much more. I think those are the main features people are looking for and MSI has got them covered quite well.

The two main things someone might point out with the X99A Tomahawk that are missing is that 4-way graphics is not supported and there is no WiFi. If you really need 4-way graphics you are not going to find an X99 motherboard at this price that supports it. Also with NVIDIA really pushing at most 2-way graphics 4-way is something only certain people are looking for. Also the wireless can easily be remedied with a USB or PCI-Express card.

One thing I really like about this board is that it does not have all of the bling (RGB LEDs) or gimmicks that other boards have. Those are some of the extra things on boards that drive up the price. If you do want some RGB effects with this board you do get the RGB header.

When it comes to overclocking there are multiple ways to overclock this motherboard. If you are a novice you can use the Command Center’s or BIOS’s Game Boost function. You can also use the MSI Gaming App, which will actually overclock both your CPU and graphics card (if its an MSI card). Then finally you can do manual overclocking in the BIOS. MSI’s Click BIOS 5 is very easy to work in and keeps on getting better and better.

If you are looking for a fully-featured X99 motherboard the MSI X99A Tomahawk is a great choice. Again it will give you all of the features you need, without all of the extras you don’t need. Again, it comes it at a very affordable price of $226.99 at our favorite online retailer. Overall ThinkComputers gives the MSI X99A Tomahawk a 9 out of 10 score and our Recommended Award!

Award 9 out of 10 Award Recommended

Pros:
– 32 GB/s M.2 and U.2
– Supports 3-way graphics
– Easy to use BIOS
– Lots of overclocking options
– Power and reset buttons on the board
– Clear CMOS button on rear I/O

Cons:
– Might be too plain for some
– Does not support 4-way graphics
– No WiFi

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