Does the motherboard influence in game performance / FPS ?

[lenene10]

i have a MSI z87 g41 pc mate mobo, and im wondering if its worth changing to a gaming z97 motherboard in order to get better performance.

 

[Thineswar]

you will not notice a direct performance improvement just as you would buy getting a better gpu.
however, high end motherboards support better overclocking features, which, if you use, will result in better fps in games.
also, higher end boards have a host of other features, again, all of which will not give you a direct performance improvement, but will help you in getting the most of your system.

in your case, both boards have quite good support for overclocking.
also, the only difference between z87 and z97 chipsets is that z97 has support for sata express and m.2 drives. other than that, not much.
so, if you budget is a constraint, i suggest you don't get the new board just yet as what you gain is not worth the price of a new board.

 

[DasHotShot]

In short: indirectly (some allow better overclocks or more PCIe lanes for GPUs etc.)

Will you see a boost from a z87 to qa z97? VERY unlikely to almost certainly not!

The long answer is long, so to keep it short there is absolutely no point in upgrading if you want higher FPS as a result of using a different board. Upgrading would make sense for features, connections, extended SLI support etc etc etc a plethora of reasons that don't apply in your case.

Want more FPS? Overclock the CPU and GPU or tweak in-game settings by turning hard to notice details down and immediately gaining some FPS in return.

 

[lenene10]

Thank you for the answers. I don't plan to overclock, and I dont really need sata e and m.2 slots, but apart from that, if I sometime plan to change my cpu (now i have i5 4440) to a better one (i.e i7 4790), will I have to change mobo as well?

 

[icehowler]

If you want to upgrade to a newwer i7, like 6700 you will have to change your MB. Your i5 runs on 1150 socket but 6700 run on 1151 socket. Also this new platform support DDR4 which is why you would upgrade. It is more future proof. It is just a mater of time until developers will optimize games for DDR4.

When you are building a gaming PC I would not recommend the cheapest MB. I would go for a mid class one. That's because you would have better overall quality, protection from electricity spikes etc. Also, don;t buy the most expensive one if you don't plan to use it at maximum (OC etc).

 

[Thineswar]

since both of them use the 1150 socket, you don't NEED to.

 

[lenene10]

I have heard things like if I want to get a better cpu (for example an i5 4690 or i7 4770) I will have to update the bios because basically my motherboard isnt compatibile with them, however, a z97 would be, and with a z97 I wont have to risk. Is this true for my mo.bo. as well? Or i just buy the i7 and replace with my current cpu?
(By the way, if I have to update bios, is it really dangerous?) Thanks.

 

[Thineswar]

a bios update is never something that you HAVE to do when upgrading the cpu, although at times, you should.
in this case, pcpartpicker says that you may need to update it.
for your second question, it is not dangerous in the sense that your components will stop working or anything serious like that, but rather there is a slight risk of you losing all of your data. just make sure you've backed up your data and you should be fine.