The MSI Z87M Gaming has got as most micro ATX motherboards a total of six SATA 6Gbps ports at the end user's disposal, all natively controlled by the Z87 PCH Chipset. Naturally Intel Smart Response Technology, Intel Rapid Start Technology and Intel Smart Connect technology are supported; RAID support ranging from RAID 0/1/5/10 by the Intel Z87.

Two e-SATA ports can be found on the back I/O panel; both are controlled by the integrated ASMedia ASM 1061 chipset and are supporting transfer speeds up to 6Gb/s.

The red BigFoot KillerNIC LAN port is easily distinguishable on the back I/O panel. Hooked up to the BigFoot Killer E2205 network processing unit (NPU) it should allow you to game online with less lag. The included software bundle is a bit complex to setup. Though once properly dialed in the end user can e.g. prioritize bandwidth for gaming purposes. In theory all this is fine, though having experienced a lot of issues during the initial months of playing Battlefield 4 online it really makes me wonder. Wasn't it a better option to have chosen for a more simple but fully functional and cheaper Intel NIC solution? However brands tend to follow trends and the Killer NIC is finding its way even into the Gaming laptops...

For the rest we find on the back I/O Panel a combined keyboard/mouse port, 2 USB2.0 ports, a clear CMOS button, a total of six USB 3.0 ports, from which four are controlled by the Z87 Express chipset and two via a Renesas UPD720202 chipset. Two HDMI ports and one display port supporting a max resolution of 4096x2160@24Hz. Finally one optical S/PDIF port and the six audio jacks.