About time they moved the CPU socket to the middle instead of keeping it right next to the PCI-E slot on their ITX boards.

The M.2 slot is on the rear of the motherboard? I wouldn't have expected enough clearance for it but I guess a good way to cram more features onto a small board. Wonder if we will see others follow the idea.

Damn and I thought the ‘MSI Z97I Gaming’ I bought in the summer was optimized for gaming ! Well i'm happy with what I have just now and can wait for the next chipset. Hopefully the features will now be a minimum standard on the MSI ITX gaming boards.

I'd rather have intel NIC than Killer. Other than that it looks pretty spot on.

Kanoe - I've got an ASUS mini-ITX motherboard and it have the M.2 slot underneath it as well (think they was the first to do this?) - more details here: http://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards/Z97IPLUS/

Looks a great board. When is it being released?