MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final [Final Report]

The MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final event has been completed on Sept 28 - Sept 29, 2012. The competition has been won by Team_MPBK from Korea. On this occasion I will present a full report of the overall schedule of the MSI MOA 2012. Stating from the battle, hardware and benchmarks used, look around the Taipei city, and the last is OC Workshop

I will explain about the MOA contest first. MOA (Master Overclocking Arena) is the international computer overclocking competition which held by the MSI manufacture. In this competition, contestants will use MSI hardware product such as mainboard and MSI graphics card.

This competition is held annually, and has been held since 2008 till now. The 5th was held in 2012. MSI invites all overclockers worldwide through a variety of qualifications held prior to competing in the final MOA Championship. The winner of the match will be a world champion MOA. 

MSI claims that the MOA is the largest overclocking contest today and be the only competition that is in great demand by all overclockers in the world.

MSI MOA has a different theme every year, theme for this year is "Steel World". Before reaching the grand final, there are several online qualifiers held at 3 different regional, namely:

• American Qualifier(3 Tickets): April 13 - May 1, 2012
• EMEA Qualifier  (5 Tickets): May 18 - June 14, 2012
• APAC Qualifier  (4 Tickets): June 15 - July 12, 2012

MSI collaboration with Futuremark hold competition online LOC (Lord Of Overclocking) 2012, which prize got 3 tickets going to MSI MOA 2012 Grand Final. Total number of tickets to the grand final of MSI MOA 2012 as many as 16 tickets.

Contestants of MSI MOA Grand Final World Wide 2012

This is the list of contestants for the MSI MOA 2012 Grand Final after online qualifiers from April 13 to Aug 13 2012.

Total contestants MSI MOA 2012 there were 16 teams from 14 different countries. Indonesia participated in the final MSI MOA regularly. Indonesia has won this competition in 2008 through Indonesia overclocker named Ekky (Jengkol) and Alva (lucky_noob). This year, 5 overclockers from Indonesia joined the MSI MOA 2012 Grand Final, they consist of two teams that JagatReview.com - IRIS (Hendra Masli) & lucky_noob (Alva Jonathan), andJagatReview-Binus CE coldest (Hendra Wijaya) & bboyjezz (Jesse). And an other overclocker from Indonesia "Hazzan" joined with Rbuass from Brazil.

Here is a list of overclockers from Indonesia who have participated in the competition overclocked MSI MOA Grand Final.

Name	Participation
Ekky (Jengkol)	2008, 2009, 2010
Alva (lucky_noob)	2008, 2010, 2012
Hazzan	2009, 2010, 2012
Patar (Jabrigselalu)	2010
Hendra Masli(I.R.I.S)	2011, 2012
Hendra Wijaya (Coldest)	2011, 2012
Jesse (bboyjezz)	2012

There is a team from Greece, who missed attending the grand final. There are no known causes of absence, but from the information I've heard, there is a problem with their immigration documents.

OVERCLOCKING GEAR

The hardware that used in this competition using two products from MSI.  The MSI Mainboard BIG BANG-XPOWER II and MSI N680GTX Lightning Graphics Card, as well as using the Intel Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition Processor. And below is a complete list of the hardware used for the MSI MOA 2012 Grand Final WW :

Mainboard	MSI BIG BANG-XPOWER II
Graphics Card	MSI N680GTX Lightning
CPU	Intel® Core™ i7-3960X Processor Extreme Edition
Memory	Kingston® HyperX Genesis DDR3-2400 2GBx4
HDD	WD VelociRaptor® (WD1000DHTZ)
PSU	Thermaltake® Toughpower XT Platinum 1275W
Gaming Keyboard	Tt® eSPORT Challenger
Gaming Mouse/Mouse Pad	Tt® eSPORT AZURUES / PYRRHUS
Operating System	Windows® 7 Ultimate SP1 64-bit & Windows® XP Professional SP3

MSI Big Bang-XPOWER II
Mainboard MSI BIG BANG-XPOWER II is a premium X79 mainboard that is made specifically for extreme Performance. From the looks seen that this mainboard uses Military Class theme. Of course, this mainboard can be used for extreme overclocking, many important features that are embedded overclock on this mainboard.
Some key features mainboard MSI Big Bang-XPOWER II :

• Xtreme Standard
  Support 4-Way SLI / CrossFire with PCI Express Gen 3. And support by 8 slots Quad Channel Memory.
• Xtreme Power Design
  22 Phase PWM Design with Digital Power is capable of delivering a maximum of 770A power supply with two 8-pin connector for the CPU and a 6-pin to VGA.
• Xtreme Components
  This mainboard uses the highest quality components such as DrMOS II (MSI called Military Class II), Hi-c CAP, SFC and Solid Cap.
• Xtreme Overclocking
  This mainboard has some essential features for overclocking, like Direct OC, Easy Button 3, V-Check Points, Multi-BIOS II and PCI-E Ceasefire.

MSI N680GTX Lightning

N680GTX Lightning is the best graphics card in the world. With a label indicating the name of Lightning graphics card is a line of TOP graphics card MSI production. This graphics card is designed to unleash the full Performance of NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 GPU. MSI graphics card is also designed for overclocking. The graphics card is designed to break several world records. Many additional features MSI embedded therein.

Important features:

Unlocked Digital Power

Unlocked BIOS: One click to unlock all protections for extreme overclocking

Digital PWM Controller: More stable and precise voltage by digital signal

Enhanced Power Design: 2X Power output for maximum OC potential

GPU Reactor

• An add-on device on the back of the GTX 680 Lightning (Behind GPU) for the overclocking stability
• Provide 200% higher power capacity and power Eliminate noise (ripple)

Xtreme Thermal

• Dust Removal technology on Twin Frozr IV keeps dust out for the best thermal condition
• Dual Form-in-one Heatsinks provide better heat dissipation and Strengthen the structure

Military Class III Components

• Meet MIL-STD-810G standards to Ensure the best stability and quality
• Adopt CopperMOS, Hi-c CAP, SSC Golden, and Dark Solid CAP

During competition goes, MSI provides LN2 in large quantities used by the contestants to do extreme overclocking.

MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final (Sept 28, 2012)

MSI MOA 2012 WW Grand Final held on 28 September 2012, and located in the NTU Sports Center, Taipei, Taiwan. The same place holding grand final MOA years ago. The day before the competition started (27 September 2012) all overclockers have come and stayed at the Miramar Garden hotel, Taipei.

This is the location where the match of MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final. Participants depart from the hotel by bus which has been provided by the committee. Arrived to the venue, the competition opened by the opening ceremony, all participants are joining to the stage.

And then the show continued with a presentation about competition rules by Master judge, Tim 'T_M' Marshall.

The competition was divided into three stages with 3 different kinds of software benchmarks with a score of different compositions. And this is the schedule:

1. Task 1: Super PI 32M (10:30 to 12:30) (40% Weighted)
2. Task 2: 3DMark 03 (12:30 to 15:00) (20% Weighted)
3. Task 3: 3DMark 11 (15:00 to 18:00) (40% Weighted)

The biggest composition score is Super PI 32M and 3DMark 11. And sessions 3DMark 11 is the longest session in the match.

After all participants get the hardware, they headed for the table that has been set by the committee. And participants were given a few times to do assembly and tune their hardware before the competition starting.

Click to enlarge

Indonesia Team

JagatReview.com - Lucky_noob & I.R.I.S

One of my favorite team from Indonesia are among the most rapid in preparing their systems, Alva (lucky_noob) have begun to test the system, while the Hendra Masli aka IRIS was busy doing hardmod on MSI N680GTX Lightning graphics card for the preparation of the round 3DMark 03 and 3DMark 11.

JagatReview-Binus CE - Coldest & bboyjezz

This Indonesian team whose also pretty quick to prepare the system to be used for the first stage 1.5 Super PI 32M, while his teammate Jesse aka bboyjezz is preparing other mainboard for use as a second system when the first system they are in trouble.

Furthermore, all participants performed the first round of benchmarks Super PI 32M 1.5 for 2 hours. In the first half, HW Gurus Team (Montenegro and Croatia) became the fastest score. Score they gets is “6 m. 8.031 s”. At 2nd position is Team USA with different 1 second with HW Gurus result. For the third to the fifth position achieved by Team_MPBK (Korea), Team Mipmap (Australia), and ASD Crew (Poland). JagatReview.com team is in the 9th position, and JagatReview - Binus CE team is in 12th position.

There is change in position in the second round (3DMark 03), the Korean team (Team_MBPK) managed to be the first position. Formerly the Korean team in the first round in third place. HW Gurus Team who previously lead in the first half fell to second place, followed by Team USA, ASD Crew, and LAB 501. Tim JagatReview.com and JagatReview - Binus CE successfully riding position to position 8 and 9.

Until the third round ended (3DMark 11), Korean Team_MPBK continue to lead and become a winner MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final. Korean team (Team_MPBK) winning about 2% of Team_USA which is the second winner. Furthermore, the third position was occupied by a team of ASD Crew. 4 and 5 positions filled by HW Gurus and LAB501 (Romania).


From the beginning, it looks Team_MPBK (Korea) has a great chance to be a winner of this competition. They always get the high score until the end of the competition.


One of Indonesia Team, JagatReview.com finished sixth. At the last minute they seem to get in the top five, but it so difficult. Then the team JagatReview - Binus CE is in position 9. While other Indonesian overclocker 'Hazzan ' with teammate 'Rbuass' (Brazil) had hardware problems in the second half that led to them not produce a score, and finally they are in a position to 13.



Congratulations to Team_MPBK has been a winner of MSI MOA 2012. And I would also like to congratulate the Indonesia Team, JagatReview.com (IRIS & lucky_noob) get rank 6 and JagatReview - Binus CE (Coldest & bboyjezz) get rank 9.

VIDEO MSI MOA 2012
This is a video of MSI MOA 2012 Worldwide Grandfinal that I made myself. Let's see ..

City Tour & OC Workshop (Sept 29, 2012)

After the competition of MSI MOA 2012 has finished, MSI carry out events like City Tour and OC Workshop.

Schedule for the City Tour was held after breakfast at 08:30 am to 12:00 pm. This is an optional trip for the contestants. The destination of this trip going to Yang-Ming Mountain. The place is a mountainous region in the city of Taipei. It took about 1 hour to reach the destination. Arrived there, the temperature is very cold, 16 degrees Celsius. This region presents a beautiful and natural of the mountains landscape, and there is a crater that emit sulfur gases. After that we visited the different place, but still in Yang-Ming Mountain region.

At 12.00 the City Tour has been completed, the group back to the Miramar Garden Taipei hotel for lunch. After lunch they will be followed the OC workshop held at the 2nd floor of Miramar Garden Hotel.

OC workshop was attended by all participants of MSI MOA 2012, MSI staff and some media. There are 6 tables with a computer that is used to show OC Workshop. Hardware provided by MSI at the OC workshop is MSI Z77 Mpower and MSI N680GTX Lightning. The workshop participants were free to test the hardware, and the committee also provides LN2 extreme overclocking for testing.

The event was quite interesting, because the purpose of the event is to discuss about the MSI hardware directly with staff. With this event, MSI can get feedback on their products from the overclockers to test their hardware when OC Workshop. OC Workshop ends at 17:30, September 29, 2012 closed with dinner.

Finally has finished the event MSI MOA 2012 World Wide Grand Final which held on Sept 28th to Sept 29th, 2012. Thanks to MSI and all staff who have given me the opportunity to attend and join to the MSI MOA World Wide Grand Final 2012. This is my first visit to Taiwan. I have gained lots of experience here, like met with the other overclockers from around the world, and met with beautiful staff of MSI. I really enjoyed all the whole MSI MOA 2012 programs. Thanks to MSI, and hopefully I can back to Taiwan next year.

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