Now that Intel's 8th generation Core processors (Coffee Lake) are available, it would not surprise us to see an increase in deals for previous generation Z270 motherboards, as they don't work with Coffee Lake. That means you can build a high-end system around Kaby Lake at a lower price than before. Case in point, MSI's Z270 Gaming M7 is available for $130 at Newegg.
That price is after a $40 mail-in-rebate. You'll also need to apply promo code EMCSBCBJ2. So, there are a couple of hoops to jump through. The reward for doing so is a pretty nice discount on a feature-rich motherboard with a $250 list price. Granted, it's sometimes on sale for $190, as it is now at Amazon and Newegg (before the rebate offer and promo code), though a price history shows it averages around $216.
The Z270 Gaming M7 supports up to 64GB of DDR3-4000 (OC) memory. It also has three PCIe 3.0 x16 slots, three reinforced PCIe 3.0 x1 slots, six SATA 6Gbps ports, three M.2 slots, a single U.2 port, Killer E2500 LAN, and a decent selection of USB 3.1 and 2.0 ports (seven total, including a USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C port).
As an added bonus, the listing shows a free gift from MSI, a PCIe Wi-Fi/Bluetooth adapter valued at $40. This should appear automatically when you add the motherboard to your cart.
If you're looking for a cheap case to throw this board into, Rosewill's Blackhawk mid-tower is on sale for $35 after mail-in-rebate, down from $100. While nothing special, it appears to be a serviceable solution that comes with five pre-installed fans.
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