# Is the Asus ROG STRIX B550-E good?



## MaurizioC (Oct 30, 2020)

Hi,

I am looking for a board to replace my Asus prime x470 pro.

I have only 1 gpu and 1 m2 so I was looking for a b550 board  also to avoid the x570 chipset fan and high power consumption.

I want  front USBC connector, BT and good VRM because I leave my PC working continuosly (Folding@Home encoding...) so I was considering the ASUS ROG STRIX B550-E .

Is there any problem know about this board?

Are there better alternatives?

Thank you

Maurizio


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## oxrufiioxo (Oct 30, 2020)

The only major downside with that board is that there are better X570 ones for around the same price. There is also a better version of it coming out soon.









						ROG STRIX B550-XE GAMING WIFI | ROG Strix | Gaming Motherboards｜ROG - Republic of Gamers｜ROG Global
					

ROG Strix B550-XE Gaming ATX motherboard is PCIe® 4.0-ready and features a robust power design, comprehensive cooling controls, AI Networking and cyberpunk-inspired looks.



					rog.asus.com


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## MaurizioC (Oct 30, 2020)

Hi thank you for your answer, what boards do you mean? In Italy the B550-E is about 250€

The XE I believe it will be more expensive and I do not need the extra overclock features.


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## Glaceon (Oct 30, 2020)

I have the B550-F which is a toned down version of that board, and it's fantastic. So yes, it's good.


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## oxrufiioxo (Oct 30, 2020)

I mean you should buy what you want there isn't anything wrong with the Strix E other than its price just research the limitations of the B550 chipset and if you're ok with them have at it.... I personally would much rather have the X570 Tomahawk over it as it doesn't have the same limitations and is typically cheaper. 

I have both the X570 Aorus Master and the X570 Crosshair Hero VIII which even at their typically 100 usd premium i would take both of them over it as well. 

To me spending over 200 usd or your local equivalent for a chipset that has major limitations vs boards of similar or cheaper cost doesn't make a whole lot of sense at the same time if you love the board and it does everything you want it to go for it.


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## Solid State Soul ( SSS ) (Oct 30, 2020)

Its fine, go for it


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## MaurizioC (Oct 30, 2020)

oxrufiioxo said:


> I mean you should buy what you want there isn't anything wrong with the Strix E other than its price just research the limitations of the B550 chipset and if you're ok with them have at it.... I personally would much rather have the X570 Tomahawk over it as it doesn't have the same limitations and is typically cheaper.
> 
> I have both the X570 Aorus Master and the X570 Crosshair Hero VIII which even at their typically 100 usd premium i would take both of them over it as well.
> 
> To me spending over 200 usd or your local equivalent for a chipset that has major limitations vs boards of similar or cheaper cost doesn't make a whole lot of sense at the same time if you love the board and it does everything you want it to go for it.



The b550 allows a pciexpr 4 connections with cpu only for 1 VGA and 1 m2 while the x570 has more pciexpr 4 lines.

Also the CPU-chipset 4x lines link is running pciexpr 3.0 instead of 4.0.

Since I do not need more than that, to me those aren't limitations and I would happily ditch chipset fan and have a chipset running a 6w instead of 11w.

The crosshair is more than 400€ while the x570 master is about 360€. I do not need all the overclock features of the first 

Since I believe zen 4 will use DDR5 I do not see the point spending 400 € for features I do not need.

I will go see reviews about the x570 Tomahawk but isn't it an inferior board chipset apart?


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## oxrufiioxo (Oct 30, 2020)

They're pretty similar actually with the msi having a better rear I/O in my opinion and gen 4 to all slots. I like that the B550 has a post code though.

As far as power delivery goes its a 12 power stage 60 amp (msi) vs a 14 power stage 50 amp (asus) so negligible. Both drastically overkill with the strix E not outperforming the strix F unless you consider 1c better a major win vrm wise


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## EarthDog (Oct 30, 2020)

oxrufiioxo said:


> that has major limitations


can you spell out these 'major' limitations? I ask that as I don't believe many of them effect most users.


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## oxrufiioxo (Oct 30, 2020)

EarthDog said:


> can you spell out these 'major' limitations? I ask that as I don't believe many of them effect most users.



Its early/late out here..... major was probably an over statement I mostly meant I wouldn't buy a board that was technically worse that also cost more/similar money.

They are a big deal to me but as I said he should do his research and if they don't matter have at a nearly 300 usd b550 board.


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## MaurizioC (Oct 30, 2020)

So I checked the MSI x570 Tomahawk and it has very good vrms. 

I will have to compare the features set .

This board is 50€ cheaper than the asus b550-e.

There is also the b500 Tomahawk  but I can't find the wifi version.

Fun thing: Tomahawk  sounds funny in italian since every italian knows what a hawk is but "toma" is the name of a alps mountains typical cheese... so it would be the alps cheese falcon motherboard... not great and I hate the chipset fan idea too


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## NoJuan999 (Oct 30, 2020)

MaurizioC said:


> Fun thing: Tomahawk  sounds funny in italian since every italian knows what a hawk is but "toma" is the name of a alps mountains typical cheese... so it would be the alps cheese falcon motherboard... not great and I hate the chipset fan idea too


LMAO

The term tomahawk was derived from the *Algonquian words “tamahak” or “tamahakan*."








						Tomahawk - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


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## MaurizioC (Oct 30, 2020)

NoJuan999 said:


> LMAO
> 
> The term tomahawk was derived from the *Algonquian words “tamahak” or “tamahakan*."
> 
> ...



ahaha yes I know it's an axe and a missile too but still.... like cheese


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## NoJuan999 (Oct 30, 2020)

LOL,
Yes, the Cheese Hawk Motherboard does Not sound so good.

Your post just made me laugh is all.
Where I live there are many, many places and things that have names derived from Native American words/names.
So while Tomahawk makes perfect sense to me as a name for a motherboard, it was good to hear your interpretation.


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## MaurizioC (Oct 31, 2020)

NoJuan999 said:


> LOL,
> Yes, the Cheese Hawk Motherboard does Not sound so good.
> 
> Your post just made me laugh is all.
> ...



Thank you for your explanation it is always nice to hear those things.

I am struggling to find any reviews of this board.

It seems just fine for my purpose (1x m2 and 1x gpu).

Is the chipset fan quiet?

Are the m2 heatsinks effective? MSI is famed not to be good at that..


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## oxrufiioxo (Oct 31, 2020)

MaurizioC said:


> Thank you for your explanation it is always nice to hear those things.
> 
> I am struggling to find any reviews of this board.
> 
> ...




its basically just a slightly cut down X570 Unify









						MSI X570 Tomahawk Motherboard Review
					

MSI's new Tomahawk is the most impressive X570 motherboard we've tested at the $200 price point and it deserves serious consideration if you're upgrading or building a...




					www.techspot.com
				





As far as chipset fan goes I've worked with the Asus X570 Tuf/X570 Hero/X570 Strix E, Msi X570 unify, and Gigabyte Aorus Master and none have been audible over a 600RPM case fan. Also on the Master and Hero they do not even come on other than during boot. They are mostly meant for a raid setup with Gen 4 drives.


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## PooPipeBoy (Oct 31, 2020)

I'm very happy with my Asus B550-F. The VRM cooling setup is top of the class for B550, even though the VRM spec itself isn't brilliant on paper. The all-black aesthetics is really nice. Great stability and there's no chipset fan to make additional noise. You still get PCI-E 4.0 for one graphics slot and one M.2 anyway, so the X570 doesn't make much sense in that respect.

You get a few perks with the B550-E like a 14+2 VRM setup instead of a 12+2, front USB 3.2 Gen 2 header and Nvidia SLI support, plus some other minor changes. But I looked into buying one and it was an extra 25% in cost for almost no useful additional features (in my situation).

These B550 boards definitely aren't cheap but they're the perfect platform for a mid-range setup.


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## Zach_01 (Oct 31, 2020)

The X570 chipset fan “issue” was a little overhyped last year. As @oxrufiioxo said it’s very quiet if it spins and most times does not need to. I never work that fan on my board. I’ve set it in silent mode through BIOS and the fan will start at around 60C.
A case fan with enough airflow (700~1000rpm) close to that region under/below the GPU can do wonders. Mine never passes 50C under load, with GPU blowing warm air, and on summer, and those PCH chips have operating limit past 80C. This time of year with 24~25C air feed PCH temp is around 40~45C with 750~800rpm on that 120mm case fan.

It’s all about people’s mindset IMHO and nothing more.

Base your choise upon features and your needs only, and not chipsets (fanless or not).


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## X71200 (Oct 31, 2020)

Changing your current board is stupita, you have no reason to. Especially considering the prices you're looking at. You have probably considered uno, duo, tre... I don't know, more bad choices than I can count in Italian.


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## MaurizioC (Oct 31, 2020)

X71200 said:


> Changing your current board is stupita, you have no reason to. Especially considering the prices you're looking at. You have probably considered uno, duo, tre... I don't know, more bad choices than I can count in Italian.



sei proprio un simpaticone!

Anyway my current board doesn't have Wifi nor Bluetooth which I want to have to tell one reason.

Are you happy with the board?


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## X71200 (Oct 31, 2020)

Just get a PCI-E card or USB dongle for those, yeah I'm pretty happy with my Tomahawk. Got all that BT, Wi-Fi, etc stuff and the M.2 heatsink works fino. Stick with your current board though, it's completely fine for your setup VRM-wise.









						AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4 (2019-11-07)
					

AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4  AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4 (2019-11-07)  By Cr1318 (Reddit) Cautilus#5912 (Discord)  (I don't accept random friend requests on Discord, but you can send me a question on there if you share a server with me, you can find me on the discord.gg/overclock server,  otherwise...




					docs.google.com


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## MaurizioC (Oct 31, 2020)

Zach_01 said:


> The X570 chipset fan “issue” was a little overhyped last year. As @oxrufiioxo said it’s very quiet if it spins and most times does not need to. I never work that fan on my board. I’ve set it in silent mode through BIOS and the fan will start at around 60C.
> A case fan with enough airflow (700~1000rpm) close to that region under/below the GPU can do wonders. Mine never passes 50C under load, with GPU blowing warm air, and on summer, and those PCH chips have operating limit past 80C. This time of year with 24~25C air feed PCH temp is around 40~45C with 750~800rpm on that 120mm case fan.
> 
> It’s all about people’s mindset IMHO and nothing more.
> ...



I do not need multi gpu nor multi m2 that's whay i was looking for a b550 board. The X570 Tomahawk  seems a very solid motherboard and the price is very good even if I believe it doesn't leverage the x570 fully since  the lines are very poorly used but I am still considering this board since is not expensive.

I have good airflow into my case so I hope the chipset fan will occasionaley spin but still no fan will always be better then one fan.


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## X71200 (Oct 31, 2020)

It actually does use the lanes properly, the other boards sometimes knock you down to 8x on the GPU when you stick something to the second slot, why bother? Multi-GPU is long dead for gaming pretty much, and if you want to do multi M.2 or PCI-E SSD, this board will do it perfectly fine. It also has fan stop for the M.2 fan, alongside of BIOS adjustment. You can get it working all the way from a rather inaudible 1-2k RPM to a loud 5k RPM. I'm still with my previous suggestion, get a card that does BT and wi-fi, stick that to one of your PCI-E slots. Problem solved with 20 Euros.


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## MaurizioC (Oct 31, 2020)

X71200 said:


> It actually does use the lanes properly, the other boards sometimes knock you down to 8x on the GPU when you stick something to the second slot, why bother? Multi-GPU is long dead for gaming pretty much, and if you want to do multi M.2 or PCI-E SSD, this board will do it perfectly fine. It also has fan stop for the M.2 fan, alongside of BIOS adjustment. You can get it working all the way from a rather inaudible 1-2k RPM to a loud 5k RPM. I'm still with my previous suggestion, get a card that does BT and wi-fi, stick that to one of your PCI-E slots. Problem solved with 20 Euros.



Gaming is not the only thing you can do with GPUs. I do not plan to get a second one but if I bought an x570 I would have liked the option.

About the card, it is a practical solution for one point but I do not like those type of card at all.


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## X71200 (Oct 31, 2020)

You're right, and if you're coming up with numbers for the usage you talked about, the GPU doesn't really care anywhere as much as it does in games about lanes. Look at any mining rig, that might give you an idea. If you don't like the add-in cards, I can't help that. But there is nothing wrong with them, and you can in fact sometimes get even superior chips there than the ones found onboard. If you still want to buy a new board, you can just get some B550-A. It will work for half the price of the aforementioned Tomahawk X570.


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