Would it be worth it to upgrade to a B550/X570 motherboard from a B450 motherboard?

[Mussels]

Sneaky. Guess you have to look for the speed of the ethernet port more than anything, as I haven't seen any that says X570s explicitly.

Gigabyte say it, basically the second gen X570's have passive chipset cooling and the faster eth/wifi

It's simply that B550 came out a good year or so later, so despite being PCI-E 3.0 it got newer accesories and few companies released new x570 variants without a new chipset

You have to text search for X570S after selecting X570 when looking for one (add to search box in this link- 15 boards listed)

https://pcpartpicker.com/products/motherboard/#xcx=0&s=33&c=138&sort=price&page=1

My MSI MAG X570S TOMAHAWK MAX WIFI has 2.5Gb LAN

MSI MPG X570S CARBON MAX WIFI AM4 ATX AMD Motherboard - Newegg.com

Buy MSI MPG X570S CARBON MAX WIFI AM4 AMD X570 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard with fast shipping and top-rated customer service. Once you know, you Newegg!

www.newegg.com

Only feature that is missing is USB C gen 2x2 (20Gbps)... didn't want to spend the extra 60+ dollars for that feature

Early MSI x570 are some of the worst garbage to hit the planet, but they learned their lesson and improved a lot for B550 and the second gen x570's like that one

Toms reviewed it here
MSI MAG X570S Tomahawk Max WIFI Review: Iterative Expectations | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)

This review of the MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard covers it quite well

AFTER they became aware of their problems, that board couldnt even handle 125W despite most of the ryzen lineup using 142W unless you ran eco mode
(From two sources)

So y'know, dont go by brand - find reviews of these boards specifically.


X570 Motherboard VRM Overview – der8auer
MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Review - The FPS Review

The bigger problem on the MSI boards was that software would says something like that 87c, but FLIR imaging would show 110+ - they put the sensors further away than other brands during this era, to make them "look" good to a casual investigation but failed miserably, since even the unreliable software readings were still insanely hot compared to every other brand/model out there


SOME of the MSI boards are top-tier, best in class. But a very small minority that you need to double check and verify before purchasing, with all their similar naming schemes.

 

[Kodehawa]

Gigabyte say it, basically the second gen X570's have passive chipset cooling and the faster eth/wifi

It's simply that B550 came out a good year or so later, so despite being PCI-E 3.0 it got newer accesories and few companies released new x570 variants without a new chipset


Early MSI x570 are some of the worst garbage to hit the planet, but they learned their lesson and improved a lot for B550 and the second gen x570's like that one

Toms reviewed it here
MSI MAG X570S Tomahawk Max WIFI Review: Iterative Expectations | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)

View attachment 281963


This review of the MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard covers it quite well
View attachment 281964

AFTER they became aware of their problems, that board couldnt even handle 125W despite most of the ryzen lineup using 142W unless you ran eco mode
(From two sources)

So y'know, dont go by brand - find reviews of these boards specifically.


X570 Motherboard VRM Overview – der8auer
MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Review - The FPS Review
View attachment 281965

View attachment 281966

The bigger problem on the MSI boards was that software would says something like that 87c, but FLIR imaging would show 110+ - they put the sensors further away than other brands during this era, to make them "look" good to a casual investigation but failed miserably, since even the unreliable software readings were still insanely hot compared to every other brand/model out there


SOME of the MSI boards are top-tier, best in class. But a very small minority that you need to double check and verify before purchasing, with all their similar naming schemes.

Making an X570 board that cannot handle 140W is both sad and funny.

 

[Mussels]

Making an X570 board that cannot handle 140W is both sad and funny.

The same happened on the intel side and it was even more extreme, sadly

Older video, B660 platform
The irony here is that the best MSI boards are truly amazing, and some were chart topping - but they assumed anyone with a high wattage CPU would buy a top tier board, and anyone buying a budget or mid-tier board would use a low wattage CPU... and then AMD and intel both released 100W+ cheap CPUs.

Note here not just the temperatures, but the performance/scores along with them
In this case it was ASUS dropping the ball seriously, with high temps and incredibly poor performance - MSI was at those same high temps, but kept the performance up at least.

The 18 board comparison for *stock wattage* CPU's really hones in the point to never, EVER trust a brand - always go by the individual product
Asus both tops this chart and bottoms it, while MSI Does great here and terrible on the hardware they released after it

A 12700 at stock settings, Asus Gigabyte and Asrock all released boards that can't even maintain stock performance - all brands that are highly recommended with many amazing boards.

 

[Icon Charlie]

Gigabyte say it, basically the second gen X570's have passive chipset cooling and the faster eth/wifi

It's simply that B550 came out a good year or so later, so despite being PCI-E 3.0 it got newer accesories and few companies released new x570 variants without a new chipset


Early MSI x570 are some of the worst garbage to hit the planet, but they learned their lesson and improved a lot for B550 and the second gen x570's like that one

Toms reviewed it here
MSI MAG X570S Tomahawk Max WIFI Review: Iterative Expectations | Tom's Hardware (tomshardware.com)

View attachment 281963


This review of the MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard covers it quite well
View attachment 281964

AFTER they became aware of their problems, that board couldnt even handle 125W despite most of the ryzen lineup using 142W unless you ran eco mode
(From two sources)

So y'know, dont go by brand - find reviews of these boards specifically.


X570 Motherboard VRM Overview – der8auer
MSI X570-A PRO Motherboard Review - The FPS Review
View attachment 281965

View attachment 281966

The bigger problem on the MSI boards was that software would says something like that 87c, but FLIR imaging would show 110+ - they put the sensors further away than other brands during this era, to make them "look" good to a casual investigation but failed miserably, since even the unreliable software readings were still insanely hot compared to every other brand/model out there


SOME of the MSI boards are top-tier, best in class. But a very small minority that you need to double check and verify before purchasing, with all their similar naming schemes.

There is a caveat to this. I own a MSI X570 A Pro.

You know if you are going to run a high end wattage usage CPU on this board OF COURSE YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE XMASS TREE LIGHTS on your VRM's. The 3950 and 5950 is not that good for this board.

However as posted before, this MB runs COOL if you put the RIGHT CPU on it.

This is where I fully disagree with INFLUENCERS ON YOUTUBE. because I have 3 YEARS of REAL 20HOURS A DAY 7 DAYS PER WEEK OF ACTUAL USE IN ALL WEATHER CONDITIONS in the motherboard/rig.

Everything works beautifully because I fully understand and have done the research on which components will work on this MB when I build this rig. EVERY COMPONENT affects the overall build. YOU MUST DO YOUR RESEARCH ON EVERYTHING YOU BUY.

They IMHO, do not understand fully on airflow management and usage of components that can make a HUGE difference wattage usage and overall temperature control. That is why my build works so damned well for me.

You better believe it I jumped immediately on the MSI X570 A Pro at the time and slapped on a AMD 3600 at first, then the 5900OEM later. $125 out the door for an X570??. Oh hell yes! Because I knew exactly what to do with this motherboard and which other components I can use on it,... and build one hell of a rig that any Grognard would enjoy.

IMHO The perfect CPU for this motherboard is any of the 65 watts types. Which I did.

As Stated before, my current rig now is a recent undervolted 5900OEM with an 8% performance increase with Undervolted DDR4 memory, with a undervolted Visiontek 5700 reference.

My cooler is a Hyper T2. Everything RUNS COOL. Hell it is running cooler than my 3600 setup.

So yea, as stated before I DO NOT FULLY TRUST YOUTUBERS. They have became influencers hawking their talking points for the sake of digital money in a digital.

That is why the old man is here on TPU. So I can share my now 34 years of experience in this "Now" hobby of mine and learn from other smart people on this site.

In ending. Though technically correct on the Data used by the Youtubers. It does not tell the entire story.

The MSI A-Pro was never meant to be a high end motherboard. It can not handle the high performance and high wattage usages of various components.

BUT if you know what you are doing and have the experience of building rigs such as I, you can turn a bunch of "Meh" components that some people say into something special.

And again the Visiontek 5700 Video card IMHO is a sleeper card and I am thinking of upgrading to a AMD 6800 so I can undervolt that to hell too and get my performance that I want for the money I want to spend.

The OLOy 4000 DDR4 ram (1.5volts) was tuned down to PC3600 with 14-14-14-34 timings @1.4 volts. I bought them because they use Samsung B chips. You are going to have a hard time finding these sticks because they were I think a limited run but they are good enough for me to go with them than my usual G.Skill. And that is saying something on how good these stick of memory are.

Again. This is all knowledge of things. Such as My Rosewill 850PSU 80+Gold Capstone. Japanese capacitors. And since I'm running under 50% usage all of the time I am not beating my PSU/Components to death. Thereby prolong the life of the Rig.

All of this is knowledge gained over the years. Yea I'll share it here. I'm no end of it all by all means. But I did manage and ran a successful computer repair service... in the real world... and not on Youtube land.

There are things that they don't even know about.

And that is why time after time again you see those youtubers reference Tech Power Up...

AND THAT... IT TELLING.

 

[Assimilator]

but they assumed anyone with a high wattage CPU would buy a top tier board, and anyone buying a budget or mid-tier board would use a low wattage CPU

Motherboards are designed to a specific price point and that means compromises, and the B660 is very much a midrange chipset whereas X570 is not. I don't think the assumption made by these manufacturers is incorrect for B660; in fact I think that it makes complete sense. The alternative is that you get a midrange board with a high-end board VRMs but no features, and how many consumers are going to buy that? Almost none, so no manufacturer is going to do that. Or you get a midrange board with high-end VRMs and all the features that costs more than boards with the high-end chipset, and that screws up the product stack, so no manufacturer is going to do that.

Basically, I find your criticism of Asrock, Asus and Gigabyte unfair in this case. While as enthusiasts we'd all love every board to have VRMs capable of handling any CPU, this is the wrong expectation to have; we should instead be pressuring the CPU manufacturers to stop releasing chips that are power-gobbling monsters.

 

[Bones]

Motherboards are designed to a specific price point and that means compromises, and the B660 is very much a midrange chipset whereas X570 is not. I don't think the assumption made by these manufacturers is incorrect for B660; in fact I think that it makes complete sense. The alternative is that you get a midrange board with a high-end board VRMs but no features, and how many consumers are going to buy that? Almost none, so no manufacturer is going to do that. Or you get a midrange board with high-end VRMs and all the features that costs more than boards with the high-end chipset, and that screws up the product stack, so no manufacturer is going to do that.

Basically, I find your criticism of Asrock, Asus and Gigabyte unfair in this case. While as enthusiasts we'd all love every board to have VRMs capable of handling any CPU, this is the wrong expectation to have; we should instead be pressuring the CPU manufacturers to stop releasing chips that are power-gobbling monsters.

I agree with most points here but at the same time, an X570 board is supposed to be the top tier of the lineup for those.
It's not unfair to expect it to be capable of handling anything it supports - Esp when you consider it's also touted as the performance version of an AM4 board, being it's the highest board model line (X570) of it's time.
I have one myself (MSI X570 MEG ACE) and it can handle whatever I set in it the board itself supports. It's not the absolute top-dog of X570 boards since MSI did make even higher tier'ed (Competition/Overclocking) models based on X570 but it will handle whatever it's supposed to at least, even on Ln2 as I've done with this one before.

I'll admit that does play into price point so that's a fair thing to say in itself.


Related to the discussion, I'd have to say to the OP hold off until they can get an AM5, all they would be gaining are some features and that's really about it.

 

[lawood]

I did just this recently.

I had a shitty b450 board so the upgrade kinda made sense, I can actually run a more aggressive curve and the boosting behavior improved a lot, before I couldn't get 4850 boost (5600x) on cpuz single core test, with the new board on the same settings I can achieve that easily. On games i observe the same gains.
Still need to test the memory but i expect to achieve a bit better results from what I've tried already.

Also shootout to gigabyte, my last board was msi and it was much harder to memory oc.
If gigabyte detects that the pc isnt booting it will just revert ONLY memory back to stock and boot to windows, that easy.
On msi mb with unbootable settings I'd have to clear cmos everytime. And i'd have to reset the WHOLE bios.
No more wondering if ill get a black screen, this board will just revert memory timmings and speed to jedec, retain all other bios settings and just boot to windows in a few seconds.

Then you have pci4, its nice to have.

 

[freeagent]

As a B550 user, the only thing X570 has to offer me is just pcie 4 lanes and usb ports. My board already has some things most B550s don’t..

 

[kapone32]

As a B550 user, the only thing X570 has to offer me is just pcie 4 lanes and usb ports. My board already has some things most B550s don’t..

You have the most Extreme B550 board. It is miles ahead in flexibility than all budget X570 boards but the rear I/O is paltry vs what is on the board in terms of connectivity. The only advantage X570 has vs that is that the 2nd M2 slot is 3.0.

 

[freeagent]

You have the most Extreme B550 board. It is miles ahead in flexibility than all budget X570 boards but the rear I/O is paltry vs what is on the board in terms of connectivity. The only advantage X570 has vs that is that the 2nd M2 slot is 3.0.

Yeah I got it on sale.. or else that would have been X570 money

 

[Kodehawa]

I imagine the VRMs on my board can handle ~115W power draw (what I have PBO set at). If so, I guess I'll just keep it.

One weird thing I noticed on this board is that w/o PBO the 5700X only does ~3.6GHz max and with PBO I usually hit 4.25GHz~4.35GHz. The non-PBO frequency is considerable lower than what I've seen. In fact, 3.6GHz seems painfully low compared to what GN got.

Does anyone here have a 5700X and can set PPT to 115 and EDC to 115 and see what kinda boost you get? To me PBO frequencies seem fine. I don't have a good point of comparison, though.

 

[freeagent]

200/140/180 +200 -30 and let er rip

 

[Kodehawa]

200/140/180 +200 -30 and let er rip

With those settings it draws 118W but it runs way hotter. No CO tho, anything more than -15 seems to just crash it outright after entering the deskop. Doesn't seem to want to sip more than 120W

 

[Mussels]

You know if you are going to run a high end wattage usage CPU on this board OF COURSE YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE XMASS TREE LIGHTS on your VRM's. The 3950 and 5950 is not that good for this board.

You cant run anything more than a 65W chip - yet nowhere does the board state it cant do that, while competing and cheaper boards can. Don't defend a bad board.

You do realise that a 5800x, 5900x and 5950x all have the exact same power limits?

 

[AleXXX666]

Why on earth are you talking about USB 1.1? That 12Mb/s junk was phased out over 20 years ago now - the slowest port on a modern motherboard is 480Mb/s...
That first adapter is to convert his NZXT H510's single front-panel USB-A port to a 480Mb/s USB 2.0 header so that his 5GB/s USB 3.2 header is available for the USB-C port via the second adapter.

Yes, USB 2.0 will bottleneck an external SSD, but most of those come with USB-C now, and OP has a 10Gb/s USB-A port at the back if he actually needs it. For the typical flash drives/dongles/peripherals/headsets etc that a front-panel USB-A is most commonly used for, 480Mb/s is plenty.

if I will write Windows install USB, the 2.0 will be daamn slow, and 2.0 for me is damn same as 1.1 heck even 1.0. USB 3.0 is what should be considered "acceptable" as modern speed.

The faster (but uglier) option is to just convert the front panel USB-C cable to USB-A and run it through an expansion slot directly to the 10Gb/s port on the back of your motherboard. You can get $2 adapters that convert the case's type-E cable into regular USB-A male. After that you just need an extension cable - 50cm would probably be enough....

View attachment 281427

not ugly if you don't watch regularly the backside of your pc heck same as monitor's back sides I don't care if it's not "big office" use case where PC-s stand in the middle of rooms.

Ok, but show me an AM5 board you can get for $140 (current USD price for the Velocita on Newegg) that isn't a total POS. Oh, and you also have to buy DDR5 RAM for AM5, so there's yet more cost.

I'll wait.

DDR5 got cheaper now - if you don't mind. Plain "black" (not even green now lmfao) 4800 sticks costs just a penny more than it's DDR4 comparatives and the cost is a little bigger if you opt for 32 GB +. If you build with 16 as a "bare minimum", so you 0-day usage doesn't have a ton of browser tabs like mine is, lucky you
Get cheapest AM5 board if you will build PC for generic usage not a "mommy I'm an overclocker looka I have such a 100 GHz processor plz buy me 1000 MHz RAM or I'll die!"

I imagine the VRMs on my board can handle ~115W power draw (what I have PBO set at). If so, I guess I'll just keep it.

One weird thing I noticed on this board is that w/o PBO the 5700X only does ~3.6GHz max and with PBO I usually hit 4.25GHz~4.35GHz. The non-PBO frequency is considerable lower than what I've seen. In fact, 3.6GHz seems painfully low compared to what GN got.

Does anyone here have a 5700X and can set PPT to 115 and EDC to 115 and see what kinda boost you get? To me PBO frequencies seem fine. I don't have a good point of comparison, though.

View attachment 282272

won't you try just STOCK usage without all these bells'n'whistles like PBO? just processor default turbo with default limits, it's a 5700X not a 5900X not a 5950X so I doubt your mobo will get a VRM fire.

 

[Kodehawa]

won't you try just STOCK usage without all these bells'n'whistles like PBO? just processor default turbo with default limits, it's a 5700X not a 5900X not a 5950X so I doubt your mobo will get a VRM fire.

stock on this board on the 5700X is broken, stuck on base clock for boost

 

[phanbuey]

Should be a poll

 

[Kodehawa]

Should be a poll

Would be interesting, but dunno how to make it one

 

[phanbuey]

Would be interesting, but dunno how to make it one

In the thread settings theres an option to add a poll.

 

[Chrispy_]

if I will write Windows install USB, the 2.0 will be daamn slow, and 2.0 for me is damn same as 1.1 heck even 1.0. USB 3.0 is what should be considered "acceptable" as modern speed.

That has nothing to do with the port.

Most USB flash drives can't write faster than about 10MB/s. Hell, I have some that won't even do 4MB/s. To prove a point, it takes just as long to create the windows installation media on a 10Gbps USB3.2 port when you're using a cheap USB flash drive.

You need an SSD or sequential writes to a mechanical hard drive to push USB2 to its limits, and in the rare occasions where you're using fast drives to transfer huge amounts of data, spend the extra 10 seconds it takes to plug it into one of the faster ports on the back of the PC.

 

[kapone32]

That has nothing to do with the port.

Most USB flash drives can't write faster than about 10MB/s. Hell, I have some that won't even do 4MB/s. To prove a point, it takes just as long to create the windows installation media on a 10Gbps USB3.2 port when you're using a cheap USB flash drive.

You need an SSD or sequential writes to a mechanical hard drive to push USB2 to its limits, and in the rare occasions where you're using fast drives to transfer huge amounts of data, spend the extra 10 seconds it takes to plug it into one of the faster ports on the back of the PC.

Something like an M2 in a USB adapter. ESATA is still missed by me.

 

[Kodehawa]

In the thread settings theres an option to add a poll.

Guess that'd need to be a new thread, since I don't see the option for this one. Don't really think it's worth to make a new one if so.

That has nothing to do with the port.

Most USB flash drives can't write faster than about 10MB/s. Hell, I have some that won't even do 4MB/s. To prove a point, it takes just as long to create the windows installation media on a 10Gbps USB3.2 port when you're using a cheap USB flash drive.

You need an SSD or sequential writes to a mechanical hard drive to push USB2 to its limits, and in the rare occasions where you're using fast drives to transfer huge amounts of data, spend the extra 10 seconds it takes to plug it into one of the faster ports on the back of the PC.

This is so true lol, I bought a 3.1 USB-C drive that advertised about USB3 speeds. Well, it lied, and installing windows took about the same indeed.

It's marginally (marginally lol) faster when transferring files, and it's somehow a lot faster at actually making the install media, but that's about it.

 

[Chrispy_]

This is so true lol, I bought a 3.1 USB-C drive that advertised about USB3 speeds. Well, it lied, and installing windows took about the same indeed.

I mean some USB flash drives aren't awful at sequential read. Here's a half-decent Kingston SE9 G2 drive that reads at >100MB/s. It's write speeds are abysmal though - it would take 25 minutes just to copy a measly 8GB of data:

I've lost my 20MB/s drive. It's probably in a pot at work, but imma find it and put it back on my keyring because this is the best thing (for write speeds) I have at home and it's pitiful:

It could be five times faster and the bare-minimum USB 2.0's 480Mbps would still be more than enough bandwidth to feed it data.

 

[Mussels]

f I will write Windows install USB, the 2.0 will be daamn slow

How is this "Daamnn slow" ?

This is me copying the latest windows 11 ISO to a USB SSD on USB 2.0
I've got half a dozen USB 3.0/3.1 flash drives here, they'll all write at 30+ and read at 100+ and none were that expensive, and this is all getting rather derailed and off topic - even a USB 2.0 port will be faster to install windows than a DVD or BD ever could, once you account for burning time too

 

[AleXXX666]

How is this "Daamnn slow" ?

This is me copying the latest windows 11 ISO to a USB SSD on USB 2.0
I've got half a dozen USB 3.0/3.1 flash drives here, they'll all write at 30+ and read at 100+ and none were that expensive, and this is all getting rather derailed and off topic - even a USB 2.0 port will be faster to install windows than a DVD or BD ever could, once you account for burning time too
View attachment 282841View attachment 282842

lol. copying one big file is okay. but, the problem is, "4K random read". Tons of small files will be bottlenecked. I mean creating USB, not copying ISO to usb, there is a difference....

stock on this board on the 5700X is broken, stuck on base clock for boost

okay