How does one determine the number and quality of VRMs in a motherboard before buying?

[john01dav]

I'm trying to vet some motherboards for overclocking. My research tells me that I need a large number of good vrms with a heatsink. The heatsink is easy enough, because it's visible in the pictures, but I can't find anything for any motherboards about the number or quality of vrms. How does one find this information?

[Enderman]

Just get a motherboard from a well known brand and don't worry that much about it.

It's only really important if you're doing some extreme overclocking on phase change or LN2.

Your motherboard will not burst into flames if you try overclocking on a lower end motherboard from a good brand.

[thx1138]

So its not just what it looks like...you need experts to check on things. here is a number of resources. 

 

first a sorta cheat sheet for INTEL

 

[thx1138]

https://www.hardwareluxx.de/community/f12/lga-1151-mainboard-vrm-liste-1175784.html#z370

a list/chart for INTEL

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrwObTfqv8u1KO7Fgk-FXHQ

 

Buildzoid goes over almost all MOBOS with a fine tooth comb

[john01dav]

1 minute ago, Enderman said:

Just get a motherboard from a well known brand and don't worry that much about it.

It's only really important if you're doing some extreme overclocking on phase change or LN2.

Your motherboard will not burst into flames if you try overclocking on a lower end motherboard from a good brand.

I have a motherboard from Asus. Apparently, according to people in the LTT Discord, its vrms are so terrible as to be a fire hazard. I also see voltage drops every few seconds under synthetic load.

 

[thx1138]

6 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Just get a motherboard from a well known brand and don't worry that much about it.

It's only really important if you're doing some extreme overclocking on phase change or LN2.

Your motherboard will not burst into flames if you try overclocking on a lower end motherboard from a good brand.

It completely depends on what Hardware you are going for. Not all MOBOS are from the same stock, and are often overlooked for their importance of being the base of all the connections of the computer...especially with the lack of downdraft coolers, and thus increased importance on quality of the VRMs

 

https://www.anandtech.com/show/13400/intel-9th-gen-core-i9-9900k-i7-9700k-i5-9600k-review/21

[Enderman]

4 minutes ago, john01dav said:

I have a motherboard from Asus. Apparently, according to people in the LTT Discord, its vrms are so terrible as to be a fire hazard. I also see voltage drops every few seconds under synthetic load.

 

Asus makes some of the best motherboards on the market.

It is not a fire hazard, people are just exaggerating because "oh gamersnexus said it has 4 instead of 8 phases hurr durr" or whatever.

 

3 minutes ago, thx1138 said:

It completely depends on what Hardware you are going for.

 

https://www.anandtech.com/show/13400/intel-9th-gen-core-i9-9900k-i7-9700k-i5-9600k-review/21

And your point is...?

Obviously an OCd processor uses more power.

The Z390 platform only supports up to a 9900K anyway, not the extreme edition CPUs that draw 500W.

[thx1138]

3 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Asus makes some of the best motherboards on the market.

It is not a fire hazard, people are just exaggerating because "oh gamersnexus said it has 4 instead of 8 phases" or whatever.

 

And your point is...?

Obviously an OCd processor uses more power.

The Z390 platform only supports up to a 9900K anyway, not the extreme edition CPUs that draw 500W.

technically the TDP of the 9900k is 95w, however even with default (if you had actually looked at the link.) can easily reach 210w and the ASUS z370-p is a sub 150w VRM.

 

Asus generally has very good BIOS, though lacking features, some quality control, and customer support for their demanded price. 

[Enderman]

3 minutes ago, thx1138 said:

technically the TDP of the 9900k is 95w, however even with default (if you had actually looked at the link.) can easily reach 210w 

Ok so...?

That's not going to be an issue...

You can overclock on lower end Z390 boards just fine as long as you're not pushing it with some extreme liquid cooling, phase change, or LN2.

Boards with worse power delivery are not "Z" boards and you're not supposed to overclock on those.

There is no chance of the motherboard catching fire because of number/quality of VRMs on it if it's a motherboard from a reputable brand.

[john01dav]

6 minutes ago, Enderman said:

Asus makes some of the best motherboards on the market.

It is not a fire hazard, people are just exaggerating because "oh gamersnexus said it has 4 instead of 8 phases hurr durr" or whatever. 

Do you know how true this holds for older am3+ boards?

[Enderman]

1 minute ago, john01dav said:

Do you know how true this holds for older am3+ boards?

Oh, for AMD there certainly were lower end motherboards that would catch fire if you put a 9590 or other stupid CPU in them and overclocked it.

I know of some MSI ones that did, not sure about asus.

I assumed you were talking about intel boards since that's what everyone was talking about lately.

[thx1138]

7 minutes ago, john01dav said:

Do you know how true this holds for older am3+ boards?

The 9xxx series used Much more Wattage than the 8xxx. and thus definitely needed much higher VRM quality.

 

The VRM of DDR3 level boards is even more important than the DDR4 level boards of today. some of the 'heatsinks' on older boards are literally just for show and dont really do anything.

[thx1138]

http://www.tomshardware.com/faq/id-2176449/list-motherboards-overclocking-am3-cpus.html

[john01dav]

6 minutes ago, thx1138 said:

http://www.tomshardware.com/faq/id-2176449/list-motherboards-overclocking-am3-cpus.html

Thanks! This is really useful

[leadeater]

Thread cleaned, remember to stay on topic which is answering the question being asked.

[pizzaboxer]

1 hour ago, john01dav said:

I have a motherboard from Asus. Apparently, according to people in the LTT Discord, its vrms are so terrible as to be a fire hazard. I also see voltage drops every few seconds under synthetic load.

 

is your ASUS motherboard an AM3 motherboard with an FX processor? because that's definitely not uncommon, older ASUS gen boards can have their VRMs explode and potentially catch fire if the CPU is too powerful, including my motherboard.