Motherboard compatibility

[Gazeley]

So I’ve been asking around for build ideas and one redditor gave me this build. However, on pcpartpicker it gives a warning about the compatibility of the motherboard and AMD chipsets. He says it’ll be fine, but I just wanted to double check that this build will work 100%. I want to be able to just put it together without worrying about drivers. 
Also what’s better motherboard wifi or network card wifi? Also also, is this build good generally speaking? 

TO add in Wifi to the motherboard, and bring costs down I'd modify the supplied build as follows:

•    ⁠Different Motherboard, full featured with wifi.
•    ⁠Cheaper but still very good monitor.
•    ⁠RTX 2070 super in place of an RTX 2080 super, still very strong at 1440p but significantly cheaper.
•    ⁠BEtter quality power supply by a long way.

PCPartPicker Part List

Type    |Item    |Price    
CPU    |AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 3.6 GHz 8-Core Processor    |£259.00 @ Amazon UK    
CPU Cooler    |be quiet! Dark Rock 4 CPU Cooler    |£53.99 @ Amazon UK    
Motherboard    |MSI B450 GAMING PRO CARBON AC ATX AM4 Motherboard    |£118.99 @ AWD-IT    
Memory    |Patriot Viper 4 Blackout 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 Memory    |£89.99 @ Amazon UK    
Storage    |Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive    |£97.98 @ Amazon UK    
Storage    |Seagate Barracuda Compute 2 TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive    |£51.27 @ Amazon UK    
Video Card    |EVGA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER 8 GB XC GAMING Video Card    |£493.47 @ Ebuyer    
Case    |Phanteks Eclipse P300A Mesh ATX Mid Tower Case    |£50.99 @ AWD-IT    
Power Supply    |Corsair TXM Gold 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply    |£79.98 @ Amazon UK    
Monitor    |AOC CQ27G2U/BK 27.0" 2560x1440 144 Hz Monitor    |£248.98 @ Laptops Direct    
Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts    |    |    
Total    |£1544.64    |    
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-03-08 00:25 GMT+0000    |    |    

[Jimkirk363]

The reason it gives you the warning is it probably will need a bios upgrade to support the CPU of choice.

[Godlygamer23]

3 minutes ago, jimkirk363 said:

The reason it gives you the warning is it probably will need a bios upgrade to support the CPU of choice.

I was able to confirm this by selecting the same parts as above. 

[SleepingGiant]

What are you generally gonna be doing for this build?

 

7 minutes ago, Gazeley said:

 Also what’s better motherboard wifi or network card wifi?

For me a wifi card will be much better for future use, if you ever get a new motherboard.

[lightfire]

Yep, your motherboard will need a bios update in order to be compatible with 3rd gen ryzen processors. To do that you will need a 1st or 2nd gen processor, or you can ask a store to do it. Or your motherboard might already ship with the updated bios.

 

You can also buy an msi B450 Tomahawk MAX, which is already ryzen 3rd gen ready and pretty much has the same features.

[minibois]

9 minutes ago, Gazeley said:

However, on pcpartpicker it gives a warning about the compatibility of the motherboard and AMD chipsets.

CPU    |AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 3.6 GHz 8-Core Processor    |£259.00 @ Amazon UK    
Motherboard    |MSI B450 GAMING PRO CARBON AC ATX AM4 Motherboard    |£118.99 @ AWD-IT

B450 motherboards have came out before the Ryzen 3000 CPU's did. That means they couldn't have made it compatible with each other since day one.

However, each B450 board that was manufactured in the factory after Ryzen 3000 came out, comes with a BIOS that is compatible with Ryzen 3000.

 

So unless the store you're buying from has significantly old stock, the board will work. PCPartPicker is just signalling there is an - increasingly low - chance the board will not work with the board right away.

The fix to this would be updating the BIOS, which you can only do with a working CPU installed. Meaning you either have to bring the board to a store to update (possibly paid) or you would need to request the bootkit from AMD's RMA department. They send you a loaner CPU to do the BIOS update.

12 minutes ago, Gazeley said:

Also what’s better motherboard wifi or network card wifi?

Doesn't matter much. If you can get a board with WiFi for not much more, it will save you a PCIE slot.

13 minutes ago, Gazeley said:

Also also, is this build good generally speaking? 

 

 

PCPartPicker Part List

Type    |Item    |Price    
CPU    |AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 3.6 GHz 8-Core Processor    |£259.00 @ Amazon UK    
CPU Cooler    |be quiet! Dark Rock 4 CPU Cooler    |£53.99 @ Amazon UK    
Motherboard    |MSI B450 GAMING PRO CARBON AC ATX AM4 Motherboard    |£118.99 @ AWD-IT    
Memory    |Patriot Viper 4 Blackout 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 Memory    |£89.99 @ Amazon UK    
Storage    |Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive    |£97.98 @ Amazon UK    
Storage    |Seagate Barracuda Compute 2 TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive    |£51.27 @ Amazon UK    
Video Card    |EVGA GeForce RTX 2070 SUPER 8 GB XC GAMING Video Card    |£493.47 @ Ebuyer    
Case    |Phanteks Eclipse P300A Mesh ATX Mid Tower Case    |£50.99 @ AWD-IT    
Power Supply    |Corsair TXM Gold 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply    |£79.98 @ Amazon UK    
Monitor    |AOC CQ27G2U/BK 27.0" 2560x1440 144 Hz Monitor    |£248.98 @ Laptops Direct    
Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts    |    |    
Total    |£1544.64    |    
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-03-08 00:25 GMT+0000    |    |    

Looks good to me.

[Gazeley]

59 minutes ago, jimkirk363 said:

The reason it gives you the warning is it probably will need a bios upgrade to support the CPU of choice.

Yeah I know, just wanted to know if it's worth worrying about and how fiddly it'd be to deal with. 

[Gazeley]

58 minutes ago, SleepingGiant said:

What are you generally gonna be doing for this build?

 

For me a wifi card will be much better for future use, if you ever get a new motherboard.

Playing single and multiplayer games and doing word document based work mostly. 

[Gazeley]

53 minutes ago, minibois said:

B450 motherboards have came out before the Ryzen 3000 CPU's did. That means they couldn't have made it compatible with each other since day one.

However, each B450 board that was manufactured in the factory after Ryzen 3000 came out, comes with a BIOS that is compatible with Ryzen 3000.

 

So unless the store you're buying from has significantly old stock, the board will work. PCPartPicker is just signalling there is an - increasingly low - chance the board will not work with the board right away.

The fix to this would be updating the BIOS, which you can only do with a working CPU installed. Meaning you either have to bring the board to a store to update (possibly paid) or you would need to request the bootkit from AMD's RMA department. They send you a loaner CPU to do the BIOS update.

Doesn't matter much. If you can get a board with WiFi for not much more, it will save you a PCIE slot.

Looks good to me.

I sort of wanna avoid doing the whole CPU borrowing thing, is it incredibly unlikely that the motherboard would be incompatible? Or would it be worth looking for another motherboard with similar features? 

[Gazeley]

1 hour ago, lightfire said:

Yep, your motherboard will need a bios update in order to be compatible with 3rd gen ryzen processors. To do that you will need a 1st or 2nd gen processor, or you can ask a store to do it. Or your motherboard might already ship with the updated bios.

 

You can also buy an msi B450 Tomahawk MAX, which is already ryzen 3rd gen ready and pretty much has the same features.

Do you think it would be likely that the motherboard would need an update? 

[lightfire]

Just now, Gazeley said:

Do you think it would be likely that the motherboard would need an update? 

Since ryzen 3rd gen has been out for quite a while, no. But still, I'm not sure if it is a risk that I'd take. Of course you can go to a store and ask them to update it, but that also depends on your country. In Belgium (where I live) we don't have many stores that'd do things like that.

 

However, I strongly suggest you take a look at the msi B450 tomawawk MAX. This one will be ryzen 3rd gen ready out of the box and it's an amazing board for the money. Unless you really need wifi on the board.

[Gazeley]

13 minutes ago, lightfire said:

Since ryzen 3rd gen has been out for quite a while, no. But still, I'm not sure if it is a risk that I'd take. Of course you can go to a store and ask them to update it, but that also depends on your country. In Belgium (where I live) we don't have many stores that'd do things like that.

 

However, I strongly suggest you take a look at the msi B450 tomawawk MAX. This one will be ryzen 3rd gen ready out of the box and it's an amazing board for the money. Unless you really need wifi on the board.

I don't need it on the board per se, but can it fit a network card? Also, is there a particular network card I should be looking at?

[lightfire]

I don't know much about network cards, but here's a link that says that they are compatible  

https://pcpartpicker.com/products/wireless-network-card/?compatible_with=Hy97YJ

[minibois]

1 hour ago, Gazeley said:

I sort of wanna avoid doing the whole CPU borrowing thing, is it incredibly unlikely that the motherboard would be incompatible? Or would it be worth looking for another motherboard with similar features? 

In my experience, every AM4 board will have the right BIOS to work right away. A motherboard needs have to sat on a shelf for at least half a year for it not to be compatible. But I can't of course be 100% sure about that.

 

Best to just inquire with the shop you're buying from, to ask if they are compatible. Or if you are buying in real life, just look at the box and see if the box has this on it (usually on the front, bottom left):

If it has that image on the box, it will work.

 

[Guest]

The B450 Gaming Pro Carbon has bios flashback, so in the unlikely event it doesn't have an up to date bios you can just update it yourself. You don't even need a cpu installed to do it.

[Gazeley]

1 minute ago, lee32uk said:

The B450 Gaming Pro Carbon has bios flashback, so in the unlikely event it doesn't have an up to date bios you can just update it yourself. You don't even need a cpu installed to do it.

Just power up the pc without a cpu and go to bios? 

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Gazeley said:

Just power up the pc without a cpu and go to bios? 

You just need a USB stick and the bios file.