ASrock Taichi B550 or X570? and other help please.

[Squidge]

I'm having difficulty choosing a motherboard for an build I'm planning. Haven't made any final choices but I'll copy paste my pcpartpicker list at the bottom.

I'm basically waiting for new Ryzen to come out and see how it will affect prices of other cpu's before I make a final decision. I'm trying to find a vain balance between performance, efficiency and aesthetics. In the past I mostly used my PC for gaming, however lately video and audio editing has become much more common, and hoping it to be the primary use. And yes I know a 3090 is overkill, but it's down there as a pipe dream.

 

I really like the look of the ASrock Taichi B550, and I'm mainly worrying about how much I lose out by not going with the X570.

If I do end up sticking with intel, I'll most likely be on the Z490.

 

I'm sure there are better motherboards out there, but I just need to know how much I'm injuring the potential of a build by going with a certain choice. So can anyone advise on where to go with this?

 

My mock-up build: 

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 9 3900X 3.8 GHz 12-Core Processor	£397.49 @ Amazon UK
CPU Cooler	NZXT KRAKEN Z73 73.11 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler	£248.78 @ More Computers
Motherboard	ASRock B550 Taichi ATX AM4 Motherboard	£298.98 @ Amazon UK
Memory	Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory	£167.52 @ Newegg UK
Storage	Gigabyte AORUS NVMe Gen4 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	£171.46 @ Scan.co.uk
Video Card	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 24 GB Founders Edition Video Card
Case	Phanteks Enthoo Pro 2 ATX Full Tower Case	£115.99 @ AWD-IT
Power Supply	Fractal Design Ion+ 860 W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£130.47 @ Scan.co.uk
Monitor	Acer VG270U Pbmiipx 27.0" 2560x1440 144 Hz Monitor	£289.00 @ Currys PC World
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£1819.69
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-10-20 12:05 BST+0100

 

 

[boggy77]

your build looks fine, apart from the overkill and extremely expensive AIO cooler. you can get a 5900x and a good 280mm aio cooler like the arctic freezer II for the price of the 3900x and the Z73.

 

as for b550 vs x570:

WHO SHOULD UPGRADE TO THE X570 PLATFORM?

Some professionals may need even more power and extensibility than what the B550 platform can offer. For such professionals, MSI’s X570 motherboards are the ideal choice. If any of the following apply to you, the X570 platform is a better choice:

• You use more than 4 USB 3.1 devices
• You use more than 6 SATA devices
• You use more than 3 Gen 4 M.2 SSDs

[mrdoubtfull]

Honestly, I just went through this at Microcenter yesterday.. I looked at the MEG ACE (which I've owned before), the Aorus Master, the X570 Taichi and B550 Taichi.. 

 

The Ace and Master was used/open box for less than $300.. After having the a X570 Hero and Meg Ace, I decided they're only worth it if you want the looks.. 

 

I was going to grab the X570 Master until I looked at the X570 Taichi and I changed my mind once I did that (rather buy new as well).. Then I went ahead and looked at the B550 Taichi and that pretty much made up my mind again.. Now mind you, I've been doing research for quite a while so I knew exactly what I was getting..

 

IMO, and for me, the B550 Taichi is nearly the best board I could get under $300. It has everything I need with well placed headers (mostly the USB 3 headers that it has TWO of).. From what I've gathered over the internet, if you ignore PCIe gen 4 (even if you don't really), the B550 Taichi is better than the X570 variant. It has two USB 3 headers, which my case requires, better audio, Intel 2.5gb Lan, CMOS clear btn on IO, etc.. And it looks nicer (something I take into consideration), I actually think it's nicer than the Hero and if you compare it to that then you're not even losing an M2 slot lol. 

 

About PCIe gen 4, you get that at both top GPU slots and on the first NVMe which is more than most need, unless you're a professional at something.. The second M2 slot is PCIe 3.0, which is absolutely just fine AND great for a second drive.. But if you ever want a third M2 (don't need one over a regular SATA SSD), you can use the second GPU slot and put an M2 NVMe expansion card and get two more NVMes, if you ever think you need it.. 

 

In the end, the B550 Taichi won me over this time.. It's the best B550 out there and it's nearly an X570..

 

I've used the X570 Hero, MEG ACE, X570 Tomahawk, B550 Gaming Carbon (on top of many X470s) and now I'm on the B550 Taichi and I haven't been this excited since the release of X570.. No gamer needs 3x PCIe gen 4 NVMes.. 

 

Enjoy! 

[mariushm]

Well I would say spending 250 pounds on a cpu cooler is downright STUPID. A 240mm or 280mm cooler, or an air based cooler will give you same results. It's a 105w TDP cpu, which doesn't overclock to a significant amount, so the cooler is seriously overkill. 

 

As for the motherboard choice, it's somewhat subjective since you say you like the looks of that one... I personally wouldn't buy it.  In that money you could get Gigabyte B550 Vision D : https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/B550-VISION-D-rev-10#kf

Thunderbold, lots of usb 3 10g connectors etc, good pci-e layout etc etc.

 

 

[mrdoubtfull]

Also, the B550 looks WAY better in person.. After looking online and then seeing it in the store, I was pretty shocked how nice it was.. The X570 Taichi is also very nice looking.. But I think the B550 looks better than the Master, ACE and Hero, for sure! 

 

You need to decide if you want 3x gen 4 NVMes or if you can make do with 2 of them (with one being gen 3).. I'll add a tiny expansion card later if I need to (for another M2), won't even be able to see it!

[Squidge]

@boggy77 thank you, I agree about the overkill cooler. Great, thank you for the clarification there. I think for what I need, b550 seems absolutly fine!

 

@mrdoubtfull thank you, I'm glad you've gone through this research and have first hand knowledge - very helpful

 

@mariushm totally agree with overkill cooler, just through it on pc-partspicker whilst I'm figuring out the main components (gives me an overall idea on maximum cost - before I start re-fining etc) I will certainly look into the Gigabyte B550 vision D, I imagine pcie layout is going to be really important with any 30 series GPU.

[Haro]

2 hours ago, Squidge said:

I really like the look of the ASrock Taichi B550, and I'm mainly worrying about how much I lose out by not going with the X570.

In terms of vrm, these are pretty similar (the x570 one has 14 sic639 doubled with IR3599 and the b550 one has 14 sic654 doubled with ISL6617 iirc), but the main difference being the chipset, the main different between B550 and X570 is that b550 allows the lanes that are wired to the cpu to be gen 4, while the lanes that are wired to the chipset are gen 3, on x570, the lanes that are wired to the cpu and to the chipset are gen 4 (assuming the cpu is zen 2/3), any reason why you chose these two boards? They are both kind of overpriced for  what they offer, unless there's a specific reason for that. 

But budget for a board? and location and currency? or is it USD? The vision D (unless you need TB3) is an overpriced board for what it offers. 

[Squidge]

@Haro thank you, that's very helpful. I was simply browsing through various motherboards, and looking at various price points and trying to weigh up what was useful or not - and well, it got very complicated very quickly.
I suppose if I'm looking at pure value - i may end up going with something like the https://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards/TUF-GAMING-X570-PLUS-WI-FI/

What initially drew me to the B550 Taichi, is (honestly) - it looks gorgeous; then reading up about it, it seemed to have a lot of positives, like its great sound, wifi, power draw etc... where I am it is currently about £100 more than the TUF Gaming x570 - which initially sounds a lot, but I don't imagine I'll be upgrading again for 5-6 years, unless my work leads me to needing something more powerful - at which point I'll be able to justify it anyway.

I record and edit using an external interface, so I suppose sound isn't a huge factor.

 

...but it's shiny.

[Haro]

1 hour ago, Squidge said:

so I suppose sound isn't a huge factor.

Well if there's no specific reason for it, and since i don't know your budget or location. 

The B550 tomahawk, b550 a pro, b550 aorus pro, b550 strix f, x570 tuf plus (the one you linked) x570 tomahawk are all pretty good boards. 

If you're set on a board around 300 euros or so, the x570 unify is pretty good. 

[Squidge]

Thank you all. Going to mark as solved. Loads of useful tips here! Just joined the site today and really pleased with the quality of responses.

 

Best wishes!