Help choose a B650 motherboard for a 7800x3D

[MaverickPT]

Hello!

 

I am planning on building a mostly gaming and a tad of hobby optical simulation/programing PC soon-ish, which will have a 7800x3D, and at the moment, I am picking a B650 motherboard.

For requierments I have the following.

• Available in Europe (Ireland to be more precise)
• Maximum price ≈ 250€
• Capable of 2x32 GB DDR5 at 6000 MT/s
• Built-in Wi-Fi is not a hard requirment, but I will need Wi-Fi so if I can avoid having to buy a PCI-E Wi-Fi card, that's a strong bonus.
• ATX size is fine, as the case will be a the Fractal North
• Ideally more than one PCI-E slot so I the possiblity to add something else later. But to be fair, it's unlikely. 
• At least 1x PCI-E 4.0x16 and 1x M.2 PCI-E 4.0 - Although it seems that all B650 motherboards do. 

Asus motherboards seem like a bad option, due to the issues with the x3D CPU's, and AFAIK, their RAM setup is one of the worst, and it's difficult to have a stable RAM at 6000 MT/s? 

Gigabyte malware is also not ideal, but I believe it can easily be disabled through the BIOS? 

ASRock doesn't seem to have good options at this price. They either offer cheaper (but less featured) boards or signifnicantly more expensive. The Steel Legend is in the right price but good lord, it look hideous... 

 

At the moment, I am split between the:

• MSI MAG B650 TOMAHAWK WIFI - Has an extra PCIe 4.0 slot but running at x2
• Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX - Has M.2 PCI-E 5.0 but I'll have a 4.0 SSD

 

They seem to be quite similar in everything else, including price. 

Therefore, what would you guys pick? 

Or do you reccommend something else entirely? 

 

Cheers!

 

EDIT:

Might actually spring to a B650E board, but I'm not sure, with the (admittedly a bit unfounded) hope of higher compatibilty in the future.

The contenders are:

• ASUS ROG STRIX B650E-E GAMING WIFI
• ASUS ROG STRIX B650E-F GAMING WIFI
• ASRock B650E PG Riptide WiFi

 

The ASUS options still ick me a bit. The PG Riptide seems like a good option, even though it's a bit ugly. 

EDIT2:

 

...maybe I don't need B650E

 

Edited June 14, 2023 by MaverickPT
Added more info

[GuiltySpark_]

Honestly not going to matter a whole lot between them. Little things like the MSI uses the AMD/Mediatek Wifi chipset, while the Rev 1.1 of the Gigabyte uses the tried and true Intel AX210 (rev 1.0 uses the AMD/Mediatek option, they likely realized it sucks and swapped back to the good Intel option). 

[Agall]

10 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

Hello!

 

I am planning on building a mostly gaming and a tad of hobby optical simulation/programing PC soon-ish, which will have a 7800x3D, and at the moment, I am picking a B650 motherboard.

For requierments I have the following.

• Available in Europe (Ireland to be more precise)
• Maximum price ≈ 250€
• Capable of 2x32 GB DDR5 at 6000 MT/s
• Built-in Wi-Fi is not a hard requirment, but I will need Wi-Fi so if I can avoid having to buy a PCI-E Wi-Fi card, that's a strong bonus.
• ATX size is fine, as the case will be a the Fractal North
• Ideally more than one PCI-E slot so I the possiblity to add something else later. But to be fair, it's unlikely. 
• At least 1x PCI-E 4.0x16 and 1x M.2 PCI-E 4.0 - Although it seems that all B650 motherboards do. 

Asus motherboards seem like a bad option, due to the issues with the x3D CPU's, and AFAIK, their RAM setup is one of the worst, and it's difficult to have a stable RAM at 6000 MT/s? 

Gigabyte malware is also not ideal, but I believe it can easily be disabled through the BIOS? 

ASRock doesn't seem to have good options at this price. They either offer cheaper (but less featured) boards or signifnicantly more expensive. The Steel Legend is in the right price but good lord, it look hideous... 

 

At the moment, I am split between the:

• MSI MAG B650 TOMAHAWK WIFI - Has an extra PCIe 4.0 slot but running at x2
• Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX - Has M.2 PCI-E 5.0 but I'll have a 4.0 SSD

 

They seem to be quite similar in everything else, including price. 

Therefore, what would you guys pick? 

Or do you reccommend something else entirely? 

 

Cheers!

FD North fits all the way to eATX (not listed support but can confirm). One thing to consider is a B650e board instead to get PCIe 5.0 support. It might not matter in 2023, but with the way the RX 7600 and RTX 4060ti are, having higher generation PCIe support can matter. They might start wiring 8x lanes on even higher mid tier cards just simply due to GPU architecture limitations.

 

B650e pricing isn't too far off and you might find better features. Either MSI or Gigabyte are fine, I've bought plenty of both over the years.

[filpo]

13 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

• MSI MAG B650 TOMAHAWK WIFI - Has an extra PCIe 4.0 slot but running at x2
• Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX - Has M.2 PCI-E 5.0 but I'll have a 4.0 SSD

i would just get the gigabyte. Not much difference

[MaverickPT]

4 minutes ago, GuiltySpark_ said:

Honestly not going to matter a whole lot between them. Little things like the MSI uses the AMD/Mediatek Wifi chipset, while the Rev 1.1 of the Gigabyte uses the tried and true Intel AX210 (rev 1.0 uses the AMD/Mediatek option, they likely realized it sucks and swapped back to the good Intel option). 

I wasn't aware of that! Thanks for letting me know! 

[MaverickPT]

9 minutes ago, Agall said:

B650e pricing isn't too far off and you might find better feature

Do you have any recommendation? 

For around ≈ 300€ I could only find ASUS boards, which I think I would like to avoid. Other options are closer to 350 or even higher. There's the ASRock steel legend but...

 

Cheers! 

[PopsicleHustler]

I just built a system yesterday with 7800X3D on Asus Strix  B650E-E, 32GB 6000Mhz and it doesn't seem to have any issues (So far), but it's out of the price range. There are Asus TUF B650s with WiFi for around 230-250, x2 4.0 slots. I built a system on that board for a friend of mine a few months ago, it runs great with 32 gigs 6000Mhz in all games and some video editing. 

 

Not a fan of MSI boards in general. Somewhat clunky Bios and lack of some features.

 

Gigabyte is a solid option.

[GuiltySpark_]

3 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

Do you have any recommendation? 

For around ≈ 300€ I could only find ASUS boards, which I think I would like to avoid. Other options are closer to 350 or even higher. There's the ASRock steel legend but...

 

Cheers! 

Its a little more money but the PG RIPtide is an option. I've had quite good luck in the past 6 months with my Asrock board and G.Skill 6000CL30 EXPO memory. Flawless, in fact. 

[Agall]

4 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

Do you have any recommendation? 

For around ≈ 300€ I could only find ASUS boards, which I think I would like to avoid. Other options are closer to 350 or even higher. There's the ASRock steel legend but...

 

Cheers! 

I'm in the US, so if you have certain retailers you're looking at I'd otherwise have to guess with a USD to Euro conversion (which I know isn't 1:1 based on supply and demand for some products). I would check to see if the same motherboards from any retailers you may use are within reason in terms of extra cost.

 

If its <50€ more as example, then its worth it in my opinion. It'll also be more likely to support future generations if the 8800x3D or 9800x3D are compatible and have some space magic level performance gaps over the 7800x3D. You'll also not run into the issue that plenty of AM4 users are having where they 'cut some cost' getting B450 motherboards that didn't support PCIe 4.0 and now can't run some GPUs at full performance without upgrading to B550 just for PCIe 4.0 support.

[MaverickPT]

6 minutes ago, PopsicleHustler said:

Asus Strix  B650E-E

It seems like a good option...but its ASUS. The whole debockle they have been going through with this generation has kinda put me off from buying ASUS

[MaverickPT]

5 minutes ago, GuiltySpark_ said:

PG RIPtide

It seems like the best option at the moment actually. It's a bit more expensive than the other two but not too much.

Also, how much of a bad idea do you think it would be if I stucked some black plastic film over those blue parts? Since they are part of the chipset/VRM cooling. I hate that GaMeRrrrr  look to be honest

[MaverickPT]

3 minutes ago, Agall said:

I'm in the US, so if you have certain retailers you're looking at I'd otherwise have to guess with a USD to Euro conversion (which I know isn't 1:1 based on supply and demand for some products). I would check to see if the same motherboards from any retailers you may use are within reason in terms of extra cost.

 

If its <50€ more as example, then its worth it in my opinion. It'll also be more likely to support future generations if the 8800x3D or 9800x3D are compatible and have some space magic level performance gaps over the 7800x3D. You'll also not run into the issue that plenty of AM4 users are having where they 'cut some cost' getting B450 motherboards that didn't support PCIe 4.0 and now can't run some GPUs at full performance without upgrading to B550 just for PCIe 4.0 support.

Agreed. I'll try to go for a B650E board and cross my fingers that AMD doesn't pull a B350/Zen 3 move 

[PopsicleHustler]

14 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

Agreed. I'll try to go for a B650E board and cross my fingers that AMD doesn't pull a B350/Zen 3 move 

Don't how how useful it is, or if you bought the RAM, but maybe AMD EXPO is more of a "stable" choice of RAM if you're worried about stability issues 

[MaverickPT]

2 minutes ago, PopsicleHustler said:

Don't how how useful it is, or if you bought the RAM, but maybe AMD EXPO is more of a "stable" choice of RAM if you're worried about stability issues 

They only component I already have is the SN850X that's sitting on laptop already (I really needed an upgrade from the 256 GB's that I had).

Everything else is on paper at the moment. 

As for RAM the plan is to get the Trident Z5 Neo DDR5-6000 CL30 2x32 GB AMD Expo from G.SKILL. 

 

Would you say that I should reconsider ASUS? I'm planning on only pulling the trigger around September/October, so hopefully the x3D chips will be stable in ASUS mb's but not sure if they have been making good progress in that regard

[PopsicleHustler]

15 minutes ago, MaverickPT said:

They only component I already have is the SN850X that's sitting on laptop already (I really needed an upgrade from the 256 GB's that I had).

Everything else is on paper at the moment. 

As for RAM the plan is to get the Trident Z5 Neo DDR5-6000 CL30 2x32 GB AMD Expo from G.SKILL. 

 

Would you say that I should reconsider ASUS? I'm planning on only pulling the trigger around September/October, so hopefully the x3D chips will be stable in ASUS mb's but not sure if they have been making good progress in that regard

I can only say from my very limited experience, but so far it runs as expected. Setting RAM to 6000 worked with no issues. So far in CPU-intensive games stability seems to be great.  I will be playing with CPU overclocking next week to see how it works out.

[MaverickPT]

2 minutes ago, PopsicleHustler said:

I can only say from my very limited experience, but so far it runs as expected. Setting RAM to 6000 worked with no issues. So far in CPU-intensive games stability seems to be great.  I will be playing with CPU overclocking next week to see how it works out.

Cool! Let us know your findings if you don't mind! 

 

[Dedayog]

1 hour ago, Agall said:

FD North fits all the way to eATX (not listed support but can confirm). One thing to consider is a B650e board instead to get PCIe 5.0 support. It might not matter in 2023, but with the way the RX 7600 and RTX 4060ti are, having higher generation PCIe support can matter. They might start wiring 8x lanes on even higher mid tier cards just simply due to GPU architecture limitations.

 

B650e pricing isn't too far off and you might find better features. Either MSI or Gigabyte are fine, I've bought plenty of both over the years.

Pcie 5 won't matter in 3930 unless direct storage comes.

 

We're in 2023 and pcie 4 can't beat sata for shit in real world use.

 

As for board, I love my Aorus Pro AX.  I wouldn't buy based on the future as hopefully you'll keep your 7800x3d for years and enjoy it.

[MaverickPT]

2 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

As for board, I love my Aorus Pro AX.  I wouldn't buy based on the future as hopefully you'll keep your 7800x3d for years and enjoy it.

You're also right on that. And I'd save some cash

Goddamnit, I hate choice paralysis

[Agall]

1 hour ago, Dedayog said:

Pcie 5 won't matter in 3930 unless direct storage comes.

 

We're in 2023 and pcie 4 can't beat sata for shit in real world use.

 

As for board, I love my Aorus Pro AX.  I wouldn't buy based on the future as hopefully you'll keep your 7800x3d for years and enjoy it.

I'm not talking about PCIe 5.0 storage, I'm talking PCIe 5.0 for GPUs.

 

We're already seeing issues with PCIe 4.0 8x cards like the RX 7600 and RTX 4060ti which use small enough dies to only get an 8x lane. When running in PCIe 3.0 8x, they get drastically lower performance. Nvidia is already upselling the bins of silicon to maximize profits for its RTX 4000 series, who's to say they don't start doing the same with newer lithography+architecture to start pumping put PCIe 5.0 8x, 4x cards all the way up to the RTX xx80 series?

 

Better $20-50 today than $300 in two years ontop of Murphy's law when replacing any component.

[Dedayog]

37 minutes ago, Agall said:

I'm not talking about PCIe 5.0 storage, I'm talking PCIe 5.0 for GPUs.

 

We're already seeing issues with PCIe 4.0 8x cards like the RX 7600 and RTX 4060ti which use small enough dies to only get an 8x lane. When running in PCIe 3.0 8x, they get drastically lower performance. Nvidia is already upselling the bins of silicon to maximize profits for its RTX 4000 series, who's to say they don't start doing the same with newer lithography+architecture to start pumping put PCIe 5.0 8x, 4x cards all the way up to the RTX xx80 series?

 

Better $20-50 today than $300 in two years ontop of Murphy's law when replacing any component.

 

 

So if we end up with a pcie5 gpu, on a pcie4 board, you're saying it'll run like a pcie5 x8 ?

 

Or is that wrong?  Not seeing how a pcie4 x16 board will be shit later.

 

Forgive me, I don't normally give a shit about pcie lanes 

[Agall]

19 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

 

 

So if we end up with a pcie5 gpu, on a pcie4 board, you're saying it'll run like a pcie5 x8 ?

 

Or is that wrong?  Not seeing how a pcie4 x16 board will be shit later.

 

Forgive me, I don't normally give a shit about pcie lanes 

Just look at benchmarks of the RX 7600, 4060ti, RX 6500 XT, Arc A380, aka any GPU that uses a PCIe 4.0 8x interface but on an older system with PCIe 3.0 maximum support. PCIe 3.0 8x isn't enough for even low-mid tier cards and something like the RTX 4090 sees a sizeable drop in performance running PCIe 3.0 16x. So its not a stretch to think that when PCIe 5.0 cards come out, some of which will certainly be PCIe 5.0 8x (maybe even 4x), that it'll run into bandwidth limitations while running PCIe 4.0. 

 

Really the premise is a fairly reasonable projection that PCIe 5.0 on GPUs will be impactful within the near future, at least the next 5 years, so why not spend a little bit more now to support it?

[Dedayog]

27 minutes ago, Agall said:

Just look at benchmarks of the RX 7600, 4060ti, RX 6500 XT, Arc A380, aka any GPU that uses a PCIe 4.0 8x interface but on an older system with PCIe 3.0 maximum support. PCIe 3.0 8x isn't enough for even low-mid tier cards and something like the RTX 4090 sees a sizeable drop in performance running PCIe 3.0 16x. So its not a stretch to think that when PCIe 5.0 cards come out, some of which will certainly be PCIe 5.0 8x (maybe even 4x), that it'll run into bandwidth limitations while running PCIe 4.0. 

 

Really the premise is a fairly reasonable projection that PCIe 5.0 on GPUs will be impactful within the near future, at least the next 5 years, so why not spend a little bit more now to support it?

But if you plan on riding out a new build for 4-5 years, and end up on a new platform anyway.... Does it matter.

 

Or if you don't buy budget x8 gpus?

 

I don't necessarily agree about spending more now for a maybe in the future.   

 

I guess it depends on a few future factors you'll have to decide now.

[Agall]

19 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

But if you plan on riding out a new build for 4-5 years, and end up on a new platform anyway.... Does it matter.

 

Or if you don't buy budget x8 gpus?

 

I don't necessarily agree about spending more now for a maybe in the future.   

 

I guess it depends on a few future factors you'll have to decide now.

You consider a $400 RTX 4060ti budget?

[MaverickPT]

Thank you all for voicing you opinion! I can understand both your points. As I will not buy the system tomorrow, I guess I'll wait and see how prices vary, how the stability of each platform evolves, etc. And if I can get the PCI-E 5 board for not much more, I'll jump on it!

 Cheers!

[Dedayog]

1 hour ago, Agall said:

You consider a $400 RTX 4060ti budget?

These days, yes.  The 60 series is supposed to be for the budget minded, no?  The 1060 was, the 1660 was, the 3060 was supposed to be, and the 4060 should be.

 

When you have the 4070, 4080, and the 4090... haven't you covered the mid and upper tier?

 

Price doesn't make something budget or not, always.