I'm looking for a motherboard with these features

Ken Masters · January 11

Hello. I want to buy a 7950x3D processor for gaming and work, but I don't know which motherboard to choose.

I don't often change PCs, so I prefer to have PCIe 5.0 for whatever may happen in a few years.
Although it's not essential, I'd prefer the motherboard to have a 5.1 minijack audio output with the typical green, black, and orange cables to connect my current speakers.
I will need to install a 10 Gb PCIe Ethernet card, so the motherboard must have at least a second PCIe x4 slot that doesn't share lanes with the main GPU's PCIe to avoid reducing the speed to 8x.
The motherboard must have at least 6 SATA ports to connect all my hard drives, a rack for hot swapping, and a DVD burner.

I have reviewed all available motherboards and I think the only one that could work for me is the MSI MPG X670E CARBON WIFI. However, I've read that this motherboard has many problems with the BIOS and fast boot cannot be activated because it causes errors.

I don't know whether to go for the MSI and wait for them to improve the BIOS over time. I would prefer Asrock, as they are said to be very stable, boot Windows quickly, and because I am happy with my current equipment of that brand, but I can't find any Asrock motherboard that meets my requirements.

Could you recommend an alternative to the MSI that meets these requirements? Or do you think I should take a chance with the MSI MPG X670E CARBON WIFI and wait for future BIOS updates?

The MSI already exceeds what I had planned to spend, so I don't want to go over $500.

Thank you for your help!

Shimejii · January 11

First off, do you actually need a 7950x3D? Should say what you exactly intend to do for work besides gaming. I usually say go 7800x3D / 14700k for gaming/ content creation stuff. Depending on what you do. I dont ever recommend 7950x3D as the issues with it are prevalent, go 7950x as its good enough for both gaming and work without needing special scheduling drivers that are known to have issues.

You dont need a $500 motherboard, also you dont need PCIE 5.0 stuff, especially NVME drives. Gen 4 NVME's is all you will ever need for now. By the time it potenitally matters in 10+ years you will need to upgrade anyhow, and B650 boards can support it too.

Ken Masters · January 11

11 hours ago, Shimejii said:

First off, do you actually need a 7950x3D? Should say what you exactly intend to do for work besides gaming. I usually say go 7800x3D / 14700k for gaming/ content creation stuff. Depending on what you do. I dont ever recommend 7950x3D as the issues with it are prevalent, go 7950x as its good enough for both gaming and work without needing special scheduling drivers that are known to have issues.

You dont need a $500 motherboard, also you dont need PCIE 5.0 stuff, especially NVME drives. Gen 4 NVME's is all you will ever need for now. By the time it potenitally matters in 10+ years you will need to upgrade anyhow, and B650 boards can support it too.

I opted for the 7950x3D because it consumes far fewer watts than the Intel and because the AM5 platform has a longer lifespan. I need it for gaming and for working with video editing, Photoshop, Virtual Studio... Is the 7950x3D problematic for these purposes? I know it can have issues in gaming if it doesn't use the V-cache, but I understand that Windows itself manages to select the right core, and you can also manually select it, for example, with Process Lasso.

I also want to keep using my current 850W Corsair AX850 power supply. Choosing the Intel (which is less efficient) might not be sufficient for 5 HDDs, 2 M.2s, a water pump, 9 fans, a 10GB network card, and the RTX 4080.

From the more budget-friendly B650 platform, only the MSI motherboards work for me because they are the only ones with at least 6 SATA ports. Unless I add a PCIe card with SATA ports to another model, but then I would have to run the SATA cables across the middle of the motherboard.

I understand that MSI BIOS are not very mature yet and they also take quite a while to boot Windows, I don't know if I'm wrong or if this happens with all MSI boards.

Best regards and thank you.

Shimejii · January 11

4 hours ago, Ken Masters said:

I opted for the 7950x3D because it consumes far fewer watts than the Intel and because the AM5 platform has a longer lifespan. I need it for gaming and for working with video editing, Photoshop, Virtual Studio... Is the 7950x3D problematic for these purposes? I know it can have issues in gaming if it doesn't use the V-cache, but I understand that Windows itself manages to select the right core, and you can also manually select it, for example, with Process Lasso.

I also want to keep using my current 850W Corsair AX850 power supply. Choosing the Intel (which is less efficient) might not be sufficient for 5 HDDs, 2 M.2s, a water pump, 9 fans, a 10GB network card, and the RTX 4080.

From the more budget-friendly B650 platform, only the MSI motherboards work for me because they are the only ones with at least 6 SATA ports. Unless I add a PCIe card with SATA ports to another model, but then I would have to run the SATA cables across the middle of the motherboard.

I understand that MSI BIOS are not very mature yet and they also take quite a while to boot Windows, I don't know if I'm wrong or if this happens with all MSI boards.

Best regards and thank you.

id suggest just going 7950x instead of 7950x3D. You can set it to the 125W mode and get most of the performance without that massive power increase. Process lasso does not always work well with the Vcache and normal CCD. That scheduler has had a LOT of posts about it causing issues, some get lucky and dont have the issues but there are quite a few posts about it so if you are using it as a work system id suggest the normal 7950x.

you can use a 7950x with a 850W psu.

I would highly suggest you migrate off using HDD's at this point. Their use has passed and really only make sense for NAS, Backing up data, or having one or two larger HDDS for putting finished videos, games you may want to return to etc. 5 Hard drives though? That is something you need to consider not doing. Going for 3 larger NVMEs will serve you better, with then having 2 HDDS or so.

MSI Bios are fine. Each vendor has its own flavor of bios so you can see all the different ones you like and chose.

Ken Masters · January 12

17 hours ago, Shimejii said:

id suggest just going 7950x instead of 7950x3D. You can set it to the 125W mode and get most of the performance without that massive power increase. Process lasso does not always work well with the Vcache and normal CCD. That scheduler has had a LOT of posts about it causing issues, some get lucky and dont have the issues but there are quite a few posts about it so if you are using it as a work system id suggest the normal 7950x.

you can use a 7950x with a 850W psu.

I would highly suggest you migrate off using HDD's at this point. Their use has passed and really only make sense for NAS, Backing up data, or having one or two larger HDDS for putting finished videos, games you may want to return to etc. 5 Hard drives though? That is something you need to consider not doing. Going for 3 larger NVMEs will serve you better, with then having 2 HDDS or so.

MSI Bios are fine. Each vendor has its own flavor of bios so you can see all the different ones you like and chose.

Well, if the 7950x3D only occasionally has problems with some games, it doesn't bother me too much. The important thing is that it doesn't cause any issues for work. But if it does have problems for work purposes, then I think I'll opt for the 7950x.

I don't use HDDs out of whim, nor for installing programs or games. I need to have a large amount of files always accessible, and the smallest of the HDDs is 4TB.

I've been looking at people's opinions on various AM5 motherboards for days and it seems that MSI's BIOS receive many complaints and are the slowest to boot. With each update, sometimes they fix some things and break others. However, I like them the most for their hardware, so I'm not sure what I'll do.

Thanks.