For those wondering if B650 is enough for AM5...(mATX sets w/ 7950X OC)

[Dedayog]

https://wccftech.com/asrock-110-us-b650-motherboard-sets-overclocking-world-record-amd-ryzen-9-7950x-cpu/#:~:text=With the correct settings applied,The score was 306%2C686 MIPS.

 

A New Entry-Level Overclocking Legend Is Born! ASRock's B650M-HDV/M.2 Motherboard Achieves Record Shattering Performance With AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X CPU!

The overclocking was done with extreme cooling such as Liquid Nitrogen which kept the behemoth AMD Ryzen 9 7950X CPU running at 6.834 GHz across all of its cores and what's impressive is that it was done on the ASRock B650M-HDV/M.2 motherboard which has a 8+2+1 phase design. This is an entry-level motherboard and usually what you'd expect is to see such overclocks on super high-end motherboards with a higher number of VRMs than what is featured on B650M.

 

My thoughts:  Further proving that AM5 is rock solid and reinforcing that you should select a board for features alone, as even mATX can handle ANY AM5 CPU.  $110 at MC even.

 

[Hellowpplz]

11 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

https://wccftech.com/asrock-110-us-b650-motherboard-sets-overclocking-world-record-amd-ryzen-9-7950x-cpu/#:~:text=With the correct settings applied,The score was 306%2C686 MIPS.

 

A New Entry-Level Overclocking Legend Is Born! ASRock's B650M-HDV/M.2 Motherboard Achieves Record Shattering Performance With AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X CPU!

The overclocking was done with extreme cooling such as Liquid Nitrogen which kept the behemoth AMD Ryzen 9 7950X CPU running at 6.834 GHz across all of its cores and what's impressive is that it was done on the ASRock B650M-HDV/M.2 motherboard which has a 8+2+1 phase design. This is an entry-level motherboard and usually what you'd expect is to see such overclocks on super high-end motherboards with a higher number of VRMs than what is featured on B650M.

 

My thoughts:  Further proving that AM5 is rock solid and reinforcing that you should select a board for features alone, as even mATX can handle ANY AM5 CPU.  $110 at MC even.

 

Don't know what it is but something tells me it's enough ://

[Dedayog]

8 minutes ago, Hellowpplz said:

Don't know what it is but something tells me it's enough ://

People will mention VRMs (power delivery) on lower priced boards as being an issue.  It's been stated for a while now that B650 boards are really well built and more than enough for an AM5 CPU.

 

This shows that even a micro ATX board with even worse VRM's that regular ATX B650 boards can deliver enough power to keep a 7950X's 16 cores all running at 6.8GHz.  Impressive for a $110 board.

[PDifolco]

21 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

https://wccftech.com/asrock-110-us-b650-motherboard-sets-overclocking-world-record-amd-ryzen-9-7950x-cpu/#:~:text=With the correct settings applied,The score was 306%2C686 MIPS.

 

A New Entry-Level Overclocking Legend Is Born! ASRock's B650M-HDV/M.2 Motherboard Achieves Record Shattering Performance With AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X CPU!

The overclocking was done with extreme cooling such as Liquid Nitrogen which kept the behemoth AMD Ryzen 9 7950X CPU running at 6.834 GHz across all of its cores and what's impressive is that it was done on the ASRock B650M-HDV/M.2 motherboard which has a 8+2+1 phase design. This is an entry-level motherboard and usually what you'd expect is to see such overclocks on super high-end motherboards with a higher number of VRMs than what is featured on B650M.

 

My thoughts:  Further proving that AM5 is rock solid and reinforcing that you should select a board for features alone, as even mATX can handle ANY AM5 CPU.  $110 at MC even.

 

AM5 boards all have overkill VRM, not sure if manufacturers expected more power or if it's just a way to increase their price for useless features...

[Skiiwee29]

Vrm quality plays a part, but the biggest issue on budget boards is usually cooling, not delivery. 

[Dedayog]

Just now, Skiiwee29 said:

Vrm quality plays a part, but the biggest issue on budget boards is usually cooling, not delivery. 

Good point, so we need to question whether they artificially cooled the VRM's to a disproportionate degree.

 

If the stock cooling isnt enough, that defeats the power delivery aspect.

[Skiiwee29]

1 minute ago, Dedayog said:

Good point, so we need to question whether they artificially cooled the VRM's to a disproportionate degree.

 

If the stock cooling isnt enough, that defeats the power delivery aspect.

Well when you're overclocking to this degree, they will always have extra cooling beyond the default heatsinks provides as they will be pushing a lot of wattage through them. Usually it's a fan or 2 taking the cold air from the ln2 pot and blowing it downward towards it. 

[RONOTHAN##]

39 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

Good point, so we need to question whether they artificially cooled the VRM's to a disproportionate degree.

 

If the stock cooling isnt enough, that defeats the power delivery aspect.

I mean, looking at the setup photos there doesn't really appear to be any sort of extra fans pointing at the VRM, but then again there are two things to remember:

1. With LN2, you also freeze the PCB itself through the CPU, so even if the board has no heat sink it will have quite a bit of cooling from the LN2 indirectly. 
2. The benchmark only runs for a minute at most, so there just isn't enough time for it to overheat. 

 

To be clear, for normal usage, this VRM is still plenty fine according to HWU's testing of it, it's just that you can't really judge an LN2 run for how good its VRM is for cooling. For actual power delivery performance though, that's fair game.

 

Plus, those XOC boards like the B650E Tachyon and X670E Gene do still have the advantage in memory support, since I would expect those boards to have at least a 400MT/s lead in 2:1 mode (1:1 mode should be basically the same though, as even a 4 DIMM B650 Tomahawk can do 7200 1:1 when on LN2)

[YoungBlade]

36 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

People will mention VRMs (power delivery) on lower priced boards as being an issue.  It's been stated for a while now that B650 boards are really well built and more than enough for an AM5 CPU.

Those people didn't watch Hardware Unboxed's B650 VRM video then. It was pretty clear that all but a couple of B650 boards can easily handle any CPU currently available for the platform - the Asrock B650M-HDV/M.2 was highlighted in that video, and has been a common recommendation of theirs for entry level AM5 systems that want to be able to upgrade in the future.

 

Things like this are why reliable 3rd party reviews are so valuable - it demonstrates that unless you need the improved connectivity of the X670 platform or some specific motherboard feature that a more expensive board has, there's no real need to spend more than about $150 on an AM5 board, even for a high end build.

[Alex Atkin UK]

1 hour ago, PDifolco said:

AM5 boards all have overkill VRM, not sure if manufacturers expected more power or if it's just a way to increase their price for useless features...

Or its future proofing as they can't know how much power future CPUs may need.

 

I realise its optimistic to think manufacturer don't want you to buy a new board every couple of years, but honestly the reputational damage should their competitors boards end up performing better with newer CPUs is probably enough of a reason for them to go overkill this time around.

[PDifolco]

1 hour ago, Alex Atkin UK said:

Or its future proofing as they can't know how much power future CPUs may need.

 

I realise its optimistic to think manufacturer don't want you to buy a new board every couple of years, but honestly the reputational damage should their competitors boards end up performing better with newer CPUs is probably enough of a reason for them to go overkill this time around.

Problem is there's no way to get a board that meets requirements and not by 3 times, and price of AM5 board is like +50% of AM4 ones, sure there's more lanes and PCIe5, why add useless power delivery ?

It's kinda like only being able to buy 5 meters long cars because your family may expand

 

 

[Alex Atkin UK]

8 hours ago, PDifolco said:

Problem is there's no way to get a board that meets requirements and not by 3 times, and price of AM5 board is like +50% of AM4 ones, sure there's more lanes and PCIe5, why add useless power delivery ?

It's kinda like only being able to buy 5 meters long cars because your family may expand

I doubt very much that better VRMs are responsible for more than 1% of that.  Motherboard vendors themselves said it was largely due to the cost of having more PCB layers and the complexity of PCIe5 signalling.