ASUS PRIME Z370-A OR TUF Z370-PLUS GAMING

[DrBonesMcCoy]

I am looking at these two motherboards and have multiple questions which I haven't  been able to find answers to.

• Apparently the Prime has more VRM's than the TUF but they aren't as stable. Which is the most stable out of these boards as I will be overclocking.
• Is the ASUS RGB SYNC the same on both motherboards?
• Should I spend more money and buy the Prime or get the TUF?

I am really unsure as to which motherboard to get as I am using a tempered glass case and want the motherboard to look nice. Although the TUF has the ASUS RGB ability the colors of the motherboard itself kind of make it a deal breaker. What do you guys think?

 

EDIT: The system will be going into a Phanteks Enthoo Pro M tempered glass Special edition

[Princess Luna]

While both motherboards are fine enough the Prime-A is superior in the VRM department.

[DrBonesMcCoy]

1 minute ago, Princess Cadence said:

While both motherboards are fine enough the Prime-A is superior in the VRM department.

But people keep saying that the TUF has better VRM's overall and the website says "military grade" Which to me means they are alot better than the primes

 

[Princess Luna]

Just now, DrBonesMcCoy said:

But people keep saying that the TUF has better VRM's overall and the website says "military grade" Which to me means they are alot better than the primes

 

Marketing stuff really... this whole military grade is silly do you really think that the pentagon computers will have yellow rgb motherboards on their computers?

 

Honestly though I like TUF motherboards but if you're after best of best for the i7 8700k overclocking the Prime-A is better even though as I said it is not like either would be bad... Asus is Asus after all.

[just_dave]

Prime Z370-A

[Mortis Angelus]

I am looking at the same dilemma right now. I bought a PC second hand, and it came with a TUF Z370 Plus gaming. I want to OC and water cool. While I like the yellow color scheme, I also would love the black and white scheme. Anyhow, would I do any good in buying the Prime A, switching out the TUF, or should I just stick with the TUF and save some money?

 

What do you guys think? Will I be able to push 5.0 - 5.1 ghz on the TUF Plus Gaming?

 

(p.s. why were there so few black and white mobos this generation?.... The black and white gigabyte gives eye-cancer, and the MSI-board is just... weird)

 

On 11/2/2017 at 1:57 PM, Princess Cadence said:

Marketing stuff really... this whole military grade is silly do you really think that the pentagon computers will have yellow rgb motherboards on their computers?

 

Well... it is not the color that is "military grade", but the components. They have to withstand certain quality tests to get the "military grade". The thing is that A) Real military hardware have higher quality than mainstream "military grade". It is just that it is usually the lowest military grade that is tested. High end boards probably have much better quality, but the components are never tested for the certificate, and thus no "military grade"-label.

 

 

On 11/2/2017 at 3:38 PM, dave_k said:

Prime Z370-A

 

[lacion]

im currently running the Asus prime z370-a and im overclocking the 8700k at 5.1Ghz no problem at all been running like that for 3 months with zero issues, full stability while using 3dsmax/maya/unity3d editor/davinci resolve/fusion/nuke, i also do a lot of machine learning and i had no problem with that (though mostly GPU intensive i use the CPU extensively too) and of course gaming.

 

so far the mobo has been giving me zero issues, I'm going to do custom waterloop soon so i may try to push my OC further.

[DarkSmith2]

On 2.11.2017 at 1:54 PM, DrBonesMcCoy said:

But people keep saying that the TUF has better VRM's overall and the website says "military grade" Which to me means they are alot better than the primes

The TUF is one of the worst z370 Boards, it doesnt even have functional LLC and only 4phase power delivery... same as the asus prime-p. While the Z370-A is "midrange".

 

[Mortis Angelus]

1 hour ago, DarkSmith2 said:

The TUF is one of the worst z370 Boards, it doesnt even have functional LLC and only 4phase power delivery... same as the asus prime-p. While the Z370-A is "midrange".

 

Thanks!

 

I dont understand why Asus decided to rebrand TUF into a low-end brand. Z270 TUF boards looks like they are ready for the apocalypse with a million sensors, while the Z370 are seemingly replacing the the Pro Gamer branch of mobos. 

[Mortis Angelus]

7 hours ago, DarkSmith2 said:

The TUF is one of the worst z370 Boards, it doesnt even have functional LLC and only 4phase power delivery... same as the asus prime-p. While the Z370-A is "midrange".

 

Sorry to bother you again, but I just noticed in the chart, that the Prime Z370-A is listed twice. One in the lower tier called "Vishay" and one higher up. How to double check which version of the board one gets?

[Mortis Angelus]

8 hours ago, lacion said:

im currently running the Asus prime z370-a and im overclocking the 8700k at 5.1Ghz no problem at all been running like that for 3 months with zero issues, full stability while using 3dsmax/maya/unity3d editor/davinci resolve/fusion/nuke, i also do a lot of machine learning and i had no problem with that (though mostly GPU intensive i use the CPU extensively too) and of course gaming.

 

so far the mobo has been giving me zero issues, I'm going to do custom waterloop soon so i may try to push my OC further.

Whenever you do the custom loop, please keep me updated on that (p.m. me or something)

[DarkSmith2]

20 minutes ago, Mortis Angelus said:

Sorry to bother you again, but I just noticed in the chart, that the Prime Z370-A is listed twice. One in the lower tier called "Vishay" and one higher up. How to double check which version of the board one gets?

you would need to remove the heatsink and take a look at the mosfets. They are labled.

[Mortis Angelus]

1 minute ago, DarkSmith2 said:

you would need to remove the heatsink and take a look at the mosfets. They are labled.

Oh darn... so is it a lottery or region-based which model you get?

[DarkSmith2]

8 minutes ago, Mortis Angelus said:

Oh darn... so is it a lottery or region-based which model you get?

lottery. but the difference aint that big though. If you would want really good stuff you should buy the Taichi or ROG Hero those wont give you any serious overclocking limitations unless you want LN2...

 

For the typical 5GHz overclock both Prime-A variants are fine though. But the TUF is not...

[Mortis Angelus]

2 minutes ago, DarkSmith2 said:

lottery. but the difference aint that big though. If you would want really good stuff you should buy the Taichi or ROG Hero those wont give you any serious overclocking limitations unless you want LN2...

It is both a cost-issue AND the fact I want a black-and-white mobo (for a bw-build). But yeah, the cost is huge thing.

 

And this might sound odd; the way I'm setting up my rig, I want 2 USB 3.1 gen 1 + 2 USB 2.0, and I do not need the USB 3.1 Gen 2. I wish the high-end boards would have 2x USB 3.1 Gen 1 + 1x USB 3.1 gen 2 and 2x USB 2.0. But I guess the issue here is Intel's head-up-in-their-own-ass and not providing more PCI-lanes, compared to Ryzen. Then again, not even Ryzen boards offer such connectivity.

[DarkSmith2]

4 minutes ago, Mortis Angelus said:

It is both a cost-issue AND the fact I want a black-and-white mobo (for a bw-build). But yeah, the cost is huge thing.

 

And this might sound odd; the way I'm setting up my rig, I want 2 USB 3.1 gen 1 + 2 USB 2.0, and I do not need the USB 3.1 Gen 2. I wish the high-end boards would have 2x USB 3.1 Gen 1 + 1x USB 3.1 gen 2 and 2x USB 2.0. But I guess the issue here is Intel's head-up-in-their-own-ass and not providing more PCI-lanes, compared to Ryzen. Then again, not even Ryzen boards offer such connectivity.

You will be fine with the Prime-A unless you want do some crazy Benchmark overclocking. With the z370 boards every board is more or less Lottery. I mean you can buy a Taichi and your CPU needs 1.3v for 5GHz to be stable and on another Taichi it needs 1.35v with the same CPU.. Z370 brought a lot of lottery its just tinkered together to have a Chipset that works for Coffeelake.  Z390 might give another picture, we havnt had such a huge difference in years.

[Mortis Angelus]

1 minute ago, DarkSmith2 said:

You will be fine with the Prime-A unless you want do some crazy Benchmark overclocking. With the z370 boards every board is more or less Lottery. I mean you can buy a Taichi and your CPU needs 1.3v for 5GHz to be stable and on another Taichi it needs 1.35v with the same CPU.. Z370 brought a lot of lottery its just tinkered together to have a Chipset that works for Coffeelake.  Z390 might give another picture, we havnt had such a huge difference in years.

True. But isn't that more about the silicon-lottery of the CPU rather than the motherboards? Or is it both (usually people only mention CPU as the main factor, while mobos are static; either good or bad)

[DarkSmith2]

20 minutes ago, Mortis Angelus said:

True. But isn't that more about the silicon-lottery of the CPU rather than the motherboards? Or is it both (usually people only mention CPU as the main factor, while mobos are static; either good or bad)

both, but the difference on z370 boards is typically "only" +/-0,05v where as your CPU can have a much bigger difference.

But it can still have an impact on my decision of running it 24/7 with 5GHz, if i would need 1.35v delidded with a 360mm AiO i wouldnt do it. I want it to last long and therefore run it with decent temperatures. 70°C+ in summer while streaming+playing isnt an option for me. 

 

I havent delidded mine yet, and it reached 75°C while playing PUBG and stream at the same time, it isnt even summer already and im only @1.25v ...

[Mortis Angelus]

13 minutes ago, DarkSmith2 said:

 

I havent delidded mine yet, and it reached 75°C while playing PUBG and stream at the same time, it isnt even summer already and im only @1.25v ...

How is that even possible? Didn't jayz run OCed i9 and dual titans and only reached like 50 degrees under full synthetic load. AfaIk, he didnt delid. But I could remember wrong. Granted, that was with two giagantic rads and an  open air case, but shouldnt that system be much hotter than your 8700K? Or do you run air cooling? 

[DarkSmith2]

56 minutes ago, Mortis Angelus said:

How is that even possible? Didn't jayz run OCed i9 and dual titans and only reached like 50 degrees under full synthetic load. AfaIk, he didnt delid. But I could remember wrong. Granted, that was with two giagantic rads and an  open air case, but shouldnt that system be much hotter than your 8700K? Or do you run air cooling? 

Na, im on a Eisbaer LT360 its a pretty good cooler its 8°C cooler then my thermalright silver arrow though. (used both with noctua fans, silver arrow with 140mm industrial and the eisbaer now with 120mm chromax fans)

 

I have multiple thoughts on that.

 

#1 when streaming (720p60+medium obs preset) + playing pubg (which uses AVX) it reaches about the same temps as prime95 (maybe 2-3°C difference)

#2 maybe the toothpaste on my 8700k is especially very bad spreaded.

#3 maybe the XMP profile on my ram is pushing extra heat because it sets SA voltage to 1.35v

 

However i talked to alot of OC junkies and experienced guys with 8700k's (people that actually bin them) and they told me its pretty normal and delidding will probably drop my temps to the 55-60°C area. My tool should have been delivered today but unfortunately wasnt. After i already bought another tool that came broken (DR.Delid professional). So i just ordered one of those china tools from ebay and it should actually arrive tomorrow. We will see what will happen ^.^

 

Edit: Also you cant compare x299 CPUs, those are bigger and therfore have a much bigger surface area for cooling.

[lacion]

2 hours ago, Mortis Angelus said:

Whenever you do the custom loop, please keep me updated on that (p.m. me or something)

working on it right now, I messed up my ekwb shopping cart and missed the brackets to mount the pump, so I'm waiting on that should be here on a couple of days, meanwhile, I'm doing the tubing for the rads. i was using a kraken x62 before and the CPU barely went past the 70 degree mark @ 5ghz OC. 

[Mortis Angelus]

5 hours ago, lacion said:

working on it right now, I messed up my ekwb shopping cart and missed the brackets to mount the pump, so I'm waiting on that should be here on a couple of days, meanwhile, I'm doing the tubing for the rads. i was using a kraken x62 before and the CPU barely went past the 70 degree mark @ 5ghz OC. 

 Did you delid? And 70 degree doing what? Gaming or full synthetic load?

[lacion]

9 hours ago, Mortis Angelus said:

 Did you delid? And 70 degree doing what? Gaming or full synthetic load?

no delid, not sure if im going to. i feel kinda bad to buy a tool for deliding to just do it once... i don't really feel like doing it manually. 

 

gaming at ultra for anything i play (Destiny2, WoW, NiNoKuni2, FFXIV and FFXV) at 1440p ultrawide, while not gaming im usually running a VM and a bunch of Docker containers running different task including heavy ML Training Sessions and some AI.

 

also a bit of maya/3dsmax davinci resolve with 4k video and unity3d engine editor

[DarkSmith2]

On 11.4.2018 at 4:05 PM, lacion said:

no delid, not sure if im going to. i feel kinda bad to buy a tool for deliding to just do it once... i don't really feel like doing it manually. 

 

gaming at ultra for anything i play (Destiny2, WoW, NiNoKuni2, FFXIV and FFXV) at 1440p ultrawide, while not gaming im usually running a VM and a bunch of Docker containers running different task including heavy ML Training Sessions and some AI.

 

also a bit of maya/3dsmax davinci resolve with 4k video and unity3d engine editor

ok, i was much lower than this when only gaming.. 

 

@Mortis Angelus

Ive delidded today.

to show before and after delidding prime95 small ffts.

[lacion]

14 minutes ago, DarkSmith2 said:

ok, i was much lower than this when only gaming.. 

 

@Mortis Angelus

Ive delidded today.

to show before and after delidding prime95 small ffts.

damn.... is that liquid cooling? AIO or custom? what paste did you used on the cpu?