Ryzen 3700X assistance please - motherboard pick

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Limp Gawd
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Jun 15, 2006
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Hello everyone. I am about to build my son (with him of course) a gaming PC. I have been out of the "staying current with everything" game for a long time, built 100s of PCs though so no issue there.

Just would like a little guidance on what motherboard and ram to get please. Naturally I would imagine he will want blinged out RGB stuff but that is not 100% required just preferred.

CPU - Ryzen 3700x air cooled
GPU - 2070S
500gb NVME drive - additional mechanical HDD installed as needed
1440P UW monitor

He may or may not get into o/c in the future right now want rock solid build for him to game with his friends who all left him behind on Xbox and went PC.
TIA for your advice.
 
I run mine on an older MSI x470 Gaming Plus i picked up refurbished for $74 on newegg .com I had to flash it with a gen 2 = 2200G boot for the new bios and just about any AM4 will work with the 65 watt cpu after you flash it or buy a Max board which is drop in support ..

Also i use the stock cooler and Team Force Red 3200 Cl 16 .. games great for me !
Edit XFX RX 5700 ref flashed

 
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I'm running a 3700x with a Gigabyte Aorus x570 Elite with Crucial Ballistix 3200 memory. The build went without a hitch, everything has been working great. Some complaints about the quality of the BIOS, but evidently that's a pretty global complaint with all these retail motherboards. Though If I did it over, I'd have sprung for the 3600 memory, don't save all that much with the 3200 and you want the higher speed for the Infinity Fabric the CPU uses to communicate internally.

An alternate suggestion is the MSI x570 Tomahawk which looks really nice, I think it's better than the Aorus Elite and a little bit cheaper too. It's just recently been released and might be hard find.

For a less expensive motherboard I'd wait for the B550 boards, they'll be out soon.

I'm using a Noctua NH-U9S cooler. I have to use a small cooler because my system is in a 4u rackmount. It was kind of a splurge, but it's quieter and a bit cooler than the stocker. Noctua stuff is rather pricey, but the quality is really good. Still the Wraith Prism that comes with the 3700x is decent.

Using a couple Sabrent Rocket 4.0 drives, very happy with these. Relatively inexpensive and meet advertised speeds. They have pretty impressive endurance too.
 
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Also i use the stock cooler and it games great for me !
Edit XFX RX 5700 ref flashed

heaven is not a game and its barely using your cpu and hitting 65c+. i guess its adequate.

op get some good 3600 or 3733 ram and you can get a b450 or better board. hit amazon, sort by rating and get something that fits your price range.
 
oh yeah i forgot the rgb. op, you need all the rgb if its for your son ;)
 
heaven is not a game and its barely using your cpu and hitting 65c+. i guess its adequate.

op get some good 3600 or 3733 ram and you can get a b450 or better board. hit amazon, sort by rating and get something that fits your price range.

I have Borderlands 3
 
Thanks guys.

Yeah was planning on a 212 for sure. Had good experience with them so far.

Motherboards are just stupid expensive or OOS right now. What a pain.

And yeah was thinking of some 3600 ram for sure price difference isn't that much


What about this ram https://www.newegg.com/g-skill-32gb-288-pin-ddr4-sdram/p/N82E16820232861?&quicklink=true
that ram is really good...its solid choice with worst possible outcome just tweaks the timings till the board is cool with it. (if necessary)
 
I'm running a 3700x with a Gigabyte Aorus x570 Elite with Crucial Ballistix 3200 memory. The build went without a hitch, everything has been working great. Some complaints about the quality of the BIOS, but evidently that's a pretty global complaint with all these retail motherboards. Though If I did it over, I'd have sprung for the 3600 memory, don't save all that much with the 3200 and you want the higher speed for the Infinity Fabric the CPU uses to communicate internally.

An alternate suggestion is the MSI x570 Tomahawk which looks really nice, I think it's better than the Aorus Elite and a little bit cheaper too. It's just recently been released and might be hard find.

For a less expensive motherboard I'd wait for the B550 boards, they'll be out soon.

I'm using a Noctua NH-U9S cooler. I have to use a small cooler because my system is in a 4u rackmount. It was kind of a splurge, but it's quieter and a bit cooler than the stocker. Noctua stuff is rather pricey, but the quality is really good. Still the Wraith Prism that comes with the 3700x is decent.

Using a couple Sabrent Rocket 4.0 drives, very happy with these. Relatively inexpensive and meet advertised speeds. They have pretty impressive endurance too.

check with thaiphoon burner and see if you're ballistix are the micron revision E dies. if they are just use ryzen calculator and overclock them to 3600mhz.. that's what i did with my crucial sports LT 3200 which use the same micron rev. E dies and was the reason why i bought them.
 
What do you guys think of this board. Having a hard time finding anything in stock that isn't 3-6 times its normal price. MC is about a 90 min drive for me but it appears I will have to go there for the case anyway so if this board is a good choice I can grab it too.

https://www.microcenter.com/product/510034/asus-b450-f-rog-strix-gaming-amd-am4-atx-motherboard
Its a solid board for stock or a mild OC, if you havent bought it already you can snag the 3700x in combo for at MC $270 (and get another 20$ off).
Just make sure you purchase it for in store pickup so you dont drive all that way and then are out of stock.
 
Ryzen 3/4/5 series VRM Spreadsheet - Would cross-check any board against that and make sure you're getting a solid implementation.

GSkill Ripjaws DDR4 3200CL14 - Just got this for my 3950x / x570 Aorus Ultra setup and it does CL14@3666 at 1.44v right off the bat. It can go higher, but my chip IF doesn't like the 1866 1:1 clocking.

Yeah I have been checking the spreadsheet.

I am probably going with the Asus board above or an Asrock X570 Steel Legend from the forum. Price difference is $50. Don't really need the X570 chipset since he will not be delving deep into O/C and as usual its always hard to tell if the board is good or not (either of them) as reviews are all over the place.

Thanks.
 
GSkill Ripjaws DDR4 3200CL14 - Just got this for my 3950x / x570 Aorus Ultra setup and it does CL14@3666 at 1.44v right off the bat. It can go higher, but my chip IF doesn't like the 1866 1:1 clocking.

What ICC's are in those? I would guess they are probably the same as in the Neos just loosened to CL16 for 3600Mhz at 1.35V.

OP to put in perspective, I got a set of RipJawsV 3600 Cas 19 and tightened them to Cas 16 with stock voltage (Hynix CJR). When I got them, 32GB (2x16GB) was $110. I've seen them around $130 recently (no RGB though).
 
What ICC's are in those? I would guess they are probably the same as in the Neos just loosened to CL16 for 3600Mhz at 1.35V.

OP to put in perspective, I got a set of RipJawsV 3600 Cas 19 and tightened them to Cas 16 with stock voltage (Hynix CJR). When I got them, 32GB (2x16GB) was $110. I've seen them around $130 recently (no RGB though).

ram.png

Doing a little bit of testing here at 3600 under 1.4v - trying to see if i can still do 3666@above timings but with a bit less voltage.
 
The b450 board looks like a winner. Only concern I would have is the link type and speed of the second m2 slot ,other than that it shines for the price. Just built one for my wife to replace her aging 4770k system and she loves how fast ,quiet and cool it runs.
 
Actually ended up going with the Asrock Steel Legend. Its X570 and should last for a while even if he decides on a upgrading down the line. Wasn't much more and also has RGB control built in for the fans and stuff
 
My complaint with 400 series mini bioses is workarounds for functions like fan control if you don’t have a Max board or equivalent.
I don’t want to run Msi dragon center for fan curve I used to have in a non Max bios.
Asrock is ok, Asus is ok, Gigabyte I haven’t touched with a Zen2 bios yet.
Cant wait for a buddy to upgrade from his 2700 and see what happens after flash.
 
IIRC, those Neos aren't b-die, so not the same ICCs.

That's pretty solid for those timings.
Are you sure the neo's aren't b-die or would the c18 timings be b-die? just bought a 16 gig set of cl 18 3600 mhz from newegg with like the last gigabyte ultra x570 they had and thaiphoon and cpuid pick it up as samsung.bdie 1.pngbdie 2.png
 
Are you sure the neo's aren't b-die or would the c18 timings be b-die? just bought a 16 gig set of cl 18 3600 mhz from newegg with like the last gigabyte ultra x570 they had and thaiphoon and cpuid pick it up as samsung.View attachment 248803View attachment 248804

No, I'm not sure. I just looked at the timings and speed and assumed it was Hynix CJR in 2x16GB based on that. 2x8GB is probably different though. After reading through some NE reviews of the Neo 2x16GB (link above), it sounds like they are Hynix. I don't know that G.Skill plays fast and loose like Corsair with the same model and a million different revisions. They are usually pretty good about sticking to the same ICCs and changing the model when they change them. I would guess that the 2x8GB is Samsung and the 2x16GB is Hynix or there might be different model numbers with different ICCs in the Neos.
 
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No, I'm not sure. I just looked at the timings and speed and assumed it was Hynix CJR in 2x16GB based on that. 2x8GB is probably different though. After reading through some NE reviews of the Neo 2x16GB (link above), it sounds like they are Hynix. I don't know that G.Skill plays fast and loose like Corsair with the same model and a million different revisions. They are usually pretty good about sticking to the same ICCs and changing the model when they change them. I would guess that the 2x8GB is Samsung and the 2x16GB is Hynix or there might be different model numbers with different ICCs in the Neos.
Honestly I'm not sure either I read multiple reviews after ordering the neo kit saying hynix d die or something similar not sure if d but whatever I read hynix and I was wondering the same thing about if g.skill was just taking a particular line of approved icc's from a singular manuf. or multiple ones for their approved for ryzen series. It's not a big deal.
 
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