Gigabyte A520M DS3H not compatible with Ryzen 5 3400G and Ryzen 3 3200G - why?

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Hand Solo

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Hello everyone. At the end of last year I bought a Gigabyte A520M and a Ryzen 5 3400G. Unfortunately, it wasn't until I had completely assembled my new system and had everything up and running that I noticed the tiny print on the motherboard box stating that it wasn't compatible with my APU. The BIOS does recognize the CPU, and everything runs fine, except that some games cause my screen to go black and system to not respond. Pressing the power and reset buttons does nothing, I need to cycle power to the PSU in order to get the system running again. I saw on a youtube video that this can be fixed by using a discrete graphics card, but given current prices, I don't really want to do that.

So my question is, why are these APUs incompatible with this mobo? Is this something that could be remedied in future BIOS updates? I'm really curious.
 
Out of curiosity, did you do a bios update when you put it together, or did you leave it on whatever it shipped with?
 
Hand Solo said:
Hello everyone. At the end of last year I bought a Gigabyte A520M and a Ryzen 5 3400G. Unfortunately, it wasn't until I had completely assembled my new system and had everything up and running that I noticed the tiny print on the motherboard box stating that it wasn't compatible with my APU. The BIOS does recognize the CPU, and everything runs fine, except that some games cause my screen to go black and system to not respond. Pressing the power and reset buttons does nothing, I need to cycle power to the PSU in order to get the system running again. I saw on a youtube video that this can be fixed by using a discrete graphics card, but given current prices, I don't really want to do that.

So my question is, why are these APUs incompatible with this mobo? Is this something that could be remedied in future BIOS updates? I'm really curious.
Click to expand...
Before you return it, try using the Bios Flashback (Q Flash Plus) or just the standard BIOS update to try to flash the latest firmware.

I've read some people being able to run 2nd Gen Ryzens on B550 boards that are supposed to be incompatible, but they work fine anyway with newer BIOS versions.
 
This is not an incompatibility, if CPU and mobo were incompatible then the PC would not run at all.

A520 mobos unofficially support the 3400G, given recent enough BIOS.
Hand Solo said:
some games cause my screen to go black and system to not respond. Pressing the power and reset buttons does nothing, I need to cycle power to the PSU in order to get the system running again.
Click to expand...
My guess is that either the PSU, the mobo, or the CPU are faulty. With the reported symptoms pointing to PSU. If you can get your hands on another PSU, maybe try swapping that.
Another possibility is that the cooler is not mounted properly and the CPU overheats.
 
A520, like B550, was not initially intended to support Zen 1 or Zen+ models. The 3400G is a Zen+ part even though it has a 3000 series number. I'm actually surprised that it works at all.

If you can't get it stable with a newer BIOS revision, I think you'll have to change either the motherboard or the CPU. Changing the board to a B450 or even A320 is probably the cheaper option; 4xxxG CPU's are hard to find and the newest 5xxxG models aren't cheap.
 
Nothing is faulty. Parts are doing as designed. This is a known, AMD created, compatibility issue. It's right on the AMD chipset sites:

https://www.amd.com/en/chipsets/b550
*Note: AMD B550 chipset is not compatible with AMD Ryzen™ 5 3400G & AMD Ryzen™ 3 3200G processors.

Not specifically stated on the A520 page, but it's the same chipset minus some features. See the chart on either page.
https://www.amd.com/en/chipsets/a520
 
jerry8169 said:
Out of curiosity, did you do a bios update when you put it together, or did you leave it on whatever it shipped with?
Click to expand...
I tried pretty much every BIOS that was on the Gigabyte site at the time. Thanks to your question, I decided to look again, and there was a newer update. I'll have to install one of the games that used to crash previously, see if the problem has been resolved. Thank you. :)
 
bwang said:
yeah that sounds like a bad PSU, what model is it?
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It's a Corsair TX550M. It must be over a decade old by now. I'll start looking around for a new one. Even if the PSU is fine, it's always good to have a replacement.
 
pgaster said:
Nothing is faulty. Parts are doing as designed. This is a known, AMD created, compatibility issue. It's right on the AMD chipset sites:

https://www.amd.com/en/chipsets/b550
*Note: AMD B550 chipset is not compatible with AMD Ryzen™ 5 3400G & AMD Ryzen™ 3 3200G processors.

Not specifically stated on the A520 page, but it's the same chipset minus some features. See the chart on either page.
https://www.amd.com/en/chipsets/a520
Click to expand...
Ahh, thank you. I'll treat this as a learning experience and be more careful in the future.
 
chithanh said:
This is not an incompatibility, if CPU and mobo were incompatible then the PC would not run at all.

A520 mobos unofficially support the 3400G, given recent enough BIOS.

My guess is that either the PSU, the mobo, or the CPU are faulty. With the reported symptoms pointing to PSU. If you can get your hands on another PSU, maybe try swapping that.
Another possibility is that the cooler is not mounted properly and the CPU overheats.
Click to expand...
I do run monitoring software, and the CPU temp is fine, even when I run a prime95 torture test. I'll keep the PSU thing in mind though, thanks.
 
Well thank you all for taking the time to reply. I'll just have to see how this goes with the new BIOS update. According to this youtube video the board will work with my CPU if I use a discreet graphics card.:

I can play some games without issue, and everything else works fine. I planned to buy a discrete GPU eventually, but I wanted to wait for prices to become more reasonable. I'll keep my eyes open for a deal, but until then, I can wait. At least KotOR 2 and Bluestacks run, lol.
 
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