AMD x470, B450 motherboard on zen2

Caporegime
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Ugh, I'm not waiting 5 months for a B550, I want a 3900x system within a month and I haven't a clue which motherboard to get. It looks like an expensive x570 and that annoying fan is the only choice. :confused:

Aorus Elite is pretty well priced. Decent VRM compared with the cheap X570 boards. £210 with a promotion for £30 of steam vouchers currently.
 
Soldato
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I was looking to get a Ryzen 3600 CPU and a MSI Tomahawk, but after reading posts from people having trouble getting Ryzen 3000 CPUs to post, I think I might as well just wait until B550 boards come out.
Is this a problem over multiple forums? I've seen so many people raving about the 3600 B450 combo with the Tomahawk coming out best, I was literally about to buy one today. Gamers Nexus said yesterday it was the best MB at this price point @10:02: https://youtu.be/zuyuS04lD4o
 
Soldato
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Is this a problem over multiple forums? I've seen so many people raving about the 3600 B450 combo with the Tomahawk coming out best, I was literally about to buy one today. Gamers Nexus said yesterday it was the best MB at this price point @10:02: https://youtu.be/zuyuS04lD4o

I don't know really. I've only really seen the thread on the MSI site. https://forum-en.msi.com/index.php?topic=321288.0

It's also been mentioned on Tech Power Up, but that references the thread on the MSI site.

Hardware wise, the Tomahawk and Carbon are highly rated for the price point they are at; partly the reason I decided on getting a Tomahawk and partly because new BIOS can be flashed without the need for a previous gen CPU; but upon seeing some people having issues, that has made me somewhat wary of buying an MSI board until they have released the 'max' 32MB versions of their boards.

I had thought about waiting until B550 is out, but I didn't realise at the time that would not be until next year. I'll likely waint until MSI has released their 'max' boards, and go from there.
 
Soldato
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I'm not sure if I want to get an Asus Prime x570-P for £200 (I lolled when the sumary on Anandtech states "The ASUS Prime X570-P sits at the lower end of the X570 product and has an MSRP of $160") or an MSI Carbon AC B450 Max for £125 (hopefully). I really can't think of a good reason to spend the additional £75. Although I am also not sure if I am going 3700x or 3800x.
 
Soldato
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Update on my side.
So I logged a ticket with Gigabyte last night reporting that my x470 aorus ultra gaming wont boot with any more than 16Gb of RAM (Running F40 Bios) and this morning I got a update on my ticket. They have passed me bios F41b - which I think is a development type. It is not yet listed on the bios website. Will give that a try tonight.
 
Associate
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I ordered a Tomahawk along with a 3600x last week and finally got the chance to assemble it this morning and failed to POST. I flashed with the Q-flash method both V17 and V18 BIOS and it always 'looked' like it had worked but all I ever got was the CPU error LED when I powered it up. I called OC to see what my options were and they said if I drove to the store they would put an old CPU and flash it that way. So that would be 120 mile round trip!! I asked to just return it as it wasn't fit for purpose and they said they would only return it as unwanted along with all the caveats that cover it. So I've now had to pay £7 to get it returned and been effectively forced into buying a 570 board at over £100 more as they're more likely to run straight out of the box.

As I'd 'treated' myself to a new PC at a signifaicant cost MSI have managed to ruin the party! Needless to say the new MB is not MSI.....
 
Associate
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I really wish there were some b450 combos with the motherboards bios already updated. Cant really justify paying more for the motherboard than the cpu.
 
Associate
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Does anyone know if Overclockers are willing to flash the bios of the non x570 boards before they're sent out if requested?

I'm getting tempted by the b450 m-ITX boards but don't want the hassle of getting flash kits from AMD or buying a 2000 process just to flash and then return.
 
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Does anyone know if Overclockers are willing to flash the bios of the non x570 boards before they're sent out if requested?

I'm getting tempted by the b450 m-ITX boards but don't want the hassle of getting flash kits from AMD or buying a 2000 process just to flash and then return.
if you get a board with bios flashback you can install a bios without a cpu installed
 
Associate
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I ordered a Tomahawk along with a 3600x last week and finally got the chance to assemble it this morning and failed to POST. I flashed with the Q-flash method both V17 and V18 BIOS and it always 'looked' like it had worked but all I ever got was the CPU error LED when I powered it up. I called OC to see what my options were and they said if I drove to the store they would put an old CPU and flash it that way. So that would be 120 mile round trip!! I asked to just return it as it wasn't fit for purpose and they said they would only return it as unwanted along with all the caveats that cover it. So I've now had to pay £7 to get it returned and been effectively forced into buying a 570 board at over £100 more as they're more likely to run straight out of the box.

As I'd 'treated' myself to a new PC at a signifaicant cost MSI have managed to ruin the party! Needless to say the new MB is not MSI.....


I'm in the same situation.
I bought b450 tomahawk from a different supplier.

I used the flashback button, and it worked.

Installed my 3700x, got to the bios a few times, but most of the time blank screen and cpu error from the bios light.
I simply don't know what to do, other than return the b450 and purchase x570.

Re seat the cpu try again.
Re flash the bios.
Return the board.

Thoughts?
 
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Does anyone know if Overclockers are willing to flash the bios of the non x570 boards before they're sent out if requested?

I'm getting tempted by the b450 m-ITX boards but don't want the hassle of getting flash kits from AMD or buying a 2000 process just to flash and then return.

Unfortunately none of the ITX B450 motherboards have the ability to update the BIOS without a compatible CPU.

I think someone posted that they phoned OCUK to enquire about the BIOS update prior to shipping, but think they were told no. Might be worth calling to double check.
 
Soldato
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been effectively forced into buying a 570 board at over £100 more as they're more likely to run straight out of the box.

As I'd 'treated' myself to a new PC at a signifaicant cost MSI have managed to ruin the party! Needless to say the new MB is not MSI.....
I could be wrong but all this talk on the net is about the tomahawk not b450. The bios needed for 3000 is seemingly larger than the MB can take, hence the MAX versions of 32mb coming out soon, so instead msi strap on some watered down bios? I haven't seen these problems for other b450's, just ram problems.
 
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Soldato
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I sent a web note to ask if they could pre flash the bios on a B450 board and was told they could not...

My kit arrived, including the MSI B450 Tomahawk, as im coming from Intel, i have no older AMD CPU to put in and flash, so i formatted and old 128mb flash drive to fat32 and put on the latest V18 bios from MSI.
I plugged in the two power leads from the PSU, and the USB to the correct port and hit the bios flashback button and let it finish, then once done, built the board into the case ect and powered it up... No screen came on... so i plugged the flash stick back in and ran it again and boom,, Bios loaded and all working now.
 
Soldato
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I really wish there were some b450 combos with the motherboards bios already updated. Cant really justify paying more for the motherboard than the cpu.

I hope some others will release some updated revisions of existing 450/470 boards, such as MSI are planning to do. They may not though, as I think this is only something MSI are doing because of the problems people have encountered, which is most likely a result of MSI having to strip their BIOS down to fit 16MB EEPROM chips.

I'm in the same situation.
I bought b450 tomahawk from a different supplier.

I used the flashback button, and it worked.

Installed my 3700x, got to the bios a few times, but most of the time blank screen and cpu error from the bios light.
I simply don't know what to do, other than return the b450 and purchase x570.

Re seat the cpu try again.
Re flash the bios.
Return the board.

Thoughts?

It's difficult to know what to do. From what I've seen some people say; some got it working after flashing just the once, some needed to flash more than once, but I've seen some people say it worked maybe once or twice after flashing, then refuses to work after rebooting.

I'm not really sure why it works for some people and not t

You could try reflashing the BIOS again. Either you'll get success or you won't.

If it were me, I'd probably return the board and wait until MSI releases the updated 'max' version of the Tomahawk, then get that. Paying the extra for an X570 board, is something I wouldn't want to do. Heck, I'd probably rather wait 6 months untl B550 boards are out than pay £200+ for a decent X570 board.

You could always consider a Gigabyte board instead, as they have a service where you can send them the board to be flashed with latest BIOS; you just pay for the shipping.
 
Associate
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It's difficult to know what to do. From what I've seen some people say; some got it working after flashing just the once, some needed to flash more than once, but I've seen some people say it worked maybe once or twice after flashing, then refuses to work after rebooting.

I'm not really sure why it works for some people and not t

You could try reflashing the BIOS again. Either you'll get success or you won't.

If it were me, I'd probably return the board and wait until MSI releases the updated 'max' version of the Tomahawk, then get that. Paying the extra for an X570 board, is something I wouldn't want to do. Heck, I'd probably rather wait 6 months untl B550 boards are out than pay £200+ for a decent X570 board.

You could always consider a Gigabyte board instead, as they have a service where you can send them the board to be flashed with latest BIOS; you just pay for the shipping.

Yeah, I gave it a few tries.
Had enough in the end, with a few hours spent.
Sent the B450 board back for a refund, and just ordered X570 Gigabyte Ultra to complete my build.
 
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Associate
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Arriving a bit late here but which X470/B450 boards are the hive mind recommending to pair with the 3700X? Having a hard time finding any that specify they support 3600mhz DDR4. I'm looking at the B450 Tomahawk but looks to only support 3200mhz.
 
Associate
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Arriving a bit late here but which X470/B450 boards are the hive mind recommending to pair with the 3700X? Having a hard time finding any that specify they support 3600mhz DDR4. I'm looking at the B450 Tomahawk but looks to only support 3200mhz.

I doubt the b450 are gonna list higher than 3200 odd because ryzen 2000 not officially supporting it.

I'm waiting for the Tomahawk max for the bigger bios but....

https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/B450-TOMAHAWK-MAX/Specification

For AMD Ryzen Gen3 (R5/R7/R9)
2667/2800/2933/3000/3066/3200/3466/3600/3733/3866/4000/4133 by A-XMP OC mode
 
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