Gigabyte GA-AB350M... with a 3900X

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Been given a PC with a GA-AB350M-Gaming 3 with a 1600X, also have my 3900X sitting on the shelf. Now I know the 3900X can work in the board with the latest BIOS... but is it a good idea? I've seen some videos on other B350 models saying at stock it's usually fine, but it does push the VRM to the limit.
 
It will work, just would be beneficial to have good airflow around the VRM’s and obviously don’t over clock it haha
 
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Good shout, probably will stick a tiny fan over them just in case. No plans to overclock but will most likely undervolt it.

Undervolting will help. I wouldn’t worry too much, I can’t imagine the board giving up. The most immediate risk is not being able to hold higher core clocks, but I can’t imagine it’s unusable…
 
what do you plan to do with the chip. if you plan of running it rendering for 8hr a day then no you will burn your house down haha..
gaming and stuff like that your fine as the CPU will never be pinned at full load for more than 1 or 2 mins at a time
 
I've had a 3900x running in an msi b350 tomahawk for little over a year now and its been perfectly fine. I did add another fan to improve airflow over the vrm, but have never had any issues.
 
what do you plan to do with the chip. if you plan of running it rendering for 8hr a day then no you will burn your house down haha..
gaming and stuff like that your fine as the CPU will never be pinned at full load for more than 1 or 2 mins at a time
I'm planning to sell it to a friend who needs a PC for their games design course. It'll do the odd blender render every now and then but at most only roughly a couple of hours a month. Gaming I know will be fine, it's just when they do rendering which was what worried me, but they have a rather small budget so couldn't fit in a better board.
 
I'm planning to sell it to a friend who needs a PC for their games design course. It'll do the odd blender render every now and then but at most only roughly a couple of hours a month. Gaming I know will be fine, it's just when they do rendering which was what worried me, but they have a rather small budget so couldn't fit in a better board.

it will throttle before anything explodes, but adding a little fan wont hurt.
i added 2x40mm to a x79 build the vrm heat sink burned my finder badly when overclocking, the 2 tiny fans made a massive difference.

i just used zip ties to stick them together and mount on the heatsink


However all jokes aside, it should be fine.

i used https://www.overclockers.co.uk/noiseblocker-blacksilent-fan-xm2-fan-40mm-3800rpm-fg-018-nb.html
i think i still have them.
 
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I have the same board in my second system and have been looking in to this as I think my taichi might be failing (pending further testing, using 3700x for now).
If you search for 'AM4 tier list' and go to the LTT forum result, they rate it was tier E - Capable of 75A with some ambient airflow, so I haven't had the guts to try my 5950 in it, but should just about be able to handle a 3900x with an undervolt and sufficient VRM airflow, just don't expect to enable PBO!

If you can pick up a cheap board in at least tier C I'd be a lot more comfortable.....if only the B450 Tomohawk was still available for £60!

Edit: a top down cooler would probably help it a fair bit, but otherwise (and if the looks aren't an issue!) I'd personally just zip tie a 120mm fan aimed at the VRMs....40mm are whiny and annoying while providing relatively little airflow!

Edit 2: on re-reading, mine is the full atx version, but I think they're still the same tier as I can't see it listed separately!
 
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Just an update on this for anyone else who plans to do a similar move, the 3900X is working great on this board. PBO disabled, couldn't work out where the undervolt setting was but did enable eco mode. Swapped the cooler for a Nocuta D12L which also blows over the VRMs too (previous cooler was blowing bottom -> top), and during Cinebench they stayed well within comfortable temps. Multicore does drop a bit because of eco mode but gaming performance is still roughly the same, still a huge upgrade for my friend who's been stuck with a 2nd gen Ryzen APU laptop and they've been happy with it, especially with Blender/Maya performance.
 
Great to hear it's working well, I think undervolt is probably described as 'offset voltage' (if available, I've never looked!), but if he's happy with performance at eco mode then that's probably safer and easier!

Has he tried it with a sustained (render) workload yet?
 
Great to hear it's working well, I think undervolt is probably described as 'offset voltage' (if available, I've never looked!), but if he's happy with performance at eco mode then that's probably safer and easier!

Has he tried it with a sustained (render) workload yet?
Yup, with both Blender and Maya. Temps on both CPU and VRMs not even close to worrying levels. The D12L is working wonders.

Tried looking for offset voltage too but couldn't see anything related to it, compared to my X570 when I had the 3900X the available voltage options is definitely a lot smaller, hence why I decided just to go the eco mode route.
 
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