What is the most reliable problem free AM4 motherboard currently?

sastusbulbas

sastusbulbas

sastusbulbas

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One of my lads is still on a 4770k/Z97/16gb DDR3 Mini ITX system currently with an RX-570 GPU. Sata SSD's.

He simply has not got the funds for a PC being a uni student with little income, and with DDR5, NVMe and GPU pricing, he has decided this old relic of a PC will need to do him for another couple of years.

It's getting to the point I am thinking of starting to think of squirreling away a motherboard, and seeing if his little brother wants to help me put together a budget or slightly better AM4 motherboard bundle as a starter for him towards a better system. Initially I had thought by this time I would have upgraded my own memory and CPU in my AM5 system, but I'm putting that off myself due to pricing.
It may not happen, but I have been looking at second hand DDR4 prices and the 3600x as possible low cost entry points. Or maybe even stretching to the 5700x if the 65w power draw worth considering.

I have contemplated a new motherboard purchase, simply as second hand prices are not really that much lower, the Asus TUF Gaming B550-Plus WiFi II, MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk Max WiFi, Asus ROG Strix B550-F gaming Wifi 2, but online reviews seem to point to network, lan, wifi bugs, usb issues, and a few other problems. So really wondering what peopl emay recommend as a solid reliable AM4 motherboard if I decide to go this route.

Not even sure how worthwhile it is as a 7500f with a Sapphire B850 and 16gb of DDR5 memory would be around £450, the 3600x with a Tomahawk B550 and 32gb of DDR4 would be around £350

I was thinking two NVMe slots with heatsinks is preferable, with reliable wifi as a must, and an inbuilt IO shield. ATX or Micro ATX can be accomodated, but I feel ATX offer better value and are the ones with two NVMe heatsinks.

Any advice or opinions please?
 
I find that where user reviews for products are concerned, especially with PC tech, you often need to try and separate PEBCAK from genuine/consistent issues. Things may have been resolved with more modern drivers/bios updates, assuming the problem was with the board to begin with and not some quirk of their O/S.
Pretty much any B550 should be absolutely fine unless he's aiming to run a 5950 down the line, there was a bit of period with prior generation AM4 boards where there were a lot of problems with VRM's and that was largely resolved with B550 due to the amount of complaints and bad press.

You can view a breakdown of VRM's for AM4 boards here if that is a potential future concern: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Smj5dh97n32wJqm5dkdDcQt8ID7vH52-lKzaaXUUQx8/edit?gid=0#gid=0

Personally? I'd just get the cheapest board that matches your requirements, unless there is some major problem with a hundred page reddit thread and/or news reports for a specific motherboard I'd honestly not worry about it. I've had an Asrock B450 Pro 4-F for years now that's running flawlessly, it was the second cheapest Asrock motherboard and one of the cheapest overall boards new for all of £80 5-6 years ago. It's ran a 1600AF, 3700X, and currently a 5800X3D without breaking a sweat.

If you've got member market access you could put in a bundle request, there's been some fantastic deals lately such as this: https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/t...-3700x-5700xt-16gb-ram-1tb-nvme-400.19010852/

Ryzen 7 3700x CPU
MSI RX 5700 XT MECH OC (8GB)
MSI B450 Tomahawk Max ATX motherboard
Patriot Viper Steel 16GB RAM (DDR4 3200 MHz 2 x 8GB sticks)
TP Link T4E dual band wireless PCi-E card (AC1200)
Seasonic Snow Silent 80 plus platinum 650w PSU
Zalman i3 midi tower case (with window on side)
Click to expand...

I think that was £400 for the lot.
 
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Gray2233 said:
If you've got member market access you could put in a bundle request, there's been some fantastic deals lately such as this:
Click to expand...
I had a full 5600x/32gb/3070ti build listed for £750. Would have accepted a £650 offer but no one wanted. :(
Sold on FB for the full £750 :cry:
 
tamzzy said:
I had a full 5600x/32gb/3070ti build listed for £750. Would have accepted a £650 offer but no one wanted. :(
Sold on FB for the full £750 :cry:
Click to expand...
Yeah, too many 'skinflints' in members market; at least in my experience in the past people are pretty trust worthy though.

I've not sold anything on eBay for years, after some major hassle when I sold a decent soundcard on there, never again for anything.
 
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tamzzy said:
Yeah, it ain't MM without a bit of haggling lol.
Click to expand...
This is true, even if something is well priced it's almost impossible to not try and get an extra tenner off. At least for me, but then I always add a tenner on thinking everyone else does the same.

The real problem with MM is when someone just wants rid of something and sells it for beans, then you want to sell the same thing later and yep, you can only now gets beans for it too.

Off topic, sorry OP
 
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