Which cheapest Z370 for 5ghz?

snowdog · 21 Jan 2018 at 16:35

Hello,

As per title, I want the cheapest possible board to go with an 8700K to 5ghz (delidded & thermal poo replaced with liquid metal if needed).

Would something like an MSI Z370-A Pro be good enough, or do I need more stable power supply with a more expensive board and/or better bios.

I need 6 Sata's. Bluetooth would be a nice plus but since a usb bluetooth module is 5 euro's tops it's not a prereq.

From other thread

Now I don't care about audio, I use Linear PCM and Bitstream over HDMI, my current board actually has a broken sound card and I don't care.
Lan, so long as it works I don't care. Usb 3.1, dunno what it adds, pretty uninteresting, but nice for re-sale value.

SLI would be nice to have as an option (since I'm at UHD) but not if it means spending 50% more...

Priority is I want to have 5ghz with not much faffing about with setting, easy 5 min tops overclock.
I'm used to Asus bios, hence biased towards that, but open to MSI, Asrock, Gigabyte, etc...

snowdog · 21 Jan 2018 at 16:58

Looks nice but in this case way over budget, I have a 75€ off voucher for a specific retailer, and they don't sell ASrock Z370 boards

.

MSI Z370-A Pro costs 118 euros, so can pick it up for 43 euros.
Asus PRIME Z370-P is 147, so 72 eu for me.
MSI Z370 SLI plus is 140, so 65 eu for me.
Asus TUF Z370-Plus Gaming would be 98 euros for me
Asus PRIME Z370-A would be 107 euros for me
Asus ROG STRIX Z370-H Gaming would be 114 for me

The ASrock would mean I can't use my voucher and have to spend 150 euros

, more than triple than the cheapest msi option

Hence my question, is it worth wasting double the money, or do they all do 5 ghz no problem?

snowdog · 21 Jan 2018 at 17:29

Slightly different because i have a 75 euro voucher and some options aren't really options for me.

I am looking at bang for buck here.

EDIT: So max 200 mhz difference between the cheapest nastiest z370 board and the most expensive ''gaming'' bs board?

snowdog · 21 Jan 2018 at 19:15

Anything in particular against the MSI Z370 SLI plus? Or even the cheap 370-A pro?

What does that Asus offer overlocking wise, above the cheaper options?

snowdog · 21 Jan 2018 at 21:12

Ty, I will go for the Asus Prime A.
I do not wish to be limited by mainboard for overclocking.

Swapping a cpu is an easy & quick job, if I won't get a nice 8700k it's no biggie as I will get my hands on another one anyhow. Changing a mainboard is very painsome though!

snowdog · 31 Jan 2018 at 16:39

Because I don't care for rubbish such as:

Led nonsense
Brand
Audio
Other rubbish features nobody needs (''gaming''/ROG/fatality/gamers/''boost''/whatever other nonsense marketing BS)
Fancy unnecessary cooling.
Onboard gfx
LAN (any gigabit is fine)
USB 3.1

Anyhow, I'm running 5.0 ghz @ 1.3v, and it can do 5.1 @ 1.47V (and pass a long test with burntest)
5.2 boots @ 1.47 boots, but crashes after a few burntest runs. It posts up to as much as 5.5 ghz, but to unstable to start windows.

Not tried asyc overclock yet (eg. 2 cores @ 5.4 max, 4 cores at 5.1).

Delidded and with thermal poo replaced by Liquid metal as it was 88c @ full load @ 4.8 ghzb efore delidding, now 25C cooler @ 5ghz...

Running 5.0 for now as temps are now ncie and cool (60-65 during burntest) and to not push silly voltages through it.