Hardware Unboxed test budget motherboard performance

[sck451]

I watched this rather interesting Hardware Unboxed video about budget motherboards and the extent to which they throttle/limit the performance of CPUs.

Broadly speaking, the Intel platform performed terribly: inconsistent and significant problems on B560 boards with VRM overheating and throttling on the i7-11700 that lead to a significant performance loss in games and other performance.

AMD, however, didn't seem to suffer the same. The key quotation (20:37 in the video):

"We now know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you can purchase any B550 motherboard from the likes of Asrock, ASUS, MSI or Gigabyte, stick a Ryzen 7 5800X on it and receive maximum performance. And the same is also true for the 12-core Ryzen 9 5900X, though you may run into a small amount of trouble with the 5950X on certain entry-level boards. ... Having said all that, I've cleared around 30 B550 motherboards to work with the 5950X for extensive all-core workloads and this includes boards as cheap as $90 and really any model priced at or above $120 will work happily with the 16-core processor while delivering performance that is comparable to the top-end X570 motherboards. I suppose what I'm getting at here is you can buy virtually any B550 motherboard and then stick whatever AM4 processor you like on it and not have to worry about whether or not you're getting maximum performance -- so the level of performance that you should get."

Now, I'm plainly not about to start recommending Prime B550/Ryzen 5950X combinations on this forum (definitely not!), but it seems that yet another way for AMD to outperform Intel is in motherboard specification/reliability, and that the AMD platform is solid enough that the majority of motherboards can handle any chip that will physically fit the socket without throttling. And, just possibly, it's possible to spec a system with a lower tier of motherboard than we conventionally do in this forum without performance losses...

Would be fascinated to hear others' opinions on all this.

(I can't believe that I, who understood very little of PC tech 18 months ago, just watched a 25-minute video of motherboard benchmarks!)

 

[SpyderTracks]

AMD put a lot of work into the B550 design. It's leaps and bounds beyond what B450 was able to do with the VRM setups, and blurs the line between B550 and X570 in respects to thermal performance.

But then with the increased TDP of the 5000 series CPU's they had to do something pretty major really.

I don't know what on earth Intel are playing at quite frankly, they're making a bad situation much worse, but fan boys just don't understand how bad it really is. You have to have a high end motherboard, top end cooling and high end CPU just to remain relevant.

 

[TonyCarter]

I think part of it is Intel‘s insistence on claiming low TDPs (for marketing purposes) and then the board manufacturers build to those specs…but everyone knows you’ll only ever see those low TDPs when the computer is off 😆

 

[SpyderTracks]

I think part of it is Intel‘s insistence on claiming low TDPs (for marketing purposes) and then the board manufacturers build to those specs…but everyone knows you’ll only ever see those low TDPs when the computer is off 😆

Soooo true

 

[sck451]

I think part of it is Intel‘s insistence on claiming low TDPs (for marketing purposes) and then the board manufacturers build to those specs…but everyone knows you’ll only ever see those low TDPs when the computer is off 😆

Trying to fix an engineering problem in marketing. Peak Intel.

 

[DarTon]

I did quite a bit of research prior to buying my PCS PC. Most of that supports what Hardware Unboxed is saying. I'm not so convinced that there is a rigid linear mapping between CPU and MB i.e. 5600X => B550, 5800X => TUF X570, 5900X => STRIX X570 etc. It's a useful starting point but I don't think it's a disaster at all if someone pairs a B550 with a 5800X. The problem is more when people try to pair a 5900X/3070 with a B450 and CV550W PSU. That's the forum's value. Stopping people making grievous errors.

I recently bought a system with 5900X but what I really wanted was a 5900. Only OEMs like Dell are currently getting access to it. With a lower TDP of 65W and clock at 3GHz (vs. 65W and 3.7GHz on the 5900X), multi-core performance is about 10% less (but still 25% better than the 5800X). You could quite legitimately pair that with a B550, less expensive cooling, and your price-performance ratio would be superb.

 

[Scott]

I had a chat about this briefly with another forum member and gave my 2 cents there too. I think the B550 is just night and day different from what would be considered a budget board. There is no doubt that they have the capacity to handle any of the chips on offer, which is a fantastic hand to play.

The key difference, for me, is the variability of the control. The higher end motherboards have far tighter voltage control, even with the capacity being the same. To that end I don't agree that you will get the same performance out of the motherboards with the higher end chips (5900X+). I think you will be able to eek a bit more out of the top end boost clocks with tighter voltages, and it goes without saying when it comes to overclocking. I agree that performance won't be hampered by the B550, in that it'll perform easily as well as it does on the tin. The gains given with the higher end boards will definitely be diminishing by the £.... but, when looking at such a level of system it's just common sense to match the components when the money is available.

I've said for quite a long time that I would have no issues pairing a 5800X with the B550 boards, most definitely for general use and gaming.

 

[Steveyg]

Genuinely shocked at how good the B550 seem to perform for the price they retail at

Mental that this is considered the entry level budget board, going to have to rethink a bit of what I thought I knew

 

[SpyderTracks]

Genuinely shocked at how good the B550 seem to perform for the price they retail at

Mental that this is considered the entry level budget board, going to have to rethink a bit of what I thought I knew

It's not entry level, B550 is mid range, A520 is entry level.

 

[Steveyg]

It's not entry level, B550 is mid range, A520 is entry level.

You're correct sorry I'm thinking on a gaming level where I generally go with the B550 as the minimum recommendation

 

[Scott]

Genuinely shocked at how good the B550 seem to perform for the price they retail at

Mental that this is considered the entry level budget board, going to have to rethink a bit of what I thought I knew

Yeah as above, it's just the level that we tend to play at. It's the "Budget" option that we recommend, but it's definitely not the budget option.

The A520 is the "Intel" model offering, it's pointless.