Question Ryzen 5 3600 compatible with RDIMM RAM? Budget LLM build

[Eriksen89]

Hi all.
I have a desktop running a small LLM via a Home Assistant add-on (Oobabooga), and I've hit the ceiling on the model size I can "effectively" use.
Currently I have a Ryzen 5 3600 and 16GB of RAM, on a Lenovo "special" motherboard. I will need to change out the motherboard.
The idea is to get a new motherboard and use server RAM since I can get it cheap. For this I was considering 32GB 2Rx4 PC4-2666V DDR4 ECC MTA36ASF4G72PZ-2G6E1SI sticks, and 4 of them, for a total of 128GB RAM.

After extensive googling I am still not able to definitively tell if this is possible with the CPU I have. I don't need the ECC function, I just need the capacity. I was considering the MSI B550M PRO-VDH WIFI motherboard, again due to it being cost-friendly.

Any insight is very welcome.

 

[Lutfij]

If you're changing the motherboard get a B450 chipset board or a B550 chipset if that's cheaper than a B450 chipset board. As for your ram, you can look at a DDR4-3200MHz dual channel ram kit if B450. If you're looking towards a B550 chipset board, then pick out a DDR4-3600MHz dual channel ram kit.

If you're looking for stability in your build, look at the rams listed in your chosen motherboard's QVL.

 

[NedSmelly]

Ryzen CPU will technically work with ECC non-registered, but it all depends on the motherboard implementation. And I have gone down this same path looking for a suitable motherboard (NAS build) and yes it’s freaking impossible finding clear specs on the product pages.

The best discussion I could find about this was this Reddit post. Asrock and Asus seem to be the most likely to work. Good luck.

(Another link here)

Postscript: looks like your specified RAM is registered ECC, so it probably won’t work regardless of which motherboard you choose.

 

[Eriksen89]

Thanks a lot for the feedback and ideas.