Question Testing 3950X

[Helios-vmg]

Hey, guys.

I have a GA-AX370-Gaming 5 and had seen months ago that it's supposed to support the 3950X with a BIOS update. Yesterday I finally got the CPU, and when I installed it after updating the BIOS, the computer failed to POST. I've already sent a support request to Gigabyte, so that's not what this question is about.
My problem is that the only other AM4 motherboard I have available is an Asus Prime A320M-K, which I use as my router and which is also supposed to support the 3950X. Obviously it's entirely possible that this board would also be incompatible with the CPU, but if it does work I'd confirm that the CPU is not dead. Beyond just firmware compatibility, would it be alright to put the 3950X on it just to see if it can POST, or would there be any risk either to the motherboard or to the CPU? I'd guess at the worst if I tried to push it (which I won't) the CPU would just throttle itself because it can't draw enough power from the board, but I just wanted to confirm my assumption.

Thanks.

 

[drivinfast247]

You do have a GPU installed and monitor connected, right?

 

[Helios-vmg]

Yes, I have a spare crappy Radeon that I use on systems without integrated graphics.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Hey, guys.

I have a GA-AX370-Gaming 5 and had seen months ago that it's supposed to support the 3950X with a BIOS update. Yesterday I finally got the CPU, and when I installed it after updating the BIOS, the computer failed to POST. I've already sent a support request to Gigabyte, so that's not what this question is about.
My problem is that the only other AM4 motherboard I have available is an Asus Prime A320M-K, which I use as my router and which is also supposed to support the 3950X. Obviously it's entirely possible that this board would also be incompatible with the CPU, but if it does work I'd confirm that the CPU is not dead. Beyond just firmware compatibility, would it be alright to put the 3950X on it just to see if it can POST, or would there be any risk either to the motherboard or to the CPU? I'd guess at the worst if I tried to push it (which I won't) the CPU would just throttle itself because it can't draw enough power from the board, but I just wanted to confirm my assumption.

Thanks.

Did you update the BIOS with the old CPU in it? You can't do it with the 3950x.

Also a good idea is to reset CMOS both BEFORE and AFTER you do the BIOS update.

EDIT: and ALSO, make sure the board isn't reverting to the backup BIOS. I had a B350 Gaming 3 that would annoyingly revert to the backup when it wanted to. If you do a dual BIOS on a motherboard, for all that's holy it should include a switch to control when it kicks in. And allow easy updating too.

 

[Helios-vmg]

Did you update the BIOS with the old CPU in it?

Of course. I confirmed the version from the BIOS setup before trying to install the new CPU.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Of course. I confirmed the version from the BIOS setup before trying to install the new CPU.

errck...resetting CMOS is all that's left I guess; probably need the old CPU back in there to do that. Oh, and making sure it's not reverting to a backup BIOS that's not Ryzen 3000 aware.

Does it issue any beep codes? or troubleshooting LED's if it has them?

 

[Helios-vmg]

errck...resetting CMOS is all that's left I guess...oh, and making sure it's not reverting to a backup BIOS that's not Ryzen 3000 aware.

I did that already. Installed the CPU, didn't work, pushed the CMOS reset button, still didn't work, reinstalled the old CPU, confirmed that the BIOS had gone back to its factory version, reupdated, retested with the new CPU, still didn't work, reinstalled the old CPU, still in the latest version.
To me it's definitely either that the CPU is just dead, or a firmware bug on the motherboard, hence my question about testing it on the other motherboard.

 

[drea.drechsler]

....
To me it's definitely either that the CPU is just dead, or a firmware bug in the motherboard, hence my question about testing it on the other motherboard.

I don't think it would hurt the A320 to post and run the 3950X if it has BIOS support for it. Pushing it would get the VRM's a bit toasty, though, so it's probably not a good home for it.

 

[Turtle Rig]

Hey, guys.

I have a GA-AX370-Gaming 5 and had seen months ago that it's supposed to support the 3950X with a BIOS update. Yesterday I finally got the CPU, and when I installed it after updating the BIOS, the computer failed to POST. I've already sent a support request to Gigabyte, so that's not what this question is about.
My problem is that the only other AM4 motherboard I have available is an Asus Prime A320M-K, which I use as my router and which is also supposed to support the 3950X. Obviously it's entirely possible that this board would also be incompatible with the CPU, but if it does work I'd confirm that the CPU is not dead. Beyond just firmware compatibility, would it be alright to put the 3950X on it just to see if it can POST, or would there be any risk either to the motherboard or to the CPU? I'd guess at the worst if I tried to push it (which I won't) the CPU would just throttle itself because it can't draw enough power from the board, but I just wanted to confirm my assumption.

Thanks.

I don't mean to be harsh my friend but why on earth with you get the highest end consumer CPU and the lowest end consumer motherboard which is couple years old. At minimum you need a B450. I may be wrong but IMO it ain't going to happen with that old chipset and a 3950x unless you prove me wrong, which you wont. That board came out such a long time ago. Why not just buy a B450 better yet a X570 to take full advantage of your expensive processor. You can grab a Aorus Elite X570 for around 150 dollars or so. I wonder what Gigabyte will say their support is iffy to say the least. I don't think things will change sorry to say. Once again Im on your side my friend and the sides of the gurus up top, but pairing that motherboard with a shiny 3950x is a cardinal sin. ✝🙈

 

[Helios-vmg]

I don't mean to be harsh my friend but why on earth with you get the highest end consumer CPU and the lowest end consumer motherboard which is couple years old. At minimum you need a B450. I may be wrong but IMO it ain't going to happen with that old chipset and a 3950x unless you prove me wrong, which you wont. That board came out such a long time ago. Why not just buy a B450 better yet a X570 to take full advantage of your expensive processor. You can grab a Aorus Elite X570 for around 150 dollars or so. I wonder what Gigabyte will say their support is iffy to say the least. I don't think things will change sorry to say. Once again Im on your side my friend and the sides of the gurus up top, but pairing that motherboard with a shiny 3950x is a cardinal sin. ✝🙈

I got the 3950X because it was an easy upgrade path. The manufacturer specifies that it supports 1000, 2000, and 3000 series Ryzens and specifically lists the 3950X in the list of supported CPUs, with the minimum BIOS version required. So regardless of how old the board is or how cheap new boards are, if the manufacturer states that it supports it, the computer should at least be able to POST.
<edit>I'll also mention that the latest BIOS is from July, so it's not like it's out of support or something. Clearly Gigabyte has manpower assigned to maintaining the firmware.</edit>

I didn't come here to hear about the morality of putting two pieces of hardware together or to ask for recommendations of new motherboards to buy, I came to ask whether I could feasibly test that the CPU works at all with the hardware I have available. Of course I know I can just buy a new motherboard; most problems are trivially fixed by just throwing more money at them. That's not the point.

I don't mean to be rude, but if you can't answer my specific question then kindly go away. It's frustrating enough to deal with hardware compatibility issues without having the implication thrown at me that I'm an idiot for ever thinking that a motherboard that's supposed to support a CPU would work with that CPU.

 

[Turtle Rig]

I got the 3950X because it was an easy upgrade path. The manufacturer specifies that it supports 1000, 2000, and 3000 series Ryzens and specifically lists the 3950X in the list of supported CPUs, with the minimum BIOS version required. So regardless of how old the board is or how cheap new boards are, if the manufacturer states that it supports it, the computer should at least be able to POST.
<edit>I'll also mention that the latest BIOS is from July, so it's not like it's out of support or something. Clearly Gigabyte has manpower assigned to maintaining the firmware.</edit>

I didn't come here to hear about the morality of putting two pieces of hardware together or to ask for recommendations of new motherboards to buy, I came to ask whether I could feasibly test that the CPU works at all with the hardware I have available. Of course I know I can just buy a new motherboard; most problems are trivially fixed by just throwing more money at them. That's not the point.

I don't mean to be rude, but if you can't answer my specific question then kindly go away. It's frustrating enough to deal with hardware compatibility issues without having the implication thrown at me that I'm an idiot for ever thinking that a motherboard that's supposed to support a CPU would work with that CPU.

No dude I care that is all, as I said my friend no ill will intentions. But I can see how you would take it at that. Im just trying to be dead honest to my fellow Tom's gurus. I want you to have the best experience and not run into problems. I mean you could always sell that motherboard and buy a new one that support your CPU and can take full advnatage of it's PCIe Lanes and have PCIe 4.0 which the 3xxx series and 5700XT Support along with newer SSD and M.2 drives. However there is no real world performance difference between PCIe 3.0 and 4.0 only in benchmarks. Also I did research and a 3xxx series Geforce card on a PCie 3.0 platform will give pretty much the same performance as on a PCIe 4.0 platform. So I praise you for trying to save money and listening to the manufcatoer and doing your reseearch. My heart just drops when you have a 800 dollar top of the line consumer CPU with that motherboard but that is just me.

Once again Im sorry It wasn't a attack I was just brutally honest. Anyhow if you want to keep this motherboard let us see what Gigabyte support says. There is a possibility it works with lower end 3xxx series AMD chips but not the monster 3950x ya know. That is worst case scenario, then at that point you have option to sell the motherboard and buy a new one and only lose like 60 bucks or so out of it but get all the fancy stuff and all the jazz that comes with a current B450 or X570 board. Good Luck. 🙏🏽🤷‍♀️🙈😷☮

 

[Helios-vmg]

No dude I care that is all, as I said my friend no ill will intentions. But I can see how you would take it at that. Im just trying to be dead honest to my fellow Tom's gurus. I want you to have the best experience and not run into problems. I mean you could always sell that motherboard and buy a new one that support your CPU and can take full advnatage of it's PCIe Lanes and have PCIe 4.0 which the 3xxx series and 5700XT Support along with newer SSD and M.2 drives. However there is no real world performance difference between PCIe 3.0 and 4.0 only in benchmarks. Also I did research and a 3xxx series Geforce card on a PCie 3.0 platform will give pretty much the same performance as on a PCIe 4.0 platform. So I praise you for trying to save money and listening to the manufcatoer and doing your reseearch. My heart just drops when you have a 800 dollar top of the line consumer CPU with that motherboard but that is just me.

Once again Im sorry It wasn't a attack I was just brutally honest. Anyhow if you want to keep this motherboard let us see what Gigabyte support says. There is a possibility it works with lower end 3xxx series AMD chips but not the monster 3950x ya know. That is worst case scenario, then at that point you have option to sell the motherboard and buy a new one and only lose like 60 bucks or so out of it but get all the fancy stuff and all the jazz that comes with a current B450 or X570 board. Good Luck. 🙏🏽🤷‍♀️🙈😷☮

Yes, I did the research. This was a big purchase for me, more than an entire month worth of wages (obviously not implying you should have known that, just pointing it out). Again, I bought the CPU specifically because Gigabyte specifies that it supports it. I don't care about any of the new features in newer boards and I'm satisfied with this one, so the only way I'd spent even more money on this upgrade is if someone from Gigabyte confirms that the board doesn't support the CPU and I've confirmed that the CPU works.

Sorry about before. I'm just a bit frustrated. I've been waiting since last year for this CPU and it's annoying not being able to use it now that I finally got it.

 

[egda23]

Yes, I did the research. This was a big purchase for me, more than an entire month worth of wages (obviously not implying you should have known that, just pointing it out). Again, I bought the CPU specifically because Gigabyte specifies that it supports it. I don't care about any of the new features in newer boards and I'm satisfied with this one, so the only way I'd spent even more money on this upgrade is if someone from Gigabyte confirms that the board doesn't support the CPU and I've confirmed that the CPU works.

Sorry about before. I'm just a bit frustrated. I've been waiting since last year for this CPU and it's annoying not being able to use it now that I finally got it.

Well it's clearly supported starting with Bios F40
https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-AX370-Gaming-5-rev-10/support#support-cpu
Are you positive that you have a good PSU ?

 

[RodroX]

Hi I don't know if you check all this so here it goes:

Do you have the BIOS switches on "Single" and "Main" BIOS like explainned in the manual page 12?

https://download.gigabyte.com/FileList/Manual/mb_manual_ga-ax370-gaming5_e.pdf

I would put the old chip, start the PC, got to BIOS and see what BIOS is working (check the LEDs on the motherboard), then check what verison the BIOS is. If version is atleast F40, then I would shut down the PC and check the switches and make sure they are Single and Main so the board does not chnage between the BIOS.

Then try the R9 3950X.

Hope you can make it work.

 

[Helios-vmg]

Well it's clearly supported starting with Bios F40

https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-AX370-Gaming-5-rev-10/support#support-cpu

Are you positive that you have a good PSU ?

The PSU is rated for up to 130 W on the CPU rails, IIRC. As I type this it's running an overclocked 1700 that under load can draw up to 96 W (measured by software). Even if it's not quite up to snuff to handle the 3950X under full load (from looking at tests I'd say it's right on the borderline), I don't think it should prevent the system from POSTing. I could of course be wrong, but I've never seen a system fail POST due to not having enough current, excluding failed PSUs or simply disconnected cables.
There's a 1200 W PSU at the office powering a dual Xeon system, that I could use to test this hypothesis, but the logistics of such a test would be a huge pain. I'd first like to hear back from Gigabyte.

I would put the old chip, start the PC, got to BIOS and see what BIOS is working (check the LEDs on the motherboard), then check what verison the BIOS is. If version is atleast F40, then I would shut down the PC and check the switches and make sure they are Single and Main so the board does not chnage between the BIOS.

Interesting. I did know about this feature, but I didn't know the firware was able to autorescue: https://www.gigabyte.com/microsite/55/tech_081226_dualbios.htm
It's somewhat unclear under what circumstances the BIOS will attempt the autorescue, though. I will try this later, though. Thanks for pointing this out.

 

[drea.drechsler]

...
It's somewhat unclear under what circumstances the BIOS will attempt the autorescue, though
....

That's exactly what I kept running into with my B350 Gaming 3 that had Gigabyte's 'Ultra Durable', switchless, dual BIOS. Never really sure why it would revert to the backup BIOS, or how to make it when I wanted it to, and had no idea how to update it since early BIOS' were so bad.

 

[RodroX]

The PSU is rated for up to 130 W on the CPU rails, IIRC. As I type this it's running an overclocked 1700 that under load can draw up to 96 W (measured by software). Even if it's not quite up to snuff to handle the 3950X under full load (from looking at tests I'd say it's right on the borderline), I don't think it should prevent the system from POSTing. I could of course be wrong, but I've never seen a system fail POST due to not having enough current, excluding failed PSUs or simply disconnected cables.
There's a 1200 W PSU at the office powering a dual Xeon system, that I could use to test this hypothesis, but the logistics of such a test would be a huge pain. I'd first like to hear back from Gigabyte.


Interesting. I did know about this feature, but I didn't know the firware was able to autorescue: https://www.gigabyte.com/microsite/55/tech_081226_dualbios.htm
It's somewhat unclear under what circumstances the BIOS will attempt the autorescue, though. I will try this later, though. Thanks for pointing this out.

I just took a look at the manual, old dog habits, you know they die hard.

Actually it was drea.drechsler the one that wrote about the dual BIOS, and that ring a bell on me about a video I saw not soo long ago on Tech Yes City channel. The guy there (sorry can't remember the name) had some troubles with the function (I think it was some MSI motherboard that didn't had a switch to pick which BIOS to boot from, so the motherboard keep jumping from one to another).

 

[Helios-vmg]

Well, guys, I managed to get it to work, with help from Gigabyte. Here's what I did:

1. Flipped the BIOS switch to "single", disabling the DualBIOS functionality. I don't think this made a difference, but I'm noting it anyway.
2. As instructed by Gigabyte's technical support, I installed the CPU and removed all the memory modules, and turned the system on like that, allowing it to fail POST. Then I turned if off.
3. I installed one of the modules, then turned it back on. It POSTed and booted correctly.
4. I installed the other module and it once again POSTed.

By the way, I also tested the CPU on the Asus motherboard and that worked flawless the first time around.

Thanks everyone for your help!