[SOLVED] Will B450/B550/X570 motherboards support Ryzen 4000?

[bazz5313]

Hi,
I am getting a new PC to replace my very old FX 6300 system, and trying to budget as best as possible. I am thinking of getting a Ryzen 5 3600X CPU. The B450 are cheaper boards, but the B550/X570 are also within my budget. Am I best to go for the 570 as I assume it is more future proof if I want to upgrade my CPU at a later date, plus I am not sure if Ryzen 4000 is supported on 450/550?
Thanks

 

[tennis2]

Go with B550.

AMD skipped Ryzen 4000 and went straight to 5000. Its probably the last generation on AM4, so future- proofing is a moot point now.

 

[Math Geek]

b450 will work as well.

but just about all mobo's need a BIOS update for 5000 series. it's just so new not many have been made and shipped after the chips were released. to be safe i'd make sure whatever you pick can update the BIOS without a cpu installed just in case. of course as time goes by, this won't be an issue but for now it's worth considering until they've had more time to update and ship boards.

 

[bazz5313]

b450 will work as well.

but just about all mobo's need a BIOS update for 5000 series. it's just so new not many have been made and shipped after the chips were released. to be safe i'd make sure whatever you pick can update the BIOS without a cpu installed just in case. of course as time goes by, this won't be an issue but for now it's worth considering until they've had more time to update and ship boards.

Hi, Thanks for the replies. Will go for either b450 or b550 in that case. When looking for a motherboard to purchase, how can I tell if the motherboard Bios can be updated without a cpu installed?

 

[drea.drechsler]

Hi,
I am getting a new PC to replace my very old FX 6300 system, and trying to budget as best as possible. I am thinking of getting a Ryzen 5 3600X CPU. The B450 are cheaper boards, but the B550/X570 are also within my budget. Am I best to go for the 570 as I assume it is more future proof if I want to upgrade my CPU at a later date, plus I am not sure if Ryzen 4000 is supported on 450/550?
Thanks

3600X is a good CPU for gaming, even today. B450 boards are indeed cheaper and work as well as any other board (X570 or B550) for 6 core CPU's. Also, most will get a BIOS at some point that will allow upgrading to a Ryzen 5000 processor in the future. So that will provides you as much future proofing as you'll get on AM4.

If cost is a priority to meet budget then go B450 with confidence. But if you can handle the cost B550 is better because they got a significant upgrade in VRM quality across the board. But I'd not look at X570 (or X470) unless you have peculiar need for a lot of devices that need high bandwidth PCIe. A B450 (or B550) fully supports a GPU, an NVME (two on some) and from 4 to 6 SATA SSD/HDD's which is all most anybody would need. X570 has no better 'future proofing' than a B450 in the sense that AMD's said they're moving off AM4 for processors after Zen 3.

And last: it's confusing but 4000 series processors are (generally) only APU's based on Zen 2. Zen 3 is fourth gen Ryzen but 5000 series CPU's. If you should look at a 4000 series APU then it is unsupported on B550 but will work on B450/X470 or X570 with an appropriate BIOS.

 

[Math Geek]

Hi, Thanks for the replies. Will go for either b450 or b550 in that case. When looking for a motherboard to purchase, how can I tell if the motherboard Bios can be updated without a cpu installed?

you have to look at the board specs. every brand calls it something different.
ASUS - BIOS Flashback
MSI - M-Flash
Gigabyte / Aorus - Q-Flash Plus

and other brands call it different as well. not every board has it but it is found on most mid range and higher boards. just have to do the homework and check up on the models you find interesting. i know my GB Aorus pro has it as does the other Arous models of various chipsets.

 

[bazz5313]

Thanks for the reply. I have checked the 2 boards I am interested in and the Asus B550 Prime Plus, and Asus TUF Gaming B550 Plus specs state " BIOS -256MB FLASH ROM, UEFI AMI BIOS - Does that equate to BIOS Flashback?
Furthermore, checked my budget, I can go with a Ryzen 5 5600X now, and either the prime plus or Tuf gaming board.

 

[bazz5313]

And last: it's confusing but 4000 series processors are (generally) only APU's based on Zen 2. Zen 3 is fourth gen Ryzen but 5000 series CPU's. If you should look at a 4000 series APU then it is unsupported on B550 but will work on B450/X470 or X570 with an appropriate BIOS.

Apologies, does that mean I couldnt use 4000/5000 on a B550 board. My only concern was when I bought my last system many years ago, I inadvertently bought a CPU/MOBO combination that had little upgrade capability for my CPU, so have had to plod along upgrading RAM, GPU etc to try and keep playing games at reasonable settings. I thought I would get a mobo whereby I would have the facility to upgrade the CPU by a reasonable amount some time in the future, though I am hoping the RYZEN 5 5600X will last for some time.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Apologies, does that mean I couldnt use 4000/5000 on a B550 board. My only concern was when I bought my last system many years ago, I inadvertently bought a CPU/MOBO combination that had little upgrade capability for my CPU, so have had to plod along upgrading RAM, GPU etc to try and keep playing games at reasonable settings. I thought I would get a mobo whereby I would have the facility to upgrade the CPU by a reasonable amount some time in the future, though I am hoping the RYZEN 5 5600X will last for some time.

You can't use a 4000 series CPU, e.g., 4700G, on B550...but you can any 5000 series CPU.

We're currently being told that 5000 series processors are the last Zen processors on the AM4 socket. Zen 5 will come out using a new socket and doubtless chipset and that will limit upgradeability of the CPU on AM4.

But many current gaming scenarios have the GPU limiting performance. For the forseeable future you might be better off upgrading GPU when you've topped out with a Ryzen 5000 CPU, for gaming at least.

 

[bazz5313]

Hi thanks, I understand now. Much appreciated.

 

[Math Geek]

Thanks for the reply. I have checked the 2 boards I am interested in and the Asus B550 Prime Plus, and Asus TUF Gaming B550 Plus specs state " BIOS -256MB FLASH ROM, UEFI AMI BIOS - Does that equate to BIOS Flashback?
Furthermore, checked my budget, I can go with a Ryzen 5 5600X now, and either the prime plus or Tuf gaming board.

the tuf gaming model has flashback but the prime plus does not.

 

[bazz5313]

Typically - I have found another website, with all the parts I want. However, I am unsure whichmotherboard to get. (RYZEN 5 5600X, GTX 1660 SUPER, 16GB RAM, etc...). The motherboards offered are mATX and ATX. The case I am ordering is ATX.
As advised by Math Geek above, all the mobo's have Q-flash plus.

The mobo options are all Gigabyte
B550M DS3H mATX == B550 AORUS ELITE mATX == B550M AORUS PRO-P mATX == B550 Gaming X ATX.
Price variation from DS3H through to Gaming X is £46. (Then it jumps to X570 boards).
Does it matter if mATX or not? What would be best buy bearing in mind I am trying to keep cost down, lol.

Edit. Just noticed there is a cheapest - A520M S2H and DS3H (cheapest out of all the mobo's) and also a A520 AORUS ELITE board too.

Many thanks.

 

[Math Geek]

mATX is not a problem. to save space you usually give up extra pcie slots and sometimes memory slots (2 instead of 4). scan the features and be sure it's what you need. but as far as performance goes, there is not really any difference.