If have built a few systems using this board and the B350, but was never able to get a Bristol Ridge APU to work. I followed the approved memory list from ASRock without success. I Always ended up using a Ryzen CPU and Cheap GPU or since March Raven Ridge. It would be interesting if anyone else got this to work with a Bristol Ridge APU?
Yes, I just finished building a system for a friend with this board and Ryzen 5 2400G. It works great, but Bristol Ridge is still a no go even with the latest BIOS 4.50.
I have the board in my hands now (you had me second guessing myself) and I can confirm there is a USB 3.1 Gen1 header and a USB 2.0 header; each of them gives an additional two ports.
Yeah was a total brain fart on the USB 3.1 Gen2, for some reasons it's been ingrained in my brain from lack of sleep and X470! - I blame the lack of Kenco in my cupboard! - Edited now, they are USB 3.0 (Type-C included)
Yeah, the board does lack USB 3.1 Gen2, it does make the B350 Gaming ITX-ac (B350 version of this board) seem like a great investment for a Mini-ITX system since you lose all the multi-GPU support benefits from X370 going small form factor.
The renaming of USB 3.0 to USB 3.1 Gen 1 is a confusing mess and it only gets worse with USB 3.2. Just to emphasise, this board does _not_ have 10 Gb/s USB 3.1 Gen 2. Even the colour of the ports is misleading. Colour and the presence of a Type C socket is no guarantee of 10 Gb/s operation. It is limited to 5 Gb/s USB 3.1 Gen 1 (formerly known as USB 3.0).
Having built a B350 myself, would love for you guys to test using an M.2 NVME SSD as your OS boot drive and running 2 SATA SSD drives in RAID 0 for DATA storage (No need to reply about reliability please) and see how smooth that goes and dry to update RAID drivers? I have had no issues with Intel 8th Gen ITX boards with this setup, but its a complete headache and reliability/perfomance issue with AMD!
Wait, so the Biostar X370GTN gets called out for having a tiny heatsink, yet this board doesn't?
Plus that board costs $50 less and has better I/O (4 rear USB 3.0 vs only 2 on this "high-end" offering). The only real sin the Biostar commits is using Realtek for networking, but at 50 less bucks, that's probably excusable.
Not to say the Biostar isn't without faults - going with Realtek networking is vomit-inducing - but
The heatsink might be small, but it's definitely more adequate than the one on the Biostar X370GTN. I actually sat at my desk today while doing some write-ups thinking to myself which has the worst VRM heatsink of the ITX boards on my desk...The Gigabyte AB350-Gaming Wi-Fi, X370GTN and the ASRock X370 Gaming-ITX/ac - I haven't yet concluded, although I do intend to find out for my own benefit as I want to build a small Ryzen 2200G system and quality is everything to me!!
I've got a 1600X running 3.95GHz @ (IIRC) 1.375V stably. I haven't gotten it to run at anything higher, but I haven't done much testing, either. It crashed almost immediately running Prime95 at that voltage and the next up (1.38 something) and by that time I was getting tired of the testing.
For some reason, the ethernet port on the back of mine quit working, which is obviously annoying, although the wifi works. (I upgraded the antenna because the one that's included is a little bit fragile, I pulled on it too hard once, and disconnected the wire from the socket, so that's probably more my fault than ASRock's.)
On the antenna? Yeah, I made a mistake on my previous post: the antenna wire pulled right out of the plug. Looks like it was only inserted or crimped in by pressure; no solder: the end of the wire is clean and not ragged. I tried pushing it back in but it didn't make a good enough connection; I never good good signal after that. (Oddly, even with both leads plugged in it got poor reception.)
Not sure what's going on with the ethernet port, if it died or if I killed it, although I don't know what I could've done to it. If the wifi didn't work I'd be more concerned.
My board couldn't run RAM at over 2133-2400 stably until the most recent BIOS updates; now it runs my 3000 ram at 2933 just fine.
Also these comments inspired me to try OC a bit more--currently I'm running at 4.0 with 1.39375. Games fine; haven't tried a stress test yet.
This board exposes 2x 480Mbps (USB 2.0), 2x 5Gbps (USB 3.1/3.1 gen 1), and 2x 10Gbps (USB 3.1 gen 2) USB ports on its IO. The X370GTN exposes 4x 5Gbps and 2x 10Gbps ports.
Gavin, despite what manufacturers may say, HDMI 2.0 works on all 300-series motherboards as well. I thoroughly investigated and tested this with Raven Ridge. In fact, my family's current HTPC, with a Ryzen 5 2400G and ASRock AB350 Gaming-ITX/ac, works flawlessly at 4K@60Hz and 12-bit color. The so-called "specification" these motherboard manufacturers list is really regarding certification alone. The ports really are just straight traces to the processor's video outputs. See here for more details:
I couldn't see the point of paying extra for the X370 version of this ITX board when the B350 delivers exactly the same performance and functionality so I bought the latter. Apart from the chipset used the only difference I can find is the different WiFi card. Does anyone disagree?
That appears to be one of very few differences that I can spot between the official specs for each board. The X370 claims 2T/ 2R on the wifi. The other difference that I noticed was a claimed difference in watercooling support (see CPU section on the respective spec page of each board via AsRock.com). I second your recommendation to get the B350 board as it is significantly less expensive as of this post.
What do you mean when you use the term "ambient cooling"? I Googled it and found that it refers to the building of datacentres in locations that are naturally cool so as to save costs on cooling. But what does it mean in the conetxt of this review?
HOW DO YOU SET THE (IT WAS ERP READY IN MY GIGABYTE BOARD ) OR WHERE IS SETTING TO STOP USB PORTS FROM STAYING POWERED ON AFTER SHUTDOWN !! LED,S STAY LIT !! HELP APPRECIATED ..
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5080 - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
If have built a few systems using this board and the B350, but was never able to get a Bristol Ridge APU to work. I followed the approved memory list from ASRock without success. I Always ended up using a Ryzen CPU and Cheap GPU or since March Raven Ridge. It would be interesting if anyone else got this to work with a Bristol Ridge APU?gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
If I had a Bristol Ridge APU to hand, I would have tried for you! I have used a Ryzen 3 2200G though and it worked fine :)5080 - Thursday, April 19, 2018 - link
Yes, I just finished building a system for a friend with this board and Ryzen 5 2400G. It works great, but Bristol Ridge is still a no go even with the latest BIOS 4.50.Geranium - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Gavin, are you sure this board has USB 3.1? Cause Asrock's website has no mention of USB 3.1.http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/Fatal1ty%20X370%20Gam...
SuperiorSpecimen - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
3rd bullet point from the bottom of the first list.jtd871 - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I only see 1 19-pin USB3 header on the mobo top.jtd871 - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
ASRock manual sez that header supports up to two ports.gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I have the board in my hands now (you had me second guessing myself) and I can confirm there is a USB 3.1 Gen1 header and a USB 2.0 header; each of them gives an additional two ports.gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I think the confusion is where it says 2 x header (it means 2 ports from a header, not 2 headers etc) - Maybe I should make it clearer in the future!gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Yeah was a total brain fart on the USB 3.1 Gen2, for some reasons it's been ingrained in my brain from lack of sleep and X470! - I blame the lack of Kenco in my cupboard! - Edited now, they are USB 3.0 (Type-C included)Daedalus685 - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I'm fairly certain you are correct. The board appears to have usb 3.1 (gen 1) ports only (formerly called USB 3.0), i.e. 5Gbps.The type C, and A ports are a different colour of blue, but all of the documentation refers to them as gen 1 ports.
gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Yeah, the board does lack USB 3.1 Gen2, it does make the B350 Gaming ITX-ac (B350 version of this board) seem like a great investment for a Mini-ITX system since you lose all the multi-GPU support benefits from X370 going small form factor.John_M - Saturday, April 28, 2018 - link
The renaming of USB 3.0 to USB 3.1 Gen 1 is a confusing mess and it only gets worse with USB 3.2. Just to emphasise, this board does _not_ have 10 Gb/s USB 3.1 Gen 2. Even the colour of the ports is misleading. Colour and the presence of a Type C socket is no guarantee of 10 Gb/s operation. It is limited to 5 Gb/s USB 3.1 Gen 1 (formerly known as USB 3.0).microking4u - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Having built a B350 myself, would love for you guys to test using an M.2 NVME SSD as your OS boot drive and running 2 SATA SSD drives in RAID 0 for DATA storage (No need to reply about reliability please) and see how smooth that goes and dry to update RAID drivers?I have had no issues with Intel 8th Gen ITX boards with this setup, but its a complete headache and reliability/perfomance issue with AMD!
The_Assimilator - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Wait, so the Biostar X370GTN gets called out for having a tiny heatsink, yet this board doesn't?Plus that board costs $50 less and has better I/O (4 rear USB 3.0 vs only 2 on this "high-end" offering). The only real sin the Biostar commits is using Realtek for networking, but at 50 less bucks, that's probably excusable.
Not to say the Biostar isn't without faults - going with Realtek networking is vomit-inducing - but
The_Assimilator - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
One day, AnandTech will allow users to edit their comments. That day, is not this day.gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
The heatsink might be small, but it's definitely more adequate than the one on the Biostar X370GTN. I actually sat at my desk today while doing some write-ups thinking to myself which has the worst VRM heatsink of the ITX boards on my desk...The Gigabyte AB350-Gaming Wi-Fi, X370GTN and the ASRock X370 Gaming-ITX/ac - I haven't yet concluded, although I do intend to find out for my own benefit as I want to build a small Ryzen 2200G system and quality is everything to me!!1_rick - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I have this board. It does have 4 USB 3.0 ports on the back (3 type A and 1 type C).1_rick - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
I've got a 1600X running 3.95GHz @ (IIRC) 1.375V stably. I haven't gotten it to run at anything higher, but I haven't done much testing, either. It crashed almost immediately running Prime95 at that voltage and the next up (1.38 something) and by that time I was getting tired of the testing.For some reason, the ethernet port on the back of mine quit working, which is obviously annoying, although the wifi works. (I upgraded the antenna because the one that's included is a little bit fragile, I pulled on it too hard once, and disconnected the wire from the socket, so that's probably more my fault than ASRock's.)
gavbon - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
You could have damaged the wiring, can you see any physical damage at all?1_rick - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
On the antenna? Yeah, I made a mistake on my previous post: the antenna wire pulled right out of the plug. Looks like it was only inserted or crimped in by pressure; no solder: the end of the wire is clean and not ragged. I tried pushing it back in but it didn't make a good enough connection; I never good good signal after that. (Oddly, even with both leads plugged in it got poor reception.)I'm using one of these now: https://www.frys.com/product/7411565. Keep meaning to buy a second, but the machine runs OK with just one.
Not sure what's going on with the ethernet port, if it died or if I killed it, although I don't know what I could've done to it. If the wifi didn't work I'd be more concerned.
My board couldn't run RAM at over 2133-2400 stably until the most recent BIOS updates; now it runs my 3000 ram at 2933 just fine.
Also these comments inspired me to try OC a bit more--currently I'm running at 4.0 with 1.39375. Games fine; haven't tried a stress test yet.
The_Assimilator - Thursday, April 19, 2018 - link
This board exposes 2x 480Mbps (USB 2.0), 2x 5Gbps (USB 3.1/3.1 gen 1), and 2x 10Gbps (USB 3.1 gen 2) USB ports on its IO. The X370GTN exposes 4x 5Gbps and 2x 10Gbps ports.jtd871 - Monday, April 30, 2018 - link
Check your eyes, sir. Neither this board nor the B350 version claim Gen 2 support. http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/Fatal1ty%20X370%20Gam... http://www.asrock.com/mb/AMD/Fatal1ty%20AB350%20Ga...Hifihedgehog - Wednesday, April 18, 2018 - link
Gavin, despite what manufacturers may say, HDMI 2.0 works on all 300-series motherboards as well. I thoroughly investigated and tested this with Raven Ridge. In fact, my family's current HTPC, with a Ryzen 5 2400G and ASRock AB350 Gaming-ITX/ac, works flawlessly at 4K@60Hz and 12-bit color. The so-called "specification" these motherboard manufacturers list is really regarding certification alone. The ports really are just straight traces to the processor's video outputs. See here for more details:smallformfactor (dot) net/forum/threads/raven-ridge-hdmi-2-0-compatibility-1st-gen-am4-motherboard-test-request-megathread.6709/
John_M - Saturday, April 28, 2018 - link
I couldn't see the point of paying extra for the X370 version of this ITX board when the B350 delivers exactly the same performance and functionality so I bought the latter. Apart from the chipset used the only difference I can find is the different WiFi card. Does anyone disagree?jtd871 - Monday, April 30, 2018 - link
That appears to be one of very few differences that I can spot between the official specs for each board. The X370 claims 2T/ 2R on the wifi. The other difference that I noticed was a claimed difference in watercooling support (see CPU section on the respective spec page of each board via AsRock.com). I second your recommendation to get the B350 board as it is significantly less expensive as of this post.John_M - Saturday, April 28, 2018 - link
What do you mean when you use the term "ambient cooling"? I Googled it and found that it refers to the building of datacentres in locations that are naturally cool so as to save costs on cooling. But what does it mean in the conetxt of this review?John_M - Saturday, April 28, 2018 - link
There are five 3.5mm audio jacks, not six.John_M - Saturday, April 28, 2018 - link
You can overclock the iGPU of a Raven Ridge APU in the BIOS, though it's hidden quite deep in the menus of the Advanced page.wswab - Wednesday, February 13, 2019 - link
HOW DO YOU SET THE (IT WAS ERP READY IN MY GIGABYTE BOARD ) OR WHERE IS SETTING TO STOP USB PORTS FROM STAYING POWERED ON AFTER SHUTDOWN !! LED,S STAY LIT !! HELP APPRECIATED ..