Gavin, you made a table that shows B350 and A320 don't support PB2 and XFR2. This is incorrect. Raven Ridge (2400G, 2200G, 2X00U) work without a problem on these boards. Yes, Raven Ridge has PB2 and XFR2 from day one. AMD advertised it when they launched RR last year.
It's not natively enabled from launch - it requires a BIOS update which not all vendors on all boards have provided. The CPUs work sure, but not all features of the CPUs will work in all products.
Hey guys, whats the best option between the asrock b450 itx and the msi b450i ? The msi seems to be missing one fan header and usb 3.1 gen 2 compared to the asrock but the msi may have better VRMs...It also supports 3000mhz ram. I don't know what to choose, some have said that asrock b450 itx is not good (VRMs wise), i intend to OC my ryzen 2600 so VRMs are important
Glad to see more options in the mATX range with two M.2 slots, not just from AsRock this time around. My next rig will either be based on the AsRock B450M Pro4 or one of the MSI B450M Mortar boards. Will wait for actual VRM setup and overclocking results / general tests to see which one will be it. I had motherboards from both manufacturers and was pleased with both. MSI has the advantage of offering PCIe M.2 options for both slots as well as SATA. One question regarding that: if I install a 3.0 PCIe x2 M.2 SSD into a 2.0 PCIe x4 slot, what will be the speed ramifications? Can it only use 2.0 PCIe x2 or can it use the full x4, thus being similar in speed to a native 3.0 PCIe x2 setup? :) Still waiting on mATX x470 mainboards.
Except that a 3.0 x2 drive is almost certainly x2 because it only has 2 PCIe lanes (cutting down on them is one of the ways the cheaper drives pinch pennies), which means it will be connected at 2.0 x2; at that point you might as well just use a SATA drive and save a bit more money.
You will get a 2 lane PCIe 2.0 connection, that means 1 GB/s. This is 1/4 of a PCIe 3.0 4-lane usual NVME drive, but real life you may get closer to 80% of the performance.
There are some seriously shady stuff going on with VRMS om X470 og B450. Check out Buildzoid on youtube. Asus B450 STRIX ITX board is single phase for SoC. Several of the Gigabyte B450 and X470 boards in reality have half the advertised amount of phases or are using doublers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IjWCOXSuKU
Thanks Gavin, I know this is a lot of information to go through and present. I would love to see a follow-up on these questions: 1. Especially for these compact boards, any problems with stock processor heat sinks blocking DIMM slots, i.e. do DIMMs with heat spreaders still fit with a Wraith or Spire cooler, respectively? 2. I have my eye on the Aorus Pro WiFi or something similar, but am wary of the placement of the WiFi antenna connectors right next to two of the USB 3 connectors. I frequently use 3-4 USB 3 devices at the same time frequently, and am wary of the USB 3 - WiFi interference with that placement. Any chance Gigabyte could state if/that they got that taken care of?
Thanks! Also, still looking forward to your Ryzen 2200/2400 GPU overclock chapter on that duo. Any chance we'll see it soon?
It looks like the ASUS ROG STRIX B450-F GAMING inherits some of the layout features of the (much more expensive) x470 Crosshair 7 in that it steals some of the CPU lanes to get a second full PCI-e 3.0 M.2 slot. Then 8x goes to PCI-e 16 1, the remaining 4x to PCI-e 16 2 and finally a chipset PCI-e 2.0
On the surface, this seems like it has totally ignored the bifrucation limitations that supposedly are inherent to the B450 chipset.
In other words, I thought you couldn't get that on this chipset.
well at least the pricing is "more inline" with the pricing they should be, newer boards, better componentes that actually save the maker a bit of coin per board made, so they keep the same "launch price" is acceptable in my books coming from gen 1 (I so hate the naming AMD used for Ryzen 1xxx and 2xxx needless confusion for nothing)
x3xx to x4xx same concept, reduced price to produce so they save some money, but the vast majority of vendors used these "savings" to cram more disco light show RGB on the boards to jack the price up some instead.
seems at least with the B4xx boards the vendors took a "better" approach beyond a few more "premium" boards which rightfully have an increased price (justifiable, maybe, but I myself have zero need of RGB and would only buy a more expensive board that offered them at the increased price if they were WORTH it as far as just overall better then lower cost boards, sadly, there seems to be little difference in more "premium" beyond a butt load of extra RGB little better in VRM etc which are much more useful and required IMO)
they could almost have a market for the premium boards RGB free, so pay a bit less for people like me who do not want all the RGB crud but still get the increased premium sound/VRM/BIOS etc ^.^
As documented by Buildzoid, the Asrock B450 Pro4 does not have the claimed 6+3-phase VRM. It is a pure 3+3-phase. Same probably applies for the B450M Pro4.
They mean SATA3 = SATA 6Gbps. Annoying that we keep running into these easily confused naming schemes (see also: USB 3.1 Gen1 and Gen2). At least SATA is getting old enough that we should soon be able to just drop the version number (unlike USB 2.0 there's really no reason to make modern hardware with SATA2).
The ASRock microATX B450M Pro4 has a total of four SATA ports not the six as wrongly posted on the final page table for choosing the right B450 Motherboard.
Gavin Bonshor's otherwise excellant page on choosing the right B450 motherboard doesn't include a list of boards that support DisplayPort. Unless I've missed some, there are eight:
ASRock B450 Gaming K4 ASRock B450 Gaming ITX/ac ASRock B450 Pro4 ASUS ROG Strix B450-F Gaming MSI B450I Gaming Plus AC MSI B450M Mortar MSI B450M Mortar Titanium MSI B450-A Pro
I once had a motherboard with a Realtek network controller and got so sick of it randomly connecting at 10 mb/sec that I vowed I would never buy another Realtech network controller. That leaves only one B450 option:
There is also the MSI B450 Carbon AC that in theory is better as it has better VRM and wireless LAN. It is also a bit cheaper in the stores in my area.
Great, really great ... but still can't buy outside of USA 13" laptop with Mobile Ryzen APU except extremely expensive not so well designed Lenovo 720S. What is the reason?
"Strix B450-F Gaming ..... Also present is a duo of M.2 slots with both having support for PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 drives, while the top slot which supports both PCIe and SATA drives up to a size of M.2 2280 (22 x 80 mm), the bottom slot only supports PCIe 3.0 x4 drives with a sizing up to M.2 22110 (22 x 110 mm)."
ALARMINGLY WRONG! Newegg:
"AMD Ryzen 2nd Generation / Ryzen 1st Generation Processors: * 1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)** 1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280/22110 storage devices support (PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)***"
edit - to remove any doubt - in full, the specs are:
"AMD Ryzen 2nd Generation / Ryzen 1st Generation Processors: * 1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)** 1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280/22110 storage devices support (PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)***
AMD Ryzen with Radeon Vega Graphics Processor: * 1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)**
* Support StoreMI and NVMe RAID. ** When the M.2_1 Socket 3 is operating in SATA or PCIE mode, SATA6G_5/6 ports will be disabled. *** When the M.2_2 is occupied by M.2 device, PCIe x16_1 will run at x8 mode."
I run win10 from an external SSD. for that I need a fast USB connection for windows to run smooth.
Would it be possible to change the USB ports in the future? OR even now already by a 3.2 gen2. Or wouldn't replacing the ports speed up my connection with the external SSD?
Also I would like a good bluetooth connection. Do I need to use an adapter?
This article pretty clearly states ECC memory is supported on this board, and so does Gigabyte's product page, however it fails to mention that 'supported' means just boot support. The actual Error Checking and Correction features are missing and unable to be leveraged.
I purchased this board purely based on this article for the sole reason of having a cheap ECC setup. Combined it with a Ryzen 2600 and Unbuffered Kingston ECC memory, and found that its impossible to get ECC working.
The system boots and works, but you do not get ECC functionality.
I read on reddit someone wrongfully stated the 2nd 16x slot is only pci gen 2. I wondered how they got this info, I then came across this review, which also states the 2nd 16x slow is gen 2.
According to the manual both slots are gen 3 and both are hooked to the cpu.
I have confirmed this as I now use an asmedia 1604 sata card, on post it reports what pci-e mode its in, if I use any of the x1 slots it reports gen 2 x1, if I use either of the x16 slots it reports gen 3 x1 (its limited to one lane). I actually have even moved the gpu to the second x16 slot as its easier to plug in cables to the sata card when its in a higher slot and even gpuz reports the gpu is on pcie gen 3.
Whats the lesson? read the manual, test and dont take what a media rep tells you for gospel ;)
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T1beriu - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Gavin, you made a table that shows B350 and A320 don't support PB2 and XFR2. This is incorrect. Raven Ridge (2400G, 2200G, 2X00U) work without a problem on these boards. Yes, Raven Ridge has PB2 and XFR2 from day one. AMD advertised it when they launched RR last year.https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/sense-mi
Ian Cutress - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
It's not natively enabled from launch - it requires a BIOS update which not all vendors on all boards have provided. The CPUs work sure, but not all features of the CPUs will work in all products.T1beriu - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
PB2 and XFR work on A320 as well.MrbigN - Wednesday, January 23, 2019 - link
If you buy the boards directly from there amazon store or on there website they should be Stock updated.As of, Jan,23 2019
bull2760 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Please fix your charts. PCIe should be 3.0 not 2.0Ian Cutress - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
The Chipset supports PCIe 2.0 lanes. PCIe 3.0 lanes come from the CPU.chrcoluk - Monday, August 30, 2021 - link
yeah but the 2nd x16 slot is also from the cpu and thus 3.0, you can even choose to make it a 8x slot in the bios by downgrading the first slot to 8x.The review incorrectly states the second full length slot is only 2.0.
T1beriu - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
StoreMI can work on 300-series motherboards but comes with an additional fee (I don't think it's BIOS dependent).https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/store-mi
Ian Cutress - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
The systems support 10 GbE, if you buy the cards. Yes it's picking hairs, but we're speaking native support.jtd871 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
What does 10GbE have to do with StoreMI?!Ian Cutress - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
10GbE has nothing to do with StoreMI. I was using it as an example of something that the system supports if you buy it. Like StoreMI.jtd871 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
It might have been more clear what point you were making if you had replied "The systems also support ...".The way it's presented in the table, though, it appears as if you are saying the older chipsets themselves do not support StoreMI, which is not true.
Death666Angel - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Seemed perfectly understandable to me. And if you know one thing about StoreMi, you know what the chart refers to. It's just software after all.jtd871 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Less-savvy readers might get an incorrect impression and come away with the sense that they need to "buy up" to use StoreMI at all.dante01 - Tuesday, August 7, 2018 - link
Hey guys, whats the best option between the asrock b450 itx and the msi b450i ? The msi seems to be missing one fan header and usb 3.1 gen 2 compared to the asrock but the msi may have better VRMs...It also supports 3000mhz ram. I don't know what to choose, some have said that asrock b450 itx is not good (VRMs wise), i intend to OC my ryzen 2600 so VRMs are importantThanks !
asmian - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
compliment (be nice to) != complement (be a good partner to)"Not much hasn't changed" - strange double negative
If there's no in-house editor, then more careful proofreading before posting, please.
Ian Cutress - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
15000 words with a couple of hours to edit. Always going to be the odd one or two typos.jordanclock - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
then be more careful**FTFY.
msroadkill612 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Its still there. Pity. Others may think it is correct.jtd871 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Your summary table based on features does not currently list the ASUS mITX board under those with 2 M.2 slots.theanalyzer - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Signed up to point that out. Needs to be fixed. It’s the only ITX board supporting 2x which sets it’s apart form the competitionDeath666Angel - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Glad to see more options in the mATX range with two M.2 slots, not just from AsRock this time around. My next rig will either be based on the AsRock B450M Pro4 or one of the MSI B450M Mortar boards. Will wait for actual VRM setup and overclocking results / general tests to see which one will be it. I had motherboards from both manufacturers and was pleased with both. MSI has the advantage of offering PCIe M.2 options for both slots as well as SATA. One question regarding that: if I install a 3.0 PCIe x2 M.2 SSD into a 2.0 PCIe x4 slot, what will be the speed ramifications? Can it only use 2.0 PCIe x2 or can it use the full x4, thus being similar in speed to a native 3.0 PCIe x2 setup? :) Still waiting on mATX x470 mainboards.Outlander_04 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
.3.0 x 2 is the same speed as 2.0 x 4DanNeely - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Except that a 3.0 x2 drive is almost certainly x2 because it only has 2 PCIe lanes (cutting down on them is one of the ways the cheaper drives pinch pennies), which means it will be connected at 2.0 x2; at that point you might as well just use a SATA drive and save a bit more money.Death666Angel - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Thanks for providing an answer to my actual question. :)AdrianB1 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
You will get a 2 lane PCIe 2.0 connection, that means 1 GB/s. This is 1/4 of a PCIe 3.0 4-lane usual NVME drive, but real life you may get closer to 80% of the performance.Death666Angel - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Thanks!Outlander_04 - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Finally some budget boards with solid VRMs.skpetic - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
There are some seriously shady stuff going on with VRMS om X470 og B450. Check out Buildzoid on youtube. Asus B450 STRIX ITX board is single phase for SoC. Several of the Gigabyte B450 and X470 boards in reality have half the advertised amount of phases or are using doublers:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IjWCOXSuKU
meacupla - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
hahaha... noAsus with the absolute trash tier VRM heatsinks
AsRock with fake phases
Gigabyte with fake phases and trash VRM heatsinks
MSI with no Vcore offset
bi0logic - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
It looks like the price link to the "TUF B450-Plus Gaming" is going to an amazon search for "ASRock B450M Pro4"eastcoast_pete - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Thanks Gavin, I know this is a lot of information to go through and present. I would love to see a follow-up on these questions:1. Especially for these compact boards, any problems with stock processor heat sinks blocking DIMM slots, i.e. do DIMMs with heat spreaders still fit with a Wraith or Spire cooler, respectively?
2. I have my eye on the Aorus Pro WiFi or something similar, but am wary of the placement of the WiFi antenna connectors right next to two of the USB 3 connectors. I frequently use 3-4 USB 3 devices at the same time frequently, and am wary of the USB 3 - WiFi interference with that placement. Any chance Gigabyte could state if/that they got that taken care of?
Thanks!
Also, still looking forward to your Ryzen 2200/2400 GPU overclock chapter on that duo. Any chance we'll see it soon?
sonofgodfrey - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
Second to last table is labeled X470 Motherboards.PingSpike - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
It looks like the ASUS ROG STRIX B450-F GAMING inherits some of the layout features of the (much more expensive) x470 Crosshair 7 in that it steals some of the CPU lanes to get a second full PCI-e 3.0 M.2 slot. Then 8x goes to PCI-e 16 1, the remaining 4x to PCI-e 16 2 and finally a chipset PCI-e 2.0On the surface, this seems like it has totally ignored the bifrucation limitations that supposedly are inherent to the B450 chipset.
In other words, I thought you couldn't get that on this chipset.
Dragonstongue - Tuesday, July 31, 2018 - link
well at least the pricing is "more inline" with the pricing they should be, newer boards, better componentes that actually save the maker a bit of coin per board made, so they keep the same "launch price" is acceptable in my books coming from gen 1 (I so hate the naming AMD used for Ryzen 1xxx and 2xxx needless confusion for nothing)x3xx to x4xx same concept, reduced price to produce so they save some money, but the vast majority of vendors used these "savings" to cram more disco light show RGB on the boards to jack the price up some instead.
seems at least with the B4xx boards the vendors took a "better" approach beyond a few more "premium" boards which rightfully have an increased price (justifiable, maybe, but I myself have zero need of RGB and would only buy a more expensive board that offered them at the increased price if they were WORTH it as far as just overall better then lower cost boards, sadly, there seems to be little difference in more "premium" beyond a butt load of extra RGB little better in VRM etc which are much more useful and required IMO)
they could almost have a market for the premium boards RGB free, so pay a bit less for people like me who do not want all the RGB crud but still get the increased premium sound/VRM/BIOS etc ^.^
WasHopingForAnHonestReview - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
Nice review. Good work.Im amazed that almost every comment is a nitpick. Rough life, Ian.
Flappergast - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
Nice overview on the last page. I’m looking for mITX WiFi - nice to see some good boardsSakkura - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
As documented by Buildzoid, the Asrock B450 Pro4 does not have the claimed 6+3-phase VRM. It is a pure 3+3-phase. Same probably applies for the B450M Pro4.https://youtu.be/yWAwOH-egFs?t=2104
JohanPirlouit - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
Hi everyone,Am I the only one to see that on the AMD picture:
- CPU: 2x SATA 3Gbps
- Chipset: 6x SATA 3Gbps
What do AMD talks about: SATA "3" (known as "6Gbps") or SATA 3Gbps (aka SATA II)?
Sakkura - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
They mean SATA3 = SATA 6Gbps. Annoying that we keep running into these easily confused naming schemes (see also: USB 3.1 Gen1 and Gen2). At least SATA is getting old enough that we should soon be able to just drop the version number (unlike USB 2.0 there's really no reason to make modern hardware with SATA2).JohanPirlouit - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
Thanks Sakkura ;-) .... And I also agree with you..patire - Wednesday, August 1, 2018 - link
The ASRock microATX B450M Pro4 has a total of four SATA ports not the six as wrongly posted on the final page table for choosing the right B450 Motherboard.Xajel - Thursday, August 2, 2018 - link
Yet not a single high-end X470 mATX motherboard !!Xajel - Thursday, August 2, 2018 - link
Yet not a single high-end X470 mATX motherboard !!jensend - Saturday, August 4, 2018 - link
WHY ON EARTH DO THEY KEEP MAKING AMD BOARDS WITHOUT DISPLAYPORT?FreeSync is a game changer for the Ryzen APUs, and very few of the inexpensive adaptive sync displays support FreeSync over HDMI.
KAlmquist - Sunday, August 5, 2018 - link
Gavin Bonshor's otherwise excellant page on choosing the right B450 motherboard doesn't include a list of boards that support DisplayPort. Unless I've missed some, there are eight:ASRock B450 Gaming K4
ASRock B450 Gaming ITX/ac
ASRock B450 Pro4
ASUS ROG Strix B450-F Gaming
MSI B450I Gaming Plus AC
MSI B450M Mortar
MSI B450M Mortar Titanium
MSI B450-A Pro
I once had a motherboard with a Realtek network controller and got so sick of it randomly connecting at 10 mb/sec that I vowed I would never buy another Realtech network controller. That leaves only one B450 option:
ASUS ROG Strix B450-F Gaming
AdrianB1 - Sunday, August 5, 2018 - link
There is also the MSI B450 Carbon AC that in theory is better as it has better VRM and wireless LAN. It is also a bit cheaper in the stores in my area.DMCbr - Sunday, August 5, 2018 - link
I think MSI totally won this time, with the PRO Carbon AC board: best sound, best lan, wifi, 5+2 VRM phases, good heat-sinks...foxbat - Tuesday, August 7, 2018 - link
Great, really great ... but still can't buy outside of USA 13" laptop with Mobile Ryzen APU except extremely expensive not so well designed Lenovo 720S. What is the reason?Djoie123 - Tuesday, August 14, 2018 - link
I think that B450 gaming plus have 4+3 vrm phase design, on their site they said it's 7 phase power designtonecas1 - Tuesday, October 30, 2018 - link
Asus Prime 450M-K has only 4 Sata ports, audio is Realtek’s ALC887 only, and memory support goes to 3466 (OC)tonecas1 - Tuesday, October 30, 2018 - link
Asus Prime 450M-K has 2 PCIe 2.0x1 and 1 PCIe 3.0 x16 by CPU supporttonecas1 - Tuesday, October 30, 2018 - link
MSI B450M Pro-M2 only supports 2x DIMM slotstonecas1 - Wednesday, October 31, 2018 - link
ASRock B450M Pro4 is not a 6+3 power system but a 3+3. You have to remove the heat sink to see the MOSFET Hi and Lo combos and IC controlersQuarterPunder - Tuesday, March 5, 2019 - link
So if i buy this motherboard do i still need to buy a wifi card/Bluetooth receptor???msroadkill612 - Wednesday, March 20, 2019 - link
"Strix B450-F Gaming ..... Also present is a duo of M.2 slots with both having support for PCIe 3.0 x4 M.2 drives, while the top slot which supports both PCIe and SATA drives up to a size of M.2 2280 (22 x 80 mm), the bottom slot only supports PCIe 3.0 x4 drives with a sizing up to M.2 22110 (22 x 110 mm)."ALARMINGLY WRONG!
Newegg:
"AMD Ryzen 2nd Generation / Ryzen 1st Generation Processors: *
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)**
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280/22110 storage devices support (PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)***"
msroadkill612 - Wednesday, March 20, 2019 - link
edit - to remove any doubt - in full, the specs are:"AMD Ryzen 2nd Generation / Ryzen 1st Generation Processors: *
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)**
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280/22110 storage devices support (PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)***
AMD Ryzen with Radeon Vega Graphics Processor: *
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (SATA & PCIE 3.0 x4 mode)**
* Support StoreMI and NVMe RAID.
** When the M.2_1 Socket 3 is operating in SATA or PCIE mode, SATA6G_5/6 ports will be disabled.
*** When the M.2_2 is occupied by M.2 device, PCIe x16_1 will run at x8 mode."
g0rnex - Sunday, June 23, 2019 - link
I run windows from external SSD so I need fast USB ports for it to run smooth. Can I replace the USB ports by 3.2 gen2 when needed?g0rnex - Sunday, June 23, 2019 - link
I run win10 from an external SSD. for that I need a fast USB connection for windows to run smooth.Would it be possible to change the USB ports in the future? OR even now already by a 3.2 gen2. Or wouldn't replacing the ports speed up my connection with the external SSD?
Also I would like a good bluetooth connection. Do I need to use an adapter?
looking into making this build:
https://pcpartpicker.com/guide/hXzKHx/entry-level-...
GayCock69 - Monday, August 19, 2019 - link
ryzen 3700x + aorus pro wifi b450 + radeon rx5700xt, will it work optimally?sh009vf5ik1a - Saturday, January 18, 2020 - link
Heads up on the Gigabyte B450 DS3H...This article pretty clearly states ECC memory is supported on this board, and so does Gigabyte's product page, however it fails to mention that 'supported' means just boot support. The actual Error Checking and Correction features are missing and unable to be leveraged.
I purchased this board purely based on this article for the sole reason of having a cheap ECC setup. Combined it with a Ryzen 2600 and Unbuffered Kingston ECC memory, and found that its impossible to get ECC working.
The system boots and works, but you do not get ECC functionality.
chrcoluk - Monday, August 30, 2021 - link
I read on reddit someone wrongfully stated the 2nd 16x slot is only pci gen 2. I wondered how they got this info, I then came across this review, which also states the 2nd 16x slow is gen 2.According to the manual both slots are gen 3 and both are hooked to the cpu.
I have confirmed this as I now use an asmedia 1604 sata card, on post it reports what pci-e mode its in, if I use any of the x1 slots it reports gen 2 x1, if I use either of the x16 slots it reports gen 3 x1 (its limited to one lane). I actually have even moved the gpu to the second x16 slot as its easier to plug in cables to the sata card when its in a higher slot and even gpuz reports the gpu is on pcie gen 3.
Whats the lesson? read the manual, test and dont take what a media rep tells you for gospel ;)