HARDWARE Short Questions That Don't Deserve Their Own Thread - Reloaded

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > HARDWARE Short Questions That Don't Deserve Their Own Thread - Reloaded

Senjuro: Aug 19, 2006

How much should I care about a motherboard's VRM if I have no intention of overclocking? What is considered good/bad? What effect (if any) does it have on performance/longevity?

# ¿ Jun 16, 2020 20:23

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# ¿ Apr 19, 2024 05:22

Senjuro: Aug 19, 2006

gradenko_2000 posted:

if you're not trying to overclock, then it's probably not going to matter all that much, because the motherboard is just going to ease off the gas if it's getting too hot

there are maybe edge cases where trying to pair a 16-core Ryzen processor with an A320 motherboard is not great because even if the motherboard/CPU is never going to run at a pace which will be a problem for the VRMs, it might mean that you're leaving some performance on the table, but it's difficult to come up with a recommendation without getting into specifics

in any case, anyone who is going to buy a 16-core Ryzen probably also has a particular use-case where an A320 is not going to be sufficient for their needs in terms of SATA ports and PCI-e slots and rear I/O and all of that stuff, so they're also probably going to buy one of the higher-end enthusiast boards anyway, just so that they can mount their five hard drives and their video capture card and their six peripherals, even if they're not going to specifically use the overclocking functionality

so I would think about THAT first, and if you still find yourself in a position where the basic H310 motherboard looks like it's good enough for you, but you still think you might pair it with an i9-9900, then you can ask

Let's say we're talking about the 8 core Ryzen 3800x and a B550 board. What would be considered a safe minimum to avoid throttling? I'm seeing VRM configurations all the way from 4+2 to 14+2. At what point is it overkill at stock speed?

# ¿ Jun 18, 2020 12:17

Senjuro: Aug 19, 2006

gradenko_2000 posted:

I've tried to do some research on this:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1d9_E3h8bLp-TXr-0zTJFqqVxdCR9daIVNyMatydkpFA/edit#gid=611478281
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuyuS04lD4o

but it's difficult to make any hard conclusions without this sort of in-depth review on a board-by-board basis

I would say that given your spec of a 3800X, at stock, you should avoid anything that doesn't have a heatsink, and anything that's only four phases, in order to be sure

That's a pretty useful spreadsheet, even without B550.
Thanks.

# ¿ Jun 18, 2020 12:57

Senjuro: Aug 19, 2006

I have a GPU with three 8-pin power connectors but only two PSU cables with two 8-pin connectors each so one cable uses only one of its connectors and the other uses both.

HWiNFO tells me that connector #1 draws more power than the other two combined so I'd rather have the cable that uses a single connector dedicated to it but the question is how can I identify which connector on the GPU is #1, #2, or #3?

# ¿ Dec 27, 2020 16:31

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