Question Replace bad 880gm MB or move on despite good CPU and ram

[mikeford]

I've got a nice Phenom II 905e cpu, 8GB of ram, but this is the second motherboard to die in this system, first was 780 and either onboard audio or video died, replaced with 880gm-p51, and I failed to fully seat a PCI card and now POST dies at attempting to load cmos. This system is in a decent "media" case intended to go in the shelves with all my AV stuff, but fixing little issues and some LONG cables and it never left my work desk.

Since it croaked I built a new work system, Ryzen 5 1600 on a B450 MB, and got a couple of old Dell i5 mini towers fixed up, and I am even working on an older Dell Hybrid 140 media system, but none of those exactly fill the niche I had in mind for a system to go with all my hifi and video equipment. The system to go with the hifi gear needs to look nice in the living room, ie in the media case, and be robust enough to manage all media formats (old dell will have some issues with newest media).

Question is; find a new/used MB that works with the cpu and ram, AM3+, or move on with all new parts?

IF replacing only the MB, with what?

 

[RLGL]

Bite the bullet, time for a major upgrade.

 

[ao_ika_red]

The latest AM3+ board is GA-78LMT-USB3 from gigabyte. If it's too pricey, better upgrade with Ryzen. Some boards still provide PCI slot, if you look hard enough.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I've got an 970M board, not sure if it's ASRock (probably) or MSI (maybe?). LMK if interested, it's BNIB, was going to go with an FX CPU that I think that I still have floating around here somewhere. Pretty sure it's an AM3/AM3+ board, so it would only work for you if you can fit a micro-ATX, and still have DDR3 RAM kicking around. No onboard video.

 

[mikeford]

Digging in my junk I found the MB from the RMA of the original MB that failed, Biostar A760G M2+, never even opened the bag since I had a new MSI already installed by the time I got it from Biostar. Wow, kinda old, DDR2, but maybe I still have some, and supposed to work with my Phenom II 905e. Keep or not I need to test it, but if I have already purposed all the DDR2 I once had in it, buying old ram seems like a bad way to go.

 

[Shmee]

Time for a new system I would say.

 

[Iron Woode]

my HTPC is a Ryzen 3 2200G on an Asrock B450 mITX motherboard. 8 GB of DDR4 and an SSD. It plays everything and is rock stable. Put it in a good airflow case and be done with it.

 

[mikeford]

Time for a new system I would say.

Yeah, I agree, waiting on HDMI 2.1 from next gen MB. Microcenter is bound to have some bundles with 3300 cpu for a decent price soon.

 

[ao_ika_red]

Yeah, I agree, waiting on HDMI 2.1 from next gen MB. Microcenter is bound to have some bundles with 3300 cpu for a decent price soon.

You do know that using 3300X will render your board's video output useless, right?

 

[mikeford]

You do know that using 3300X will render your board's video output useless, right?

Nope, not only don't I know it, didn't see it mentioned in reviews just now. Are you thinking about a G part?

Also, not really expecting HDMI 2.1 from the first of cheap new MB I'm likely to buy, so some video card is likely.

 

[ao_ika_red]

Nope, not only don't I know it, didn't see it mentioned in reviews just now. Are you thinking about a G part?

Also, not really expecting HDMI 2.1 from the first of cheap new MB I'm likely to buy, so some video card is likely.

Yes, if you want to use board's video output, your only chance is with 4xxxG APU which should be released this summer. Regarding HDMI version, you should check board's specification carefully. For APU I have recommendation on some Gigabyte and Biostar boards simply because they put more power stages for SoC side. But I still have no idea which HDMI version they use.

 

[mikeford]

HDMI 2.1 is slowly rolling out, its something to do with sync and beyond 4k displays.

BTW plenty of MB have video output without any gpu, they just don't do any game stuff like 3D, but many do fine for movies etc. on "normal" displays.

Ironically my last setup could not use the MB video, as my ancient TV best input was SVHS, nothing remotely modern.

 

[blckgrffn]

HDMI 2.1 is slowly rolling out, its something to do with sync and beyond 4k displays.

BTW plenty of MB have video output without any gpu, they just don't do any game stuff like 3D, but many do fine for movies etc. on "normal" displays.

Ironically my last setup could not use the MB video, as my ancient TV best input was SVHS, nothing remotely modern.

Not anymore. Those days are over.

Outside of some server boards, you get a GPU *on* CPU or you have a bunch of dead ports on the back of your motherboard.

Personally, the way AMD is going, I'd prefer most boards gave me more USB ports than any video ports, but maybe I am the minority. I think it's just really confusing for people who get these boards with video out and in like, what, 90% of those builds those ports do nothing? Worse than useless.

 

[ao_ika_red]

Not anymore. Those days are over.

Outside of some server boards, you get a GPU *on* CPU or you have a bunch of dead ports on the back of your motherboard.

-out of topic-
That got me thinking of the cost adding basic display adapter on the chipset. My RPi 3 has very small silicon footprint and yet it can play 1080p30 youtube stream flawlessly. If a small board computer can do that, why an ATX-sized board can't? If I remember correctly, G series boards back in LGA775 and AM3+ days costed less than their flagship motherboard so it mush be more than just cost issue.
-out of topic ends-

I think it's just really confusing for people who get these boards with video out and in like, what, 90% of those builds those ports do nothing? Worse than useless.

Yeah, especially when they come from Intel platform which since Nehalem have IGP in all of their mainstream CPU. I have to explain to them every time they ask why I can't simply plug HDMI cable in the motherboard. And even more confusing, I did that with FM2+ board which most of its CPU should have IGP but he bought Athlon CPU so he had to buy discrete GPU.

 

[blckgrffn]

-out of topic-
That got me thinking of the cost adding basic display adapter on the chipset. My RPi 3 has very small silicon footprint and yet it can play 1080p30 youtube stream flawlessly. If a small board computer can do that, why an ATX-sized board can't? If I remember correctly, G series boards back in LGA775 and AM3+ days costed less than their flagship motherboard so it mush be more than just cost issue.
-out of topic ends-


Yeah, especially when they come from Intel platform which since Nehalem have IGP in all of their mainstream CPU. I have to explain to them every time they ask why I can't simply plug HDMI cable in the motherboard. And even more confusing, I did that with FM2+ board which most of its CPU should have IGP but he bought Athlon CPU so he had to buy discrete GPU.

I have friends who build computers for other people bit by this. A friend of mine built a batch of 5 PCs with new Athlon CPUs back in the not so distant past thinking the ports on the motherboards meant that there was onboard graphics. He about choked when I explained it to him and he left behind most of his profits by adding in GPUs. I don't get it, but he loves building and selling computers as cheaply as possible. That's not my thing.

To your first point... yeah, I don't know. I mean, it seems like they could add small GPU to the board, but then it wouldn't get used most of the time? IDK. It probably won't be long until we can boot a board without a CPU and still get some sort of GUI, for firmware flashing and the like? Already a some boards support no-cpu UEFI updates... I've never used them but I have read about them.

Not long ago, I got an old PC In trade for building a new one. It was an Intel P67 chipset, and I breathed a sigh of relief. All the OC capabilities of the Z67 but no video out! Just a bunch of USB ports there! I grabbed a cheap, no GPU Xeon off of ebay with zero hesitation because since there was no video ports, there was no way anyone would be confused by this setup.

IMO, I think most of the high end AMD chipsets (x470, X570, etc.) should really ditch the video ports. There is a very, very small use case for buying those boards and CPU with graphics. Usually you are getting those for the power delivery, water cooling controls, etc. If you want video out, buy the mainstream boards.

 

[ao_ika_red]

IMO, I think most of the high end AMD chipsets (x470, X570, etc.) should really ditch the video ports. There is a very, very small use case for buying those boards and CPU with graphics. Usually you are getting those for the power delivery, water cooling controls, etc. If you want video out, buy the mainstream boards.

Agree, just like the past when 990FX or P45 was meant for enthusiast but we also had 760G or G45 for productivity people.

 

[VirtualLarry]

IMO, I think most of the high end AMD chipsets (x470, X570, etc.) should really ditch the video ports. There is a very, very small use case for buying those boards and CPU with graphics. Usually you are getting those for the power delivery, water cooling controls, etc. If you want video out, buy the mainstream boards.

Agree, just like the past when 990FX or P45 was meant for enthusiast but we also had 760G or G45 for productivity people.

I actually "sort of" agree.. except... a single HDMI-output port, arranged vertically, doesn't take up much I/O bracket space, and can be wedged in between some ports. I think that all boards that DO support APUs, should have SOME sort of video-output port, preferably HDMI (2.0x), just so that when the board is done with its overclocked lifestyle, that it can be "put out to pasture" for someone's web-browsing pleasure, with whatever newest or cheapest APU is available for that socket.

But yeah, AXE the DVI-D and VGA ports. MAYBE keep the full-sized DP port, if nothing else for VRR gaming on an APU, which connected to an early FreeSync monitor.

Edit: This gives the big-box OEMs some flexibility too, to drop in a higher-end AMD AM4 CPU + GPU combo, or just drop in an APU. Although, that applies more to Micro-ATX boards, few OEM big-box PCs have ATX mobos in them, for whatever reasons.

 

[Arkaign]

This brings up a weird hole on the Zen lineup imho, especially for OEMs.

The APUs so far have been fairly weak.
The full Zen CPUs 6C+ have been very nice.

However, there's no real option for quality Zen OEM systems without dGPUs.

A tiny Intel HD level Radeon spot on the package of some Zen models would be a really nice option. Perhaps revamp the non X models. If done with Zen2 in my eyes it would have looked like this :

Ryzen 3500/3600/3700/3800/3900 : includes IGP.

Ryzen X series all have no IGP.

Boom, easy. And the kicker is that with the chiplet layout, it seems fairly straightforward to simply use package space for a GPU as one of the 4 chiplets. This necessarily means no 3950 w/IGP, but that level of market seems vanishingly small.

However, the market for an i5/i7 business desktop with IGP for heavy business use is actually pretty respectable. They're more than powerful enough unless someone is actually doing something serious graphically, or needs more ports than supplied by the OEM Mobo.

When selling tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of units, being able to sell Intels without the hassle of sourcing, installing, and supporting dGPUs for business PC lineups has to be a compelling factor vs building alternative models that necessitate dGPUs. Of which the lower end models seem to be inexorably getting both more divorced from reasonable performance metrics, and higher than ever in price.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Boom, easy. And the kicker is that with the chiplet layout, it seems fairly straightforward to simply use package space for a GPU as one of the 4 chiplets. This necessarily means no 3950 w/IGP, but that level of market seems vanishingly small.

I think that you meant to say "as one of the 2 chiplets", and "no 3900X / 3950X". Because the CPU chiplets on 7nm, contain a CCD, which is two CCXs, which are four cores (+ SMT), and cache memory.

There isn't enough room under the AM4 heatspreader, for four 7nm chiplets, and the 12/14nm I/O die.

Personally, I would have preferred a modified I/O die, with a small iGPU in it, which could still result in dual-chiplet CPU designs. (Aka. 12C/24T and 16C/32T CPUs, with mini-iGPUs. Those would be an awesome choice for a business box.)

 

[Arkaign]

I think that you meant to say "as one of the 2 chiplets", and "no 3900X / 3950X". Because the CPU chiplets on 7nm, contain a CCD, which is two CCXs, which are four cores (+ SMT), and cache memory.

There isn't enough room under the AM4 heatspreader, for four 7nm chiplets, and the 12/14nm I/O die.

Personally, I would have preferred a modified I/O die, with a small iGPU in it, which could still result in dual-chiplet CPU designs. (Aka. 12C/24T and 16C/32T CPUs, with mini-iGPUs. Those would be an awesome choice for a business box.)

Ah damn, you're right, for some reason I conflated EPYC (with even higher limits than 4 chiplet) with AM4 Zen2 potential.

Well, 8 + GPU would be good enough I guess, and leave 3900/3950 for the X class.

 

[mikeford]

Business desktop maybe will have its own rules, I picked up a couple cheap surplus Dell 7010 with i5 3470 cpu, and I honestly can't guess why so many places are upgrading from them (a ton of them are cheap used). I put a $10 shipped R5 240 in one, and it seems "fine" for non game use, browsing media etc.

For the short term, the nicer of the two 7010 with the R5 240 and a small SSD may be my "media" PC until a new MB.

 

[blckgrffn]

Business desktop maybe will have its own rules, I picked up a couple cheap surplus Dell 7010 with i5 3470 cpu, and I honestly can't guess why so many places are upgrading from them (a ton of them are cheap used). I put a $10 shipped R5 240 in one, and it seems "fine" for non game use, browsing media etc.

For the short term, the nicer of the two 7010 with the R5 240 and a small SSD may be my "media" PC until a new MB.

Probably off-lease units or ones that are replaced on 5/6 year life cycles. Many large businesses budget to replace a certain percentage of their workstations each year to ensure there aren't generational tidal waves of replacements.

 

[Arkaign]

Probably off-lease units or ones that are replaced on 5/6 year life cycles. Many large businesses budget to replace a certain percentage of their workstations each year to ensure there aren't generational tidal waves of replacements.

This is something I've seen with regards to supporting law firms and healthcare firms : the sheer bloat of huge Outlook email accounts and running tons of tabs and open word, excel, and PDF docs has made it hard to run 4C/8GB level systems these days. Where it's my decision, I've migrated as many power users as possible to 6C/12T/16GB as possible, preferably with Zen+/Zen2, though that's not always possible, so that leaves i7-8700 or better, along with SSDs typically of at least 480GB so I don't have to worry as much about users pushing them past the capacity levels where their performance starts to drop suddenly.

It's funny, because for a lot of users who are more focused on a tight number of tasks, say a handful of tabs, a clean Outlook inbox and not some cluster of huge PSTs in addition to a gigantic OST file, and 2-4 documents instead of a dozen+, a Sandy Bridge i5 or better with 8GB and an SSD is not appreciably different from the most expensive system I can throw at a user. Sure, something may take .6 seconds to open instead of .3, but in practice that's not even very noticeable.

Where it gets notable are the galaxy brain kind of person who wants to open tons and tons of things and it's definitely a challenge reining some of those people in sometimes haha. Even with a 3950X and 64GB, sometimes software itself is just not conducive to a total lack of judicious balance.

"Yes, please take your 27GB of emails from pre-2017 and make a PST, and then take it offline. Yes, you can still access them should you need to in the future, look you can just add the file on demand lol."

 

[mikeford]

my HTPC is a Ryzen 3 2200G on an Asrock B450 mITX motherboard. 8 GB of DDR4 and an SSD. It plays everything and is rock stable. Put it in a good airflow case and be done with it.

Almost what I had in my current "media" PC, except 16Gb of ram, worked dandy, then I got tempted to play some WOW classic and the 2200G wasn't cutting it. MicroCenter, gotta love them, easy return and bought a 1600 and found a cheap RX 460 on ebay, and that is what I am typing on now, but haven't gotten around to restoring the full media system.

That points to the heart of the problem, I want a nice low power system for whole family media use, but from time to time I will want to do some gaming on a big screen.

Many commercial users have a schedule to replace PCs and haven't changed the timing in decades. Win7 support ends, boom new PCS. Dell service contract ends, boom new pcs, etc.

 

[Iron Woode]

Almost what I had in my current "media" PC, except 16Gb of ram, worked dandy, then I got tempted to play some WOW classic and the 2200G wasn't cutting it. MicroCenter, gotta love them, easy return and bought a 1600 and found a cheap RX 460 on ebay, and that is what I am typing on now, but haven't gotten around to restoring the full media system.

That points to the heart of the problem, I want a nice low power system for whole family media use, but from time to time I will want to do some gaming on a big screen.

Many commercial users have a schedule to replace PCs and haven't changed the timing in decades. Win7 support ends, boom new PCS. Dell service contract ends, boom new pcs, etc.

well, the 2200G isn't a gaming CPU to start with. You can play games if the system has fast dual channel ram and you keep the resolution at 720P and adjust the details for performance. The 2400G is better for APU gaming as are the 3200G and 3400G's.

But that then begs the question: are you gaming or HTPC? If you wish to do both then a discrete graphics card is a must as is a more powerful CPU.

I don't game with my HTPC. I could try flash games and such but I just use it for videos and music.