Ryzen 1700 or 1700X with X370 or B350 Motherboard

Aj Baron

Junior Member
Mar 9, 2017
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I am going to build AM4 PC to play game or overclock.

Does anyone know more of what the differences?

What's the different between X370 and B350?

What's the different between 1700 and 1700X?

What's the XFR?
 

tamz_msc

Diamond Member
Jan 5, 2017
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Reason to choose the 1700X - higher stock clocks. Reason to choose 1700 - much better thermals and power consumption, thus better efficiency. All of the Ryzen 8-core CPUs overclock the same to around 4 GHz.

XFR - extra boost beyond single-core turbo - 100MHz for the 1700X and 50MHz for the 1700. Needs to have Balanced power profile in Windows, however that interferes with all-core turbo, hence a disadvantage. In practice, not that useful.

X370 - most expandability, boards featuring this chipset are generally better for overclocking, have better RAM support, and have enthusiast-friendly features. Both SLI and Crossfire are supported.
B350 - in terms of actual specs not that different, but B350 boards do not have as many features for enthusiasts (BIOS code display, on board power and clear-CMOS buttons etc.), lesser overclocking features, and depending on the model, lesser expansion slots and I/O. Supports only Crossfire; no SLI.

First thing you need to know is what resolution you would be gaming at and whether high refresh rate is important to you.

Also, what other things would you like to do with the system. If it's going to be gaming-only, then there are better options out there.
 

whm1974

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Jul 24, 2016
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I would wait first for a few months until the BIOS and motherboard supply issues are sorted out.
 
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alexruiz

Platinum Member
Sep 21, 2001
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If you want to overclock, X370.
The 1700X is better binned, so might yield a better overclock.

X370 + 1700x

ps. The system will fly in everything, even games, and it will get better and better. Be ready to be updating your board firmware often during the first few weeks.
 

Aj Baron

Junior Member
Mar 9, 2017
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Reason to choose the 1700X - higher stock clocks. Reason to choose 1700 - much better thermals and power consumption, thus better efficiency. All of the Ryzen 8-core CPUs overclock the same to around 4 GHz.

XFR - extra boost beyond single-core turbo - 100MHz for the 1700X and 50MHz for the 1700. Needs to have Balanced power profile in Windows, however that interferes with all-core turbo, hence a disadvantage. In practice, not that useful.

X370 - most expandability, boards featuring this chipset are generally better for overclocking, have better RAM support, and have enthusiast-friendly features. Both SLI and Crossfire are supported.
B350 - in terms of actual specs not that different, but B350 boards do not have as many features for enthusiasts (BIOS code display, on board power and clear-CMOS buttons etc.), lesser overclocking features, and depending on the model, lesser expansion slots and I/O. Supports only Crossfire; no SLI.

First thing you need to know is what resolution you would be gaming at and whether high refresh rate is important to you.

Also, what other things would you like to do with the system. If it's going to be gaming-only, then there are better options out there.

I am going to play For Honor.
 

Aj Baron

Junior Member
Mar 9, 2017
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If you want to overclock, X370.
The 1700X is better binned, so might yield a better overclock.

X370 + 1700x

ps. The system will fly in everything, even games, and it will get better and better. Be ready to be updating your board firmware often during the first few weeks.

Do you have any suggest X370 motherboard for overclock & game.
 

tamz_msc

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Jan 5, 2017
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I am going to play For Honor.
See this isn't a good way of deciding on what to choose while building a new PC. As I said before, if all you want to do is gaming, then depending on the type of game you have better options.
 

Flapdrol1337

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May 21, 2014
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If it were my money I'd get a 1700, none of the ryzen cpu's like to be over 4 GHz so I doubt "better binning" will get you much extra performance if you manually overclock.

The main difference between X370 and B350 is that X370 allows you to run multiple graphics cards in crossfire/sli (sli might not be on all). Both allow overclocking.
 

unseenmorbidity

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Nov 27, 2016
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If it were my money I'd get a 1700, none of the ryzen cpu's like to be over 4 GHz so I doubt "better binning" will get you much extra performance if you manually overclock.

The main difference between X370 and B350 is that X370 allows you to run multiple graphics cards in crossfire/sli (sli might not be on all). Both allow overclocking.
Xfire works on at least the tomahawk. I wouldn't see why it wouldn't work on the others as well, but that is the only one I saw that listed it as supported.

I am going to build AM4 PC to play game or overclock.

Does anyone know more of what the differences?

What's the different between X370 and B350?

What's the different between 1700 and 1700X?

What's the XFR?
Good question, but I wouldn't rule out a 1700 and a B350. Someone on reddit supposedly got up to 4.25 GHz @ 1.406v on that setup.

Though the entry asrock x370 asrock boards are only an extra $30-$40.

The killer and taichi(not really entry) also come with a m.2 Intel 802.11ac WiFi card, which is $17 on newegg. So, the killer is $135 after MIR, and comes with $17 network card, so it boils down to say $120. Now compare that to the other b350 boards. $100-$110. It's only a $10 difference, assuming you need the network card.

I went the other way. I was looking at the boards, and I was like "I am already spending $140 for the x370 k4, and I need a wireless card, so I might as well buy the taichi for another $20."
 
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Topweasel

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Oct 19, 2000
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I went the other way. I was looking at the boards, and I was like "I am already spending $140 for the x370 k4, and I need a wireless card, so I might as well buy the taichi for another $20."

One of the reason's I choose the Taichi as well. Now if only Asrock would ship some to Newegg.
 

Aj Baron

Junior Member
Mar 9, 2017
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Xfire works on at least the tomahawk. I wouldn't see why it wouldn't work on the others as well, but that is the only one I saw that listed it as supported.


Good question, but I wouldn't rule out a 1700 and a B350. Someone on reddit supposedly got up to 4.25 GHz @ 1.406v on that setup.

Though the entry asrock x370 asrock boards are only an extra $30-$40.

The killer and taichi(not really entry) also come with a m.2 Intel 802.11ac WiFi card, which is $17 on newegg. So, the killer is $135 after MIR, and comes with $17 network card, so it boils down to say $120. Now compare that to the other b350 boards. $100-$110. It's only a $10 difference, assuming you need the network card.

I went the other way. I was looking at the boards, and I was like "I am already spending $140 for the x370 k4, and I need a wireless card, so I might as well buy the taichi for another $20."

I will not consider asrock again. I have RMA experience about Asrcok.
 

Sullivan

Junior Member
Mar 13, 2017
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If I were you, I would choose 1700 & B350 TOMAHAWK.
I would avoid one of the pricier X370 motherboards unless you really need the extra features or want to do some more serious overclocking,
although you can overclock with this board.
and only Tomahawk support Crossfire on B350 mobo.
 

funks

Golden Member
Nov 9, 2000
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Built my budget ryzen (1440P resolution) rig for my main desktop / workstation. Moved the 4790K to the HTPC VR rig. I don't really care much about overclocking and want a stable rig.

Boo for Coolermaster though, they say the Hyper T4 is compatible out of the box with the AM4, well - it does snap in but the orientation of the HSF goes towards the memory chips (can only clock it that way) - vertical instead of horizontal.

Parts List
Gigabyte AB350 Gaming 3 - BIOS F5
Ryzen 1700x
Corsair H110i (AIO cooler - this one fits out of the box with AM4)
Corsair C70 Vengeance Case
Corsair TX650W Power Supply
GeForce GTX1070 FE
Patriot 32GB Dual Channel Kit ( 2x16 GB DDR4 - PC4-22400 - #PVE432G280C6KGY)

Notes
  • I settled on the Gigabyte AB350 Gaming 3 as the price is great, it has a Realtek ALC1220 Codec (and still has Optical Out in the I/O header - most boards got rid of them) and doesn't have useless legacy stuff like PCI slots. It also has USB 3.1 Gen 2 ports on the back (lot of the budget boards only have Gen 1). I wish the boards would get rid of the PS2 keyboard / mouse port also and use the space saved for another USB port on the back instead of a header on the board (there are three internal headers, one USB 3.0 and 2 USB 2.0)

  • Purchased the Patriot Ram as it's supposed to go up to 2800 MHZ (still 1.2 volts). The 16GB sticks are dual rank which aren't ideal. I'm expecting at most, 2400 MHZ (AMD says Ryzen officially supports 2400 MHZ on Dual Channel Mode - 2 Dual Rank DIMMS).
 
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guachi

Senior member
Nov 16, 2010
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Funks,

Thanks for the update. Let me (us) know what you think of your parts

I was leaning towards the same board as you for the same reasons (optical and 1220 audio). I'm up in the air between the 1700 or 1700X, so if you OC, I'd like to know how high you get. Also, I still have my ancient (in PC terms) Hyper 212+ that should suffice for now but I'd like to know how the H110i works for you.

Anyway, good luck with your build.
 

funks

Golden Member
Nov 9, 2000
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I've been using the rig as my main workstation ( java development work, vm's with VMware workstation pro) and so far it's stable under Windows 10.

I don't overclock which is why I got the 1700x (got a good price - brand new from Craigslist, seller wanted an 1800x and sold it to me for 350$ - that's about the same price as a 1700 after taxes).

I had the Hyper 212+ on the 4790K and was pretty happy with it, I would have used it on the Ryzen rig if I had AM4 brackets on-hand. Does it use the same brackets as the Hyper 212 EVO, and the Hyper 212 X? (RR-ACCY-AM4B-R1).

Would have preferred not spending money on the h110i but it seems to be doing its job well (adds more complexity to the system tho). Pretty sure the 212+, 212 EVO would have no problem cooling an overclocked 1700, 1700x - most of them seem to hit 3.9 GHZ without issues. The board also has 8 power phases which should be more than adequate (4 for the main CPU, 3 for the CPU North Bridge, and 1 for the Memory).

The onboard RealTek Gigabit Ethernet Lan is working properly as well, I'm getting around 93 to 94 Megabytes per second transfer rates with it from the my NAS (which is about the limit for Gigabit Ethernet). The board comes with 6 SATA connectors (2 are from the CPU - labeled ASATA,, and 4 are from the chipset), - speeds are pretty good there as well (my drives are hooked up to the chipset). Glad to note that my single "boot" SSD drive is running at full speed, also AMD-RAID to RAID0 stripe two 480GB SSD's as a "data" drive and that is showing proper scaling as well.
 
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Malogeek

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Mar 5, 2017
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yaktribe.org
The onboard RealTek Gigabit Ethernet Lan is working properly as well, I'm getting around 93 to 94 Megabytes per second transfer rates with it from the my NAS (which is about the limit for Gigabit Ethernet).
Just for comparison on my Prime X370-Pro with Intel 211T I'm sustaining 110mb/s from my NAS.
 

funks

Golden Member
Nov 9, 2000
1,402
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I'll have to check what I get computer to computer, my NAS (older unit) may be the limiting factor. I don't have jumbo packets enabled either.

Just an update, enabled 4K jumbo packets on both the NIC and the NAS - it's peaking at 112 Megabytes a second from time to time , looks like it's working correctly.

9622d9c1-0173-49e6-bafb-5aa0aa6b7878_zpsrljv4k5n.png
 
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funks

Golden Member
Nov 9, 2000
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Further updates...

BIOS: F6d

I mucked around with my system some more and was able to boot my 2 x 16 GB sticks @ 2666 MHZ -

Memory Notes:
Name: Patriot Viper Elite Series DD4 32GB (2 x 16 GB) 2800MHz Kit (Gray))
Rank: Dual Rank
Channel: Dual
Highest Rated Speed per SPD: 2800 MHZ / 16-18-18-36 @ 1.2v

Here's what I changed on the BIOS..

1) Enabled XMP
2) Set Memory Multiplier to 26
3) Changed Timing on Memory Channel A to "15-17-17-34"
4) Changed Memory Voltage from 1.2v to 1.33 volts
5) Disabled XMP
6) Saved Settings
7) Restarted

IMG_20170320_160629_zpsd0fulzrc.jpg


IMG_20170320_160608_zpsxrheivwq.jpg


IMG_20170320_160620_zpsmophecnf.jpg


IMG_20170320_160638_zpsd9zs2xvy.jpg


2017-03-20_zpsmt1wzmlo.png
 
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Shmee

Memory & Storage, Graphics Cards Mod Elite Member
Super Moderator
Sep 13, 2008
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I have the microATX version of the B350 gaming 3. I also have Patriot memory. Interesting that you were able to get it to boot at faster speeds with a little tweaking, I may have another try. Currently on F3c, which for some reason was removed from Gigabytes website. Now they only have F2 listed.
 

funks

Golden Member
Nov 9, 2000
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What speed are your RAM rated at? You should be able to get at least 2400 MHZ out of them - might want to try XMP on, set memory multiplier to 24, then set Channel A timings manually, maybe set the memory voltage to 1.25, or 1.30 volts, then turn off XMP, save it and see if it boots.

I do a -1 on the Manual SPD timings on the MOBO, when I run the mem at 2400 MT/s, I use the timing from SPD for 2600 MT/s (slightly looser). When I set the memory to to 2660 MT/s, I used the timing from SPD for 2800 MT/s (slightly looser).

I dropped my stuff back down from 2666 MT/s to 24000 MT/s per second, I noticed that the Command Rate at 2666 MT/s was being set to 1T automatically (most likely wrong) while it's 2T @ 2400.

There must be something funky with the firmware's subtiming detection still at 2666 + MT/s, better stable than sorry - lol
 
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