A320M board paired with Zen3 processor?
A320M board paired with Zen3 processor?
I possess a Gigabyte A320M-S2h and when searching for BIOS updates I see they recently released new BIOS (F54c) with an AGESA update. Then I checked the CPU support list and it confirms Zen3 support (R5 5600x, R7 5800x, etc.). Is it really a good choice to use that budget motherboard for Zen 3? Someone in China has reportedly done Zen 3 on an Asrock board, but I hadn't imagined anyone would actually do it.
You might be able to power a 5600x on that board since it appears on the supported CPU list: https://www.gigabyte.com/Motherboard/GA-...upport-cpu. However, according to a review by GN, the board can only supply up to 68 watts in stock, and the VRMs might struggle under that load. In the worst case, the board could throttle the CPU to prevent overheating. If you still want to try, adding extra fans or using a downwind cooler would help, as they push air toward the motherboard and improve VRM cooling. Good luck!
I understand your point, though the board doesn’t actually have VRM heatsinks and blowing air on those worn components won’t make much difference. In fact, just a few minutes ago someone reported another gigabyte B450 DS3H board failing due to overheating from its 5600x clock speed—still a pretty poor build but at least it’s not a completely bad one. These boards just perform poorly overall. I’ve seen one with a stock 2400G causing emergency shutdowns, which might be an outlier, but even that wasn’t too tough to run.
I didn’t anticipate such frequent shutdowns from that motherboard. A friend’s setup with a 3500/3500x on an a320m S2H V2 is working well, so I assumed it would be similar. I suggested the same configuration to them. Here’s a story I found: it wasn’t necessary, but someone succeeded before. Apologies if it sounded like I was backing the idea from my previous post—I wasn’t. Just trying to give them the best option possible.
It mainly depends on how much stress you place on the CPU. Heavy workloads can quickly damage the motherboard. Remember, the 3500 model has only six cores—not the usual six-core or high-threaded ones. I’m aware I sometimes overlook that detail, making it seem like a good choice. Still, it’s risky to rely on it for long-term use. Pushing the board beyond its limits is definitely a concern. While I didn’t mean to dismiss your point, I’d say this board isn’t ideal for sustained performance.
I'm checking the stock Ryzen 5 1600 without any cooling upgrade, which is drawing around 80-83W. If you try using the cooler (like Wraith Spire) at around 40% capacity, the VRM will reach about 100°C after a few minutes. Eventually it will hit its maximum temperature of 117°C and I won't upgrade to even the Ryzen 7 1800X because performance would drop too much. It's interesting how Gigabyte released the BIOS update with Zen 3 support.
It's likely acceptable if the high-end X370 board was included, but this GA-A320M-S2h is essentially a low-cost motherboard. They haven't added X370 support for the Zen 3 CPU yet, so the A320M doesn't even have that capability in its GA-AX370-Gaming 5 CPU Support List.
It seems the choice likely depends on which model is in higher demand. I’d expect the A320 boards to be more common than the X370 ones.