TR Forums

If you don't plan on overclocking, there's literally no difference in performance between motherboards.

The B450 and X470 are very similar. The only differences I am aware of are:
--- The X470 supports SLI, allowing two PCIe x16 (physical) slots to operate at x8 (electrically) so that you can have two graphics cards,
and
--- The X470 has more USB and SATA.

So if you want to have dual graphics cards, you need X470. If not, then ask how much USB and SATA you need, and look at the specs of each motherboard you are considering.

For example, I'm comparing an ASRock X470 Taichi to an ASRock Fatal1ty B450 Gaming K4.

The X470 has 8 SATA (6 chipset, 2 third-party) while the B450 has only 6 SATA (4 chipset, 2 third-party).

The X470 has 8 USB (six 3.1 Gen1, one 3.1 Gen2 Type-C, one 3.1 Gen2 Type-A) while the B450 also has 8 USB but they're of older standards (two of the 3.1 Gen1 are replaced with 2.0).

I also notice the X470 has Wifi, more temperature sensors, and a slightly better integrated soundcard.

So basically, the X470 just has a few more bells and whistles.

So if money is tight, the B450 will do you just fine. If those $200 are critical, I'd say you're better off getting the B450 and putting the $200 into a bigger SSD or a better graphics card.

The two most important things for gaming are:

1) a graphics card powerful enough for the game + resolution you want to play
2) avoiding bottlenecking the graphics card with any of the other components in the system

My take is the B450 won't be a problem for you -- as others have mentioned, the things the X470 gives you over the B450 aren't things that will impact gaming much outside of pushing-the-envelope overclocking. The 2600 is acceptable for gaming (although if you can swing a 2600X the additional clockspeed from XFR would give you more performance headroom).

Other than that, get a good set of DDR4 RAM and a decent SSD and you shouldn't have any issues.

In my (admittedly very limited) experience, the higher end motherboards, besides the bells and whistles mentioned above, are more durable. I had issues with some cheaper motherboards dying, or the audio no longer working; that seems to happen less often with more expensive ones.

As for the extra features, WiFi can be very useful depending on whether you plan to move the PC around occasionally. For example, when I moved to a new apartment, it was a few days before I could get all the wiring set up so as to conveniently connect to the switch through an Ethernet cable. Or, when my friends come home and we play some co-op on the TV, it's too far from the switch so it's easier to just use WiFi. The improved audio is also nice - nothing earth shattering but definitely noticeable (I'm not an audio nerd). Bluetooth can also come in handy for things like file transfer from a cell phone, or using a speaker.

So yeah, more $ = more convenience and (a little more) peace of mind. If all you ever intend to do is leave the case in its corner and play games, I wouldn't bother with a more expensive mobo, but a PC can do a lot more things than that, so think it through.

Waco wrote:

If you don't plan on overclocking, there's literally no difference in performance between motherboards.

^ This, pretty much. Decent GPU, CPU that won't bottleneck the GPU, and enough RAM are all more important, as long as you're not looking at some off brand, bargain basement piece of junk motherboard.

Platedslicer wrote:

In my (admittedly very limited) experience, the higher end motherboards, besides the bells and whistles mentioned above, are more durable. I had issues with some cheaper motherboards dying, or the audio no longer working; that seems to happen less often with more expensive ones.

IMO this was more true in the past. These days as long as you stick with established/respected brands, even the lower-priced boards tend to be pretty reliable. I don't think I've seen a board that didn't use solid electrolyte caps in the VRMs for close to a decade now.

Again, this is if you plan on running stock. If you try to OC on a budget board, you do run a risk of frying the VRMs due to insufficient phases/cooling.

mikewinddale wrote:

The B450 and X470 are very similar. The only differences I am aware of are:
--- The X470 supports SLI, allowing two PCIe x16 (physical) slots to operate at x8 (electrically) so that you can have two graphics cards,
and
--- The X470 has more USB and SATA.

So if you want to have dual graphics cards, you need X470. If not, then ask how much USB and SATA you need, and look at the specs of each motherboard you are considering.

Only the first thing is true. The two chipsets have identical connectivity. The X470 allows splitting the x16 slot into a pair of x8 slots for SLI and...that's it.

There are REALLY nice B450 motherboards available for $100-120 max, and I can't see going beyond that. Something like an Asus Prime B450 Plus would be my pick.

I cheaped out with an ASRock AB450M Pro4 and it's fine for my daughter's usage. The fan speed controls are not great, so a high-power system with a discrete GPU and a higher-powered CPU might run warmer or get louder. For her Ryzen 3 2200G, I could get it relatively quiet with some work in the EFI menu. Fine for us, but not something I recommend.

derFunkenstein wrote:

Only the first thing is true. The two chipsets have identical connectivity. The X470 allows splitting the x16 slot into a pair of x8 slots for SLI and...that's it.

Yeah... most of the differences you'll see at the motherboard level between these two chipsets are design decisions by the motherboard vendor, and are not inherent to the chipset used. X470 boards will tend to have more features just because they are aimed at the premium market, whereas B450 is intended to be a mainstream part.

XFR has been provent to be almost as effective as a manual overclock, so save the $200 on a new board, just set XFR and forget about it, and then dump the $200 into a faster GPU or faster DDR4.

B450 ought to be enough for everybody --Someone on the internet

With that said:

As long as you don't plan on using multiple GPUs (most people don't these days) buy a B450 mobo.