Fairly high-end PC spec ....

[DanceswithUnix]

but the cost difference between B550 and X570 isn't,

Well you can get an X570 board for £140. The problem here is that the B550 boards are generally newer which bends their feature set in favour of things like 2.5GbE networking, but then they are also largely mATX which cuts the features down vs the largely ATX X570 boards. That was my original point, I wouldn't compromise the rest of the board for networking when it is an easy to get and put in on day one £32 card.

... but then I guess I got on my usual soapbox of disappointment with networking standards and lost the message a bit

Edit: My last computing purchase was a USB cheap video grabber. Damned near everything is USB these days, I seem to have a web of cables hanging out the PC and wonder if there was any way it could be neatly inside a box! My most common PCIe card purchase in the house is extra USB slots. I think for a lasting for years PC I would put most emphasis on USB.

[ik9000]

See, that's the bit I struggle with.

I agree that an X570 is probably the best move, I'm typing this on my home X470-pro based machine and at work I have an X570 board because there aren't any B550 boards that could take the amount of I/O I needed to plug in on day one of getting that machine.

However, my reasoning is actually because B550 boards never have that weird front USB-C connector on them and the last few devices purchased in our house (phones, tablet, Oculus Quest 2) are all USB-C connected. Yes I do have some USB A to C cables and you don't *need* a USB C connector on the front of the PC and they all come with one around the back, but with my ageing back getting to the rear of the PC isn't fun so on any new PC a front USB C port will be right up near the top of the must have list. This X470 board did have the connector for a front C cable, though I had to buy a connector panel to go in one of the 5-1/4 in drive bays as the Antec 300 case is way too old, but I have my front C connector with a 10Gbps data rate

But networking? Well WiFi is a constantly moving target and my motherboards always outlast wifi generations by several cycles so I actively avoid motherboards with WiFi on them. There are some which have an M.2 WiFi connector on them so you can get a laptop WiFi card and upgrade the WiFi which seems a good compromise. My last WiFi upgrade cycle consisted of buying a TP link Deco pack of three mesh devices for £100 which gives me a decent coverage across the house, and those come with a pair of gigabit ports so you can plug devices into them to connect them to the wiifi network if I wanted to do that. But I have powerline, which is faster and more stable than wifi so I don't.

My point with 2.5GbE was simply that for example my work board is an Asus X570 Pro (because I needed three x16 slots and wanted ECC ram) and I think it cost £230. It doesn't have 2.5GbE, but I could add that with no stress using a £32 plug in PCIe card and still be under the cost of most boards with native 2.5GbE so if there are features I like in a board then ethernet support is right down the list because I can (and am increasingly likely to) plug it in. My wife's PC has a 2.5GbE port because I liked the rest of the features of the board, the faster ethernet was a bonus.

OFC my argument for ethernet cards could extend to a USB-C card as well. There is a cable neatness issue which is worth a few quid to me but I look at the cost of something like the Asrock Steel Legend board (which has the WiFi card connector to add your own WiFi) and you can buy a lot of cards with the savings.

adding that card, for 10Gbps bandwidth, needs a pcie2.0x4, pcie3.0x2 or pcie4.0x1 slot. B550 only offers pcie3.0, and very few boards have a x4.0 or x2.0 slot beyond the x16 (at x4) slot, and using that often deactivates an M2 slot, or some sata ports, or where they will run both downrates the 3.0x16(at x4) slot to x2 (which would be ok for this case). But that's your expansion slot gone. You can't then use it for extra USB-C or Sata ports, a custom sound card or whatever.

For X570 some have a 4.0x1 slot but then you already have 2.5Gb/s in most cases so even that x1.0 slot is free to use with something else. If it's purely a "max LAN bandwidth for min cost" exercise then you're correct. But if it's a "max flexibility for simultaneous connectivity etc" then X570 offers so much more. To me that was worth the extra (though B550 wasn't even an option when I went X570. I must say the lack of chipset fan is nice though. Hence my yearning for X570s to finally appear!)

[DanceswithUnix]

For X570 some have a 4.0x1 slot but then you already have 2.5Gb/s in most cases

To be fair, if a motherboard has Raspberry Pi level gigabit networking ability you have to wonder what else they skimped on. But still, a quick glance on Scan and it looks like only a third of the X570 boards they stock have 2.5GbE.

[Saracen999]

Well you can get an X570 board for £140. The problem here is that the B550 boards are generally newer which bends their feature set in favour of things like 2.5GbE networking, but then they are also largely mATX which cuts the features down vs the largely ATX X570 boards. That was my original point, I wouldn't compromise the rest of the board for networking when it is an easy to get and put in on day one £32 card.

....

AAnd that, and the discussion between you guys, is what is so very useful. An informed bouncing back and forth is teaching me a LOT in a short space of time.

To be honest, in posting this thread, I wasn't really looking for a "buy this" but for precisely that kind of discussion because it comes down, as I think I said earlier, to trying to work oyut what best suits my priorities and the best way to sort that out is to get (and try to follow ) the arguments (in the best sense) back and forth.

For instance, if the X570 is fuller featured but older, I might be better off with less features but newer implementations, or with more but older, depending on exactly what I need. I'm getting to the point where I canmake a semi-informed choice on that alternative, and it'll be more than a blind punt in the dark.

I'm tech literate but out of date. The only consolation for the non-tech literate that get 'advice' from a sales person in whatever shop they visit is they'll probably never know they didn't ask the right questions .... but the blue one looked nice.

[Saracen999]

adding that card, for 10Gbps bandwidth, needs a pcie2.0x4, pcie3.0x2 or pcie4.0x1 slot. B550 only offers pcie3.0, and very few boards have a x4.0 or x2.0 slot beyond the x16 (at x4) slot, and using that often deactivates an M2 slot, or some sata ports, or where they will run both downrates the 3.0x16(at x4) slot to x2 (which would be ok for this case). But that's your expansion slot gone. You can't then use it for extra USB-C or Sata ports, a custom sound card or whatever.

For X570 some have a 4.0x1 slot but then you already have 2.5Gb/s in most cases so even that x1.0 slot is free to use with something else. If it's purely a "max LAN bandwidth for min cost" exercise then you're correct. But if it's a "max flexibility for simultaneous connectivity etc" then X570 offers so much more. To me that was worth the extra (though B550 wasn't even an option when I went X570. I must say the lack of chipset fan is nice though. Hence my yearning for X570s to finally appear!)

This is another minefield for me. As I understand it, each chip only has a given number of lanes and while you may have loads of slots, that doesn't mean they can all operate, at full speed. Exactly what you can populate without compromising something else is black magic to me .... but I'm aware that that number of lanes is still fixed, and whether onboard LAN uses them, or not, is not clear to me and if it does, it won't matter whether it's on the mobo or on a card.

Argh. Sometimes, a inquiring mind gets me what curiosity gets cats. (Not you, C5, the furry ones with claws and whiskers).

[ik9000]

This is another minefield for me. As I understand it, each chip only has a given number of lanes and while you may have loads of slots, that doesn't mean they can all operate, at full speed. Exactly what you can populate without compromising something else is black magic to me .... but I'm aware that that number of lanes is still fixed, and whether onboard LAN uses them, or not, is not clear to me and if it does, it won't matter whether it's on the mobo or on a card.

Argh. Sometimes, a inquiring mind gets me what curiosity gets cats. (Not you, C5, the furry ones with claws and whiskers).

that google comparison sheet does a good job of explaining what works simultaneously and what turns off what.

It's what led me to the x570 ACE or Master as my final choice as they are the only ones with three full speed NVMe without gimping something else (beyond 2 sata III ports in the case of the gigabyte). This means the pcie4.0x16(x4) slot is still available for, say, a PCIe NVMe controller card for an additional two full speed pcie4.0 NVMe M2 drives. So that's 3 native NVMe at full pelt, plus one more at full pelt (at any give time from the pcie converter out of 2 or even 4 mounted on the card), and you still have the pcie4.0x1 slot for a SATA /RAID hub. Once pcie4.0 cards come out that bandwidth offers 3.5 additional full (real) speed SATAIII simultaneously (so make one of those your DVDRW as it only needs SATAII speed anyway).

They might not have as much USB on the rear panel, but what they have is good enough, and the lanes are more sensibly devoted to NVMe and PCIe which offers more long-term flexibility IMO.

[Saracen999]

I have a spare GPU you can have. It's a cutting edge gtx460 1GB. At today's prices that's worth what? £500. But I'll do it for say £300?

No seriously...

Y'know, I'm so out of touch with graphics cards and their ..... nomenclature .... I actually had to look that up to see what it was. That was probably current, though, last time I even thought about GPUs.

So okay, you officially had me going there for a moment.

But assuming for a sec' you actually meant have it, then thanks for the thought, and it's generous but, I still have a contact or two and I think I can get something decent enough for my needs for this system (which will be neither bottom end nor top end) for a non-scalper price, and despite the general supply situation.

And if not, I still have a Vega Video 7 that should fit .... given a big enough hammer.

[DanceswithUnix]

For instance, if the X570 is fuller featured but older, I might be better off with less features but newer implementations, or with more but older, depending on exactly what I need.

The B550 chipset was horribly delayed, from memory it was well over a year. That released them into a slightly different market.

The X570S boards should be an interesting refresh. It is the exact same chip as the X570, but a software update has lowered the heat they generate, so some refreshed motherboards are being released with passive cooling to make use of the lowered tdp. So far the boards I've seen have been on the higher end with a decent feature set. I'm sure there will be some "we can cost reduce out the fan" ones as well, but so far they seem good with 2.5Gb ethernet and three band WiFi 6E

Only seen one for sale though, and that was via New Egg so would be a killer for import duties. But it looks like they are turning up. If it really is just the old X570 chip with an AGAESA update to lower the power then there shouldn't be a supply issue from it being a new chip.

They might not have as much USB on the rear panel, but what they have is good enough, and the lanes are more sensibly devoted to NVMe and PCIe which offers more long-term flexibility IMO.

Perhaps it's because I think the concept of a boot drive is at least 5 years out of date, but that seems a lot of NVMe. Recent machines I've built don't even touch SATA, just one decent sized (usually 1TB is enough) NVMe stick leaving a spare on boards with two NVMe slots. With a NAS in the mix it would seem the pressure on local storage is even lower.

[Saracen999]

The B550 chipset was horribly delayed, from memory it was well over a year. That released them into a slightly different market.

The X570S boards should be an interesting refresh. It is the exact same chip as the X570, but a software update has lowered the heat they generate, so some refreshed motherboards are being released with passive cooling to make use of the lowered tdp. So far the boards I've seen have been on the higher end with a decent feature set. I'm sure there will be some "we can cost reduce out the fan" ones as well, but so far they seem good with 2.5Gb ethernet and three band WiFi 6E

Only seen one for sale though, and that was via New Egg so would be a killer for import duties. But it looks like they are turning up. If it really is just the old X570 chip with an AGAESA update to lower the power then there shouldn't be a supply issue from it being a new chip.

....

Well, the X570S appears attractive provided it arrives at UK retail in time, and provided the price differential is modest. I'm not seeing anything that would induce me to pay more than a very modest premium (if any) and certainly not seeing anything I'm prepared to put the project on hold for. It's always a bit of an issue with "if I just wait insert guess of time period, the new insert whatever is due", but by the time you get that, you're waiting another period for something else new to arrive. If it's a really major change and I really wanted/needed it, then .... okay. Otherwise, it's a mug's game to keep waiting. Been there, done that.

....

Perhaps it's because I think the concept of a boot drive is at least 5 years out of date, but that seems a lot of NVMe. Recent machines I've built don't even touch SATA, just one decent sized (usually 1TB is enough) NVMe stick leaving a spare on boards with two NVMe slots. With a NAS in the mix it would seem the pressure on local storage is even lower.

I know that was addressed to ik, but as it happens, I was thinking about that 10 mins ago, because I was looking at NVMe for the NAS (*), and extended it to the boot device for this machine.

I think it depends on what you want to do with the machine, and what infrastructure it will be connected into. I made a preliminary (and subject to rethinking) that this machine would be exactly that - a modest (maybe 500GB, maybe 1TB) NVMe 4.0 x4 drive as a system/program drive for this system, 500GB doesn't sound huge but, when I think about what needs to go on to a fixed location machine that is connected to a NAS with (by my standards) a lot of HD space, and an SSD or two (again, very possibly NVMe but maybe SATA) I won't need much data stored directly on this machine because the NAS should be permanently available.

However, if this machine wasn't intended to have a NAS as a data store, I'd probably be thinking more of 1TB or even more as the really fast boot/progs/some data drive, and an HD for the bigger stuff where speed is not as much of an issue. and ifit was portable, I'd probably want everything on fast NVMe and no HD at all, not least to minimise damage potential from bumps and jolts. My usage preferences would depend on how I was using the machine.


(*) Trying to decide how many slots the NAS needs and, if I decide to add an SSD or two, whether to use NVMe which will (depending on make/model) probably require a PCI card upgrade, or whether to buy with an extra couple of slots and stick a (non-RAIDed) SSD in one. Or both.

[DanceswithUnix]

However, if this machine wasn't intended to have a NAS as a data store, I'd probably be thinking more of 1TB or even more as the really fast boot/progs/some data drive, and an HD for the bigger stuff where speed is not as much of an issue. and ifit was portable, I'd probably want everything on fast NVMe and no HD at all, not least to minimise damage potential from bumps and jolts. My usage preferences would depend on how I was using the machine.

Speed vs cost of storage is still one of the build compromises.

My last storage purchase was an 8TB HDD, actual spinning rust, for £180. For about £170 I could get a 1TB screaming fast NVMe PCIe4 drive such as a Samsung 980 Pro. But, and here those multiple NVMe slots could come in useful, I could get a pair of WD SN550 Blue 1TB drives and stripe them for 2TB of storage of about the same speed.

My last SSD I just went for the compromise option of a 1TB WD SN750, a quick PCIe 3 drive that goes for about £100.

Small drives are slower and worse cost per GB than larger drives, so at this point I'm largely done with 500GB drives. I have a few kicking around, so if I have a need I upgrade something with an old 500GB drive with a nice new 1TB drive, usually swapping SATA for NVMe while I'm at it

I haven't seriously looked at Optane though. The cost per GB is so stupidly high, I could raid up flash SSDs for the same money to get the same performance and wear figures just spread over a magnitude more total storage.

[Saracen999]

Speed vs cost of storage is still one of the build compromises.

My last storage purchase was an 8TB HDD, actual spinning rust, for £180. For about £170 I could get a 1TB screaming fast NVMe PCIe4 drive such as a Samsung 980 Pro. But, and here those multiple NVMe slots could come in useful, I could get a pair of WD SN550 Blue 1TB drives and stripe them for 2TB of storage of about the same speed.

....

Indeed, but there's more to it than even that. It's one thing putting a screaming fast (980 Pro, Samsung ?? etc) in a machine but sticking it in a mobo slot and sticking it in a limited width PCIe expansion slot in a NAS are different propositions. First, what's the speed/width of the lanes in the NAS ('cos it varies a lot), and then, what's the bandwidth of the LAN. And even assuming that's not a bottleneck for the screaming fast, how many simultaneous users and are they demanding enough to actually challenge the screaming fast NVMe? If not, why waste money on the screaming fast, when it won't get the chance to scream? It's like buying a Porsche Turbo, and using it to commute 500 yards to the Post Office to pick up your pension. In first gear.

My last drive purchase, by the way, was a 12TB Helium-filled WD DataCentre class HC520. £230.

[Millennium]

Can I suggest you look for memory that can do CL16 or under at 3800 for your Ryzen 3 system. There is no need to pay over the odds - this is probably not such a hard overclock for a few cheap kits.

you might wanna get 16*2 at the start since 4*8 probably won't clock as nicely.

enjoy the new build!

[philehidiot]

Evenin'

I don't have time to read the entire thread but I want to ensure, as RAM is being mentioned, you have taken into account dual and single rank memory. This is becoming common on cheaper laptops and is starting to sneak into desktop memory as well. There's a severe performance hit. Linus explains.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7CO9v9rpOk

[DanceswithUnix]

Indeed, but there's more to it than even that. It's one thing putting a screaming fast (980 Pro, Samsung ?? etc) in a machine but sticking it in a mobo slot and sticking it in a limited width PCIe expansion slot in a NAS are different propositions. First, what's the speed/width of the lanes in the NAS ('cos it varies a lot), and then, what's the bandwidth of the LAN. And even assuming that's not a bottleneck for the screaming fast, how many simultaneous users and are they demanding enough to actually challenge the screaming fast NVMe? If not, why waste money on the screaming fast, when it won't get the chance to scream? It's like buying a Porsche Turbo, and using it to commute 500 yards to the Post Office to pick up your pension. In first gear.

My last drive purchase, by the way, was a 12TB Helium-filled WD DataCentre class HC520. £230.

For a consumer NAS I would probably just go for straight for something like a WD Blue SN550. Nice cheap drive, fast enough. I'm used to high end stuff that comes with up to 1TB of ram for caching, but that is for serving petabytes of drives to thousands of users. On a domestic NAS I can see you hitting diminishing returns pretty fast.

But a PC is somewhat different. I'll pay a bit more for that, but even then I can see the diminishing returns pretty fast. Frankly a SATA SSD is still totally usable as far as I am concerned, just the price is often about the same as a faster NVMe so why would you bother on a new build?

Nice price on the spinning rust if that was recent.

[Saracen999]

It was recent. I went back to get some more a few days later and the Chia thing had broken and prices shot up, if you could get them at all. However, my original source is back at close to that again.

I pretty much had reached exactly the same conclusion on the use of very fast SSD in both NAS and PC. For me, not worth it in the NAS but a conventional SSD, as direct storage not cache, will be provided I'm careful what I put on it. The justification for 980 Pro-type in the PC is exactly that - for a build like I'm proposing, it'll probably be the only storage in the PC and for the price difference .... why not?

[Saracen999]

Can I suggest you look for memory that can do CL16 or under at 3800 for your Ryzen 3 system. There is no need to pay over the odds - this is probably not such a hard overclock for a few cheap kits.

you might wanna get 16*2 at the start since 4*8 probably won't clock as nicely.

enjoy the new build!

Well, the build was going to be either 5800X or 5900X so Ryzen 7 or 9, not R3. I did say Zen 3, but not Ryzen 3. Still not sure if I'll build or buy, though.