Gigabyte B550 AORUS Pro

[Chrispy_]

I have (had) plans for the 1600X and B350 setup.
Now I'm not sure what I'm gonna do.

Simple.

Whatever you were going to do with a 1600X and B350 you now get to do with a 3600 and B450

 

[RealNeil]

Simple.

Whatever you were going to do with a 1600X and B350 you now get to do with a 3600 and B450

I was going to give it away to someone who needs a hand with a PC, but I'm not sure that I want to do that.
I have a quad-core Xeon on the shelf that would do for him.

 

[NRANM]

On GIgabyte's specs page the M.2 slot connected to the chipset is listed as supporting only PCIe SSDs, not SATA. From this review, however, it isn't entirely clear what that slot supports. Anybody can shed some light here? It seems somewhat counterintuitive that I would need to connect my M.2 NVMe SSD to the chipset, and my M.2 SATA SSD to the CPU.

 

[Chrispy_]

On GIgabyte's specs page the M.2 slot connected to the chipset is listed as supporting only PCIe SSDs, not SATA. From this review, however, it isn't entirely clear what that slot supports. Anybody can shed some light here? It seems somewhat counterintuitive that I would need to connect my M.2 NVMe SSD to the chipset, and my M.2 SATA SSD to the CPU.

I would imagine both slots support SATA, but they only mention the PCIe because it's reduced to PCIe 3.0 instead of 4.0 on the chipset's M.2 slot.
If in doubt, download the user manual and see if there's any specific note about where you cannot insert a SATA M.2 drive.

 

[NRANM]

The user manual lists the same information -- that the chipset M.2 slot (M2B_SB) supports only PCIe 3.0. Granted, it doesn't mention explicitly that a SATA SSD cannot be plugged into that slot, but I doubt it would support if it doesn't mention it.

We'll see, I've already ordered it.

 

[Chrispy_]

I would imagine they don't mention SATA support off the chipset specifically because that's just assumed to always be there.
Even if your fears are justified, you won't have a problem since Zen2 CPUs have two SATA ports directly on the IO die of the CPU. Counter-intuitive or not, it'll work just the same.

 

[NRANM]

I have no doubt it will work. It just seems a bit illogical to have to connect the slower SSD to the faster port, which would leave the faster SSD for the slower port. I doubt I would notice any difference in real-world scenarios, and I suspect this would only matter for some serious benchmarks, but it is still a bit weird.

I will report back with more information once I've replaced the my current B450 board with the new B550 one.

 

[jesdals]

Seems that the bios slide with sata settings shows new chipsets the lastest bios for the x570 tell of new x590 as well.

 

[Caring1]

Seems that the bios slide with sata settings shows new chipsets the lastest bios for the x570 tell of new x590 as well.
View attachment 161662

Yep, been reported before, weeks ago

 

[NRANM]

As promised, I'm here to report on my findings. Yes, the technical specifications on Gigabyte's page are indeed correct. The chipset M.2 slot does NOT support SATA SSDs, only NVMe.

I also encountered a weird problem, where my mouse would stop working every few seconds for about another few seconds, and my keyboard's backlight kept blinking. That happened when both were connected to the top-most row of USB 2.0 ports on the rear panel, alongside a USB DAC and the USB cable for the monitor's USB ports. Moved the mouse and keyboard down to the second row of USB 2.0 ports (the one next to the video outputs), and thus far they are behaving fine.

 

[Chrispy_]

As promised, I'm here to report on my findings. Yes, the technical specifications on Gigabyte's page are indeed correct. The chipset M.2 slot does NOT support SATA SSDs, only NVMe.

I also encountered a weird problem, where my mouse would stop working every few seconds for about another few seconds, and my keyboard's backlight kept blinking. That happened when both were connected to the top-most row of USB 2.0 ports on the rear panel, alongside a USB DAC and the USB cable for the monitor's USB ports. Moved the mouse and keyboard down to the second row of USB 2.0 ports (the one next to the video outputs), and thus far they are behaving fine.

Thanks for being the early adopter so that by the time I start buying B550 boards in bulk you and other paying beta testers will have discovered most of the worst problems!
/salute.

 

[NRANM]

Well, me being an early adopter was somewhat not entirely my choice, as I was having problems with my ASRock B450 Pro4, and wanted to replace it. The exhibited problems did not prevent the board from working but since they arose a few months after purchased and since I'm a bit of a perfectionist, I was both concerned about the future of the board and annoyed, which is why I decided to replace it this early.
X570 boards were expensive and quite of an overkill, few B450 boards fit my needs (two M.2 slots), so I decided to just get a B550 board as a good middle ground between B450 and X570 in terms of features and price. The B550 Aorus Pro is probably a bit of an overkill as well (stock R7 3700X) and it was a bit more than what I was planning to spend initially, but it gives me peace of mind, its fan control is light-years ahead of what ASRock offered (at least on the B450), and I can always try to pretend the falcon is actually a raven. One can dream...

 

[Win_Wiz]

Could you please check the available dram termination voltage range for me?
I want this board but need low dram termination voltage for micron rev E overclocking.
I can't find this info anywhere, so your first hand info. would be much appreciated

 

[RealNeil]

Simple.

Whatever you were going to do with a 1600X and B350 you now get to do with a 3600 and B450

She ended up letting me upgrade her system. She really likes how much faster it is now.

 

[NRANM]

Could you please check the available dram termination voltage range for me?

If you can give me some basic pointers where to look (I am not familiar with AM4's overclocking options, as I cannot be bothered to overclock anything), I wouldn't mind checking.

 

[Win_Wiz]

Its a bios setting. Gigabyte label it Dram termination (ch a/b). The setting is located under tweaker.

 

[NRANM]

Its a bios setting. Gigabyte label it Dram termination (ch a/b). The setting is located under tweaker.

Range is 0.450 V to 1.000 V. There are also "Auto" and "Normal" options.

 

[Win_Wiz]

Range is 0.450 V to 1.000 V. There are also "Auto" and "Normal" options.

Perfect. That's what I hoped for. Thank you so much.

 

[vladp6]

After using this board (B550 Aorus Pro AC) for two weeks, I'd say better go with the cheap X570 board. The BIOS is still in the development (only F2 has now been released, whilst my previous B450 has F50 version). It does not support well new video cards (I'm having troubles with Gigabyte Radeon RX 5600 XT). There are no lanes to install my second SSD (Samsung Evo 860), so I'm stuck with only 500 GB of Gigabyte Aorus SSD. Heating up issues, it seems there is a problem with voltages on the board, CPU is overheating all the time (compared to my previous B450). So, my sincere advice to all: just wait, don't buy the half-developed product from Gigabyte. If you need a new motherboard for new Ryzen and video card, buy a cheap X570 board, which has been on the market for quite some time.

 

[NRANM]

For the record: no overheating issues here with my R7 3700X.

 

[Win_Wiz]

After using this board (B550 Aorus Pro AC) for two weeks, I'd say better go with the cheap X570 board. The BIOS is still in the development (only F2 has now been released, whilst my previous B450 has F50 version). It does not support well new video cards (I'm having troubles with Gigabyte Radeon RX 5600 XT). There are no lanes to install my second SSD (Samsung Evo 860), so I'm stuck with only 500 GB of Gigabyte Aorus SSD. Heating up issues, it seems there is a problem with voltages on the board, CPU is overheating all the time (compared to my previous B450). So, my sincere advice to all: just wait, don't buy the half-developed product from Gigabyte. If you need a new motherboard for new Ryzen and video card, buy a cheap X570 board, which has been on the market for quite some time.

Samsung 860 Evo, that's a sata ssd right? Do you have many sata devices or how come there is no lanes for it?

 

[vladp6]

Samsung 860 Evo, that's a sata ssd right?

It is M.2 SATA: https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-500GB-SATA-Internal-MZ-N6E500BW/dp/B078218TWQ

I can insert it into only into one available M.2 slot under the graphic card. There are actually two M.2 slots: one for PCIe, which is now occupied by Aorus NVMe, and another one is for anther M.2 SSD. However, the board does not detect any SSD, even being SATA, in this second slot. I've tried both Samsung 860 Evo and my older M.2 SATA SSD, but to no avail. Any SSD can be detected only in the first slot.

Do you have many sata devices or how come there is no lanes for it?

This is the only SATA device I have.

 

[Win_Wiz]

It is M.2 SATA: https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-500GB-SATA-Internal-MZ-N6E500BW/dp/B078218TWQ

I can insert it into only into one available M.2 slot under the graphic card. There are actually two M.2 slots: one for PCIe, which is now occupied by Aorus NVMe, and another one is for anther M.2 SSD. However, the board does not detect any SSD, even being SATA, in this second slot. I've tried both Samsung 860 Evo and my older M.2 SATA SSD, but to no avail. Any SSD can be detected only in the first slot.



This is the only SATA device I have.

It is kind of stupid that only the pcie 4 m.2 slot supports sata. But for my usage it's better than competing ASRock boards that only support pcie 3x2/sata on the second m.2 slot.

The first m.2 slot (pcie4 from cpu) should support sata.
Would the second (pcie3 x4 from chipset) slot bottleneck your Aorus ssd if you plug it in the 2nd m.2 slot?

 

[NRANM]

I can insert it into only into one available M.2 slot under the graphic card. There are actually two M.2 slots: one for PCIe, which is now occupied by Aorus NVMe, and another one is for anther M.2 SSD. However, the board does not detect any SSD, even being SATA, in this second slot. I've tried both Samsung 860 Evo and my older M.2 SATA SSD, but to no avail. Any SSD can be detected only in the first slot.

The lower M.2 slot does not support SATA SSDs, only NVMe. If you have a SATA SSD, it needs to be inserted into the upper M.2 slot. I explicitly tested this, and mentioned it above, as I wasn't sure if it was an error in the technical specifications for the motherboard.

 

[vladp6]

Would the second (pcie3 x4 from chipset) slot bottleneck your Aorus ssd if you plug it in the 2nd m.2 slot?

Not sure, but nothing works in that second slot if the video card is connected to PCIe x16. I've tried to move the video card to the lower PCIe slot, but to no avail. I've tried different combinations and came to conclusion that the only system that can boot is the SSD (any) in the first M.2 slot together with the video card below.

This info is from Gigabyte manual:
1 x PCI Express x16 slot (PCIEX4), integrated in the Chipset:

1. Supporting PCIe 3.0 x4 mode
   * The M2B_SB connector shares bandwidth with the PCIEX4 slot. The PCIEX4 slot will become unavailable when an SSD is installed in the M2B_SB connectors.

1 x PCI Express x16 slot (PCIEX2), integrated in the Chipset:

1. Supporting PCIe 3.0 x2 mode
   * The PCIEX2 slot shares bandwidth with the SATA3 4, 5 connectors. The PCIEX2 slot will become unavailable when a device is installed in the SATA3 4 or SATA3 5 connector.

The lower M.2 slot does not support SATA SSDs, only NVMe. If you have a SATA SSD, it needs to be inserted into the upper M.2 slot. I explicitly tested this, and mentioned it above, as I wasn't sure if it was an error in the technical specifications for the motherboard.

Exactly. However, I prefer that my Gen4 NVMe would benefit from the Gen4 slot. If I change their slots then I'd loose the advantage of using fast Gen4 SSD.