ASRock B550 Taichi Review: The $300 B550 Motherboard with Chutzpah
by Gavin Bonshor on August 21, 2020 3:30 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
- AMD
- ASRock
- Taichi
- AM4
- Ryzen 3000
- Ryzen 3700X
- Ryzen 4000
- B550
- B550 Taichi
Gaming Performance
For B550 we are running using Windows 10 64-bit with the 1909 update.
World of Tanks enCore
Albeit different to most of the other commonly played MMO or massively multiplayer online games, World of Tanks is set in the mid-20th century and allows players to take control of a range of military based armored vehicles. World of Tanks (WoT) is developed and published by Wargaming who are based in Belarus, with the game’s soundtrack being primarily composed by Belarusian composer Sergey Khmelevsky. The game offers multiple entry points including a free-to-play element as well as allowing players to pay a fee to open up more features. One of the most interesting things about this tank based MMO is that it achieved eSports status when it debuted at the World Cyber Games back in 2012.
World of Tanks enCore is a demo application for a new and unreleased graphics engine penned by the Wargaming development team. Over time the new core engine will implemented into the full game upgrading the games visuals with key elements such as improved water, flora, shadows, lighting as well as other objects such as buildings. The World of Tanks enCore demo app not only offers up insight into the impending game engine changes, but allows users to check system performance to see if the new engine run optimally on their system.
Grand Theft Auto V
The highly anticipated iteration of the Grand Theft Auto franchise hit the shelves on April 14th 2015, with both AMD and NVIDIA in tow to help optimize the title. GTA doesn’t provide graphical presets, but opens up the options to users and extends the boundaries by pushing even the hardest systems to the limit using Rockstar’s Advanced Game Engine under DirectX 11. Whether the user is flying high in the mountains with long draw distances or dealing with assorted trash in the city, when cranked up to maximum it creates stunning visuals but hard work for both the CPU and the GPU.
For our test we have scripted a version of the in-game benchmark. The in-game benchmark consists of five scenarios: four short panning shots with varying lighting and weather effects, and a fifth action sequence that lasts around 90 seconds. We use only the final part of the benchmark, which combines a flight scene in a jet followed by an inner city drive-by through several intersections followed by ramming a tanker that explodes, causing other cars to explode as well. This is a mix of distance rendering followed by a detailed near-rendering action sequence, and the title thankfully spits out frame time data.
F1 2018
Aside from keeping up-to-date on the Formula One world, F1 2017 added HDR support, which F1 2018 has maintained; otherwise, we should see any newer versions of Codemasters' EGO engine find its way into F1. Graphically demanding in its own right, F1 2018 keeps a useful racing-type graphics workload in our benchmarks.
Aside from keeping up-to-date on the Formula One world, F1 2017 added HDR support, which F1 2018 has maintained. We use the in-game benchmark, set to run on the Montreal track in the wet, driving as Lewis Hamilton from last place on the grid. Data is taken over a one-lap race.
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Irata - Saturday, August 22, 2020 - link
You also have x4 PCIe 4.0 plus several USB ports connected directly to the CPU with Ryzen. There is an Aorus board that allows the x8 plus three times x4 for nVME connection all directly from the CPU.If the Ampere and RDNA2 only need the bandwidth provider by 8x PCIe 4 / 16x PCIe 3, you can run the GPU and three nVME at full speed that way, plus USB devices connected to the CPU *and* still have the x4 PCIe 3 lanes for the chipset to CPU connection for everything else on B550.
I'd say this is where Ryzen 2 and 3 shine vs the competition that is much more limited with PCIe 3 and four fewer lanes from the CPU.
Death666Angel - Saturday, August 22, 2020 - link
I'm curious, what would be your use case for two x8 slots? Multi GPU is dead and are there any peripheral cards that need an x8 slot from the CPU? :)MrVibrato - Sunday, August 23, 2020 - link
There are x8 HBAs / RAID controllers.So, if one wants to use a GPU and such a HBA / RAID controller, two available x8 slots can make sense...sandtitz - Friday, August 21, 2020 - link
"...and the slightly older Intel AX200 [vs AX201]"According to Intel ARK, they're both the same product, released at the same time. Only the system connectivity differs.
No reason to prefer either.
invinciblegod - Friday, August 21, 2020 - link
What does system connectivity mean?dotes12 - Friday, August 21, 2020 - link
I think that Intel's AX200 does Wi-Fi through PCI-E and Bluetooth through USB, while Intel's AX201 uses CNVi for both in one CNVio link. I might have the 200/201 numbers reversed, but that's the idea as far as I understand it.Hyoyeon - Friday, August 21, 2020 - link
CNVi (intel proprietary) modules are often soldered, so I prefer the AX200.jabber - Saturday, August 22, 2020 - link
I must admit for me the PCIe slot setup I'd prefer is1 x 16
4 x 4
More practical for my use. Boards come with way too many 16 and 1 slots for my liking. The x4 slot is underappreciated.
Gigaplex - Saturday, August 22, 2020 - link
x4 cards fit in an x16 slot. There's not really much benefit in putting a physical x4 slot on the board - may as well just put an x16 slot and have it share lanes with some of the other slots, dropping down to x4 active.jabber - Monday, August 24, 2020 - link
Ahhh well you see I want to just have SET slots. I don't want that "if X is in Y then V is x4 or disabled and if Y is in V then C is X16 and if X is in V then its x8 but if you have NVMe in Slot B its disabled" nonsense.