AMD FX 8350 OC Motherboard

[Garrlor]

Hey guys.

Looking to get the right mobo for my FX 8350, I will be looking to OC with a Corsair H60 up to about 4.5Ghz if I can get that. My concern is with the motherboard and if it can handle it. I have a budget of £80-100, but I can only buy from Amazon.co.uk due to issues getting things sent to me.

If I need to move to a more expensive board, I will downgrade my GPU from a R9 390 to a R9 380. One final thing is to consider is plenty of fan connectors, and I am going to be using a Corsair Carbide 300R (windowed), with as many fans as I can fit in. Front and bottom to intake, top/rear to exhale. As well as intakes on the side too.

 

[naturesninja]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gigabyte-GA-990FXA-UD3-990FXA-UD3-SKT-AM3-Motherboard/dp/B00545BZOG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-2&keywords=990fx or http://www.amazon.co.uk/M5A99X-R2-0-Motherboard-PCI-Express-iControl/dp/B008RPZUZK/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-8&keywords=990fx or this http://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-990FXA-Motherboard-Processor-Gigabit/dp/B004ZHC2DC/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-10&keywords=990fx They will all serve you well.

 

[clutchc]

+1^
The UD3 is what I had with my FX-8350. A bit confusing to use the BIOS for OC'ing, but that's only because it has so many options.
The Asus M5A99FXA is another top end 990FXA board: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-intel-amd-motherboard,3902.html (scroll down)

 

[Garrlor]

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gigabyte-GA-990FXA-UD3-990FXA-UD3-SKT-AM3-Motherboard/dp/B00545BZOG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-2&keywords=990fx or http://www.amazon.co.uk/M5A99X-R2-0-Motherboard-PCI-Express-iControl/dp/B008RPZUZK/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-8&keywords=990fx or this http://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-990FXA-Motherboard-Processor-Gigabit/dp/B004ZHC2DC/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-10&keywords=990fx They will all serve you well.

Cheers for that! Always nice to have options!

The case/cooling was at first the biggest issue I had to overcome, and now its nice to fix the CPU/Mobo issue. If only I could pick between NVIDIA and AMD graphics.....

 

[clutchc]

AMD and Nvidia are both great. But keep in mind, Nvidia's high end cards will do what AMD's will do... but at much less wattage (and heat). I just made a sideways move from a R9-290X OC to a GTX 970 FTW ACX 2.0+. Slight improvement in my Firestrike score, but hugely lower temps and power draw.

 

[sora]

I would personally choose 990FX motherboard haha.

 

[Garrlor]

Well,

I got the MSI 990FXA, which I am very happy with. I am pairing it with my FX8350 and 16Gb of 1866Mhz Ram, along with a Samsung EVO SSD so it should be a pretty nippy system right out of the box even without an OC.

As for graphics, I went with the MSI R9 380 4Gb. Its a good card, scores well in benchmarks and is no where near as power hungry as the previous generation of AMD cards. I researched into the various cards, and decided that the GTX 960 just didn't give the same amount of performance. I cant afford a GTX 970 in this build, so this is the way forward for me. As I am going to be running 2 140mm fans in the side of the case, the MSI twin Frozr system and these should see my card stay nice and cool.

My only concern now is if my H60 is going to be enough cooling to do some OC work on the CPU, though I know it will be more than good enough for the stock speed. If I need to upgrade it in the future its not the most expensive piece of equipment, so we shall see.

Thanks for the help guys, its much appreciated.

 

[clutchc]

I used the H60 on my FX-8350/Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 system a while back. While it did a slightly better job of cooling than my 212 EVO did, I still couldn't get past 4.6 GHz w/o temp issues causing throttling. 4.6 GHz wasn't bad (it was stable), but I think a 240mm cooler would have probably allowed me to take the OC higher.

You should have a nice 1080p gamer there. Is this the board you got? http://us.msi.com/product/mb/990FXA-GAMING.html#hero-overview

 

[Garrlor]

I used the H60 on my FX-8350/Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 system a while back. While it did a slightly better job of cooling than my 212 EVO did, I still couldn't get past 4.6 GHz w/o temp issues causing throttling. 4.6 GHz wasn't bad (it was stable), but I think a 240mm cooler would have probably allowed me to take the OC higher.

You should have a nice 1080p gamer there. Is this the board you got? http://us.msi.com/product/mb/990FXA-GAMING.html#hero-overview

No its this one http://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-990FXA-Motherboard-Processor-Gigabit/dp/B004ZHC2DC/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1440702324&sr=8-10&keywords=990fx.

Still a good board for the money!

The amazing thing with this system is, i just got a refund for £319 for a laptop that never turned up. Plus on top of that I get to claim VAT back off my purchases at the moment, so this whole system is coming in at under £600. As far as I am concerned, i could not have got anything better for the money, and it will let the wife enjoy some 1080p gaming while having plenty in the tank so she can use lightroom to her hearts content.

If you struggled to get the OC above 4.6, I will probably struggle as well. Living in Cyprus it can get very hot in the summer, the room temp can easily hit 35 Celcius. I can maybe give the CPU a little nudge to a 4.2/4.3, just to get a little extra juice out of it. Maybe I will squeeze some extra cash out for the H75.

 

[Garrlor]

I have just been looking at the USB 3.0 situation. I want to put a card reader in the front, alongside the 2 USB 3.0 connectors that will be a the top of my Corsair 300R case. I know you can get internal expansion PCI-E cards, would I need 2 of these cards to get all 4 USB 3.0 connections working, or can you get splitters?

I am just finalizing the last bits that I need for the build, and this was the one issue that has raised its ugly head. Bloody MSI only giving me USB 2.0 connectors on the mobo lol! I am currently looking at picking up 2 of these http://www.amazon.co.uk/Silverstone-SST-ECU01-PCI-E-Internal-Dual/dp/B00NNPNM7M/ref=sr_1_8?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1441026504&sr=1-8&keywords=Internal+USB+3.0+expansion, which will give me 4 USB 3.0 on the front of the case when everything is installed, though its a bit of a pain for cable management. I will see if there are any that can just draw power direct from the PCI and save me some hassle!

My only concern is looking at the cards, the PCI connectors at the bottom look bigger than the slots on the Mobo. Is this a common occurrence due to photographs not showing the correct scale, or am I screwed for getting some USB 3.0 love into my mobo? Im not going to be a happy bunny if I have to pick up a different mobo just to get some USB 3.0 connections.

Thoughts?