Asus B150 Pro Gaming Aura Edition mobo vs Z170 mobos

[Pieter van Santen]

Hi

My 1st PC build include a Asus B150 Pro Gaming mobo combined with an Intel i7 7500 @ 3.4 Ghz, a Gtx 1060 6GB and 8GB of DDR4 RAM. I'm not planning to do any overclocking with my PC.

I'm from South Africa and the Z170 mobos is a bit out of my price range due to expensive hardware prices. How will the B150 in my build compare to a Z170? How will choosing a B150 impair future upgradability?

Thanks

 

[Multipack]

No you only need a Z170 for k chips and the overclocking features. B150 is still a very good chipset for non 'k' (unlocked) CPU's.

A B150 wont really affect upgrade options in future unless you plan on adding a 2nd graphics card. Your board doesnt support Nvidia SLI. It will only support deafult 2133MHz DDR4 RAM so you cant overclock it with XMP.

 

[Isokolon]

however most B150 (or all of them) need a BIOS update to work with the i5-7500
so you should aim for a B250 board

 

[apk24]

Any reason you're not going for a 200 series chipset? If you can wait a month or so, the price should become reasonable.

As far as the B150 chipset goes, it isn't lacking anything significant for use in a non-overclockable gaming build. In fact, depending on what else you're putting in your system and how pricing looks in your local stores, I might recommend a decent h110 board because you might not need a b150.

 

[Pieter van Santen]

Any reason you're not going for a 200 series chipset? If you can wait a month or so, the price should become reasonable.

As far as the B150 chipset goes, it isn't lacking anything significant for use in a non-overclockable gaming build. In fact, depending on what else you're putting in your system and how pricing looks in your local stores, I might recommend a decent h110 board because you might not need a b150.

The Asus B150 Pro Gaming Aura Mobo costs 154.978 USD in South Africa (ZAR converted to USD)! B250 mobos are even more expensive... I had to choose a mobo to fit best within my budget and with the other components of my build.

I'm just concerned that I should rather have picked a Z170 to increase my options to upgrade in the future.

 

[apk24]

The Asus B150 Pro Gaming Aura Mobo costs 154.978 USD in South Africa (ZAR converted to USD)! B250 mobos are even more expensive... I had to choose a mobo to fit best within my budget and with the other components of my build.

Living in the US, I forget how expensive computer parts can be in other countries. What are you planning on doing with the system? Do you plan on using an NVMe or M.2 SSD? Do you plan on using a separate audio card? What peripherals do you use? You might not need even a B150, it's possible an H110 board would work fine. Those are usually somewhat cheaper.

 

[Multipack]

Like Isokolon says, B150 will need a BIOS update to be compatible with a 7500 (I missed the fact it was a Kaby Lake chip).

 

[Multipack]

And you need a compatible Skylake CPU to do that.. so you'll be left with a board that doesnt support that CPU. Beware.

 

[Pieter van Santen]

No you only need a Z170 for k chips and the overclocking features. B150 is still a very good chipset for non 'k' (unlocked) CPU's.

A B150 wont really affect upgrade options in future unless you plan on adding a 2nd graphics card. Your board doesnt support Nvidia SLI. It will only support deafult 2133MHz DDR4 RAM so you cant overclock it with XMP.

Thanks

Would you say that 8GB 2133 MHz DDR4 RAM (Corsair Vengeance) is sufficient for gaming purposes? I also have a 250 GB SSD (Samsung 750 EVO) and 1 TB HDD (WD Blue) in my build.

I will most probably never use two GPUs at once and rather upgrade to a higher end GPU (1070 or 1080 etc.)

 

[Multipack]

8gb should be just enough. The most I have ever seen used in a game is 7gb (GTA V) but there may be even more demanding games out there. Doubt it tho.

See my post about your CPU above tho..

 

[Pieter van Santen]

Like Isokolon says, B150 will need a BIOS update to be compatible with a 7500 (I missed the fact it was a Kaby Lake chip).

Thanks

My hardware supplier said they will update the BIOS, so no problem there.

 

[Multipack]

Cool. You should be good to go then!

 

[Pieter van Santen]

The Asus B150 Pro Gaming Aura Mobo costs 154.978 USD in South Africa (ZAR converted to USD)! B250 mobos are even more expensive... I had to choose a mobo to fit best within my budget and with the other components of my build.

Living in the US, I forget how expensive computer parts can be in other countries. What are you planning on doing with the system? Do you plan on using an NVMe or M.2 SSD? Do you plan on using a separate audio card? What peripherals do you use? You might not need even a B150, it's possible an H110 board would work fine. Those are usually somewhat cheaper.

I plan to use the system to play games, preferably at 1080p. The build includes a 250 GB Samsung 750 Evo SSD and a 1TB WD Blue HDD and no separate sound card. The only peripherals are a gaming keyboard and mouse and a Dell 22" 1920x1080 HD monitor. Another reason I chose the B150 is for the RGB lighting and because its price fell within my budget.

 

[apk24]

I plan to use the system to play games, preferably at 1080p. The build includes a 250 GB Samsung 750 Evo SSD and a 1TB WD Blue HDD and no separate sound card. The only peripherals is a gaming keyboard and mouse and a Dell 22" 1920x1080 HD monitor. Another reason I chose the B150 is for the RGB lighting.

Other than RGB, an H110 motherboard looks like it would serve your needs, and might be found at around 75% the price.You could put the money saved into more RAM or something. IDK the pricing and availability near you though, so can't really make any solid recommendations.