Advice on an ASRock a520m or Gigabyte a520i itx

Soulstorm brew

Weaksauce
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Mar 29, 2019
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Hi all.
Looking to buy a cheap 520 itx to go with a 3600 and these 2 look to be all there is on Amazon.
Anyone have any experience with either?
I should add, I´d like to undervolt if possible on one of these as it´s going into a small case.
 
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If you're undervolting anyway, you could go with either one. Really depends on personal preference. I've had good luck with several ASRock boards, and I have the GB B550i which is solid also.
 
Thanks
I like the b550i but it is about 55 pounds dearer, which I could put towards a graphics card, ( if I can get one at a decent price)
Any idea what the i and the m stand for?
 
I've got the Gigabyte A520i AC. Not much to say about it, it works and must have been at the low end of prices, or I wouldn't have bought it. :D

I did use the EasyTune software to fiddle with voltages a bit when it was new, it's pretty janky, but lets you fiddle with voltages anyway. Also voltages are available in the bios. Not a whole lot of controls, but it's A520, so that's what you get. I'm running an APU, and it won't pull that many watts, so I can't tell you if the power regulation is good or anything like that.
 
Thanks
I like the b550i but it is about 55 pounds dearer, which I could put towards a graphics card, ( if I can get one at a decent price)
Any idea what the i and the m stand for?

i is usually ITX and m is mATX.
 
I've got the Gigabyte A520i AC. Not much to say about it, it works and must have been at the low end of prices, or I wouldn't have bought it. :D

I did use the EasyTune software to fiddle with voltages a bit when it was new, it's pretty janky, but lets you fiddle with voltages anyway. Also voltages are available in the bios. Not a whole lot of controls, but it's A520, so that's what you get. I'm running an APU, and it won't pull that many watts, so I can't tell you if the power regulation is good or anything like that.
Thanks for that, I read somewhere that you can´t oc with that board, just the ram. I won´t be doing much tinkering, just undervolting a little, it sounds like from what your saying there´s options in bios for this?
i is usually ITX and m is mATX.


That´s what confused me a bit, that ASRock a520m is an itx, for intel it´s a B560m itx.
Looks like it´s an ASRock thing, goes back to the a320 as well.
 
Thanks for that, I read somewhere that you can´t oc with that board, just the ram. I won´t be doing much tinkering, just undervolting a little, it sounds like from what your saying there´s options in bios for this?



That´s what confused me a bit, that ASRock a520m is an itx, for intel it´s a B560m itx.
Looks like it´s an ASRock thing, goes back to the a320 as well.

I took some screenshots for you, these are the sensible options in the tweaker menu. I think you can dig down into some weirder stuff in the settings menu, but a lot of it seems like duplicated but less user friendly; I did see something about setting the TDP target somewhere in there, but IIRC, I could go down to 15W or 45W? but not above 65W.
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