20 Best Value B550 Motherboard (2022 Updated)

I originally bought a Phantom Gaming 4 but returned it and in the middle of shipping transit I decided to upgrade it to the ROG Strix. The main reason was the BIOS flashback feature as I had an AMD 5600X for it.

It seems it was a newer stock item so it already had the updated BIOS. I still tried the BIOS flashback feature to upgrade to the newest BIOS and liked it. Overall it’s a great motherboard. I only put 4 stars because of two things.

One it lacks an ARGB header on the top of the motherboard so all routing has to go to the bottom and daisy chain from there. Another is not really the motherboard but ASUS AURA RGB software. It kept reverting to red, which is the default color.

After a quick online search I found you have to change an XML file on the Aura folder to Read-Only as a workaround. I don’t like that I had to do that as if I want to change I want to remove the Read-Only attribute, change to the new setting, and then set again to Read-Only.

On the plus side, I liked their fan control software as it detected the fans and set the AIO pump automatically to 100%, versus the Asrock software on the Phantom Gaming 4 (I have another one on a different system which is why I initially bought another and then decided to try a different model).

However, you need to do an additional download of the AI software suite after you install the Armory Crate for the ASUS Fan control software to be available. A cool feature is the “eye” logo on the board that stays on even after you turn off the computer.

This feature lets you know if you have the Power Supply switch on or off, that is, if the motherboard is still receiving power or not. Also I noticed that as I did some troubleshooting and swapped components around my two computers, the same hardware stayed way cooler, around 10-15 degrees less on the ASUS ROG versus the Asrock Phantom.

I also liked some other nice touches that are bit more high-end on the ROG like the thermal pads and covers on the M. 2 slots, but of course the ROG is a more expensive board so you expect more high-end features.

One final comment is that the VRM covers on the top of the motherboard conflicted a bit with the screws of the 240mm AIO I installed so I had to fiddle around that. The AIO fans went into the top PWM headers so I also have very little clearance for the wires to avoid hitting the fans.

You could say this is an issue with the case height but on the Asrock this was not the case as the headers were located differently and I had the same AIO.

Great feature set with some style, but more than one thing annoyed me: RMA process was inconsistent with claiming advance RMA was available, RAM QVL was not available for Ryzen 5000 series at launch then was more limited than 3000 series, and insufficent notes on EATX12V connectors.

I would only get this mobo if you like the feature set compared to other mobos – Otherwise get something different and cheaper. Features go beyond what I need like a thunderbolt header, 2. 5 gbps Ethernet, USB 3.

2 Gen 1 header, built in I/O shroud, and the all important BIOS flashback with USB for my 5600X worked great. SATA data cables are unfortunately right behind where the main GPU goes, requiring case’s rear panel to be removed to disconnect SATA cables.

Slots 1, 3, 5 are closest to the GPU while 2, 4, 6 are one port away. I couldn’t get SATA cable to release even with thin tools. Optical audio port fits looser than any other mobo or audio device I’ve used, as easily slips out if small to moderate tension exists.

Armory Crate software has been mostly good for updating drivers & BIOS plus basic RGB/AURA effects, though one Armory Crate update for “Device Kits” failed until I did a restart. Auto OC is awesome if you have an aftermarket cooler, but resulted in Deus Ex Mankind Divided being unstable, crashing about once per hour.

RMA was the only way I could confirm whether I had a mobo or CPU issue in handling RAM. Turned out it was CPU, not this mobo.

– I got this motherboard together with AMD 5800X and DDR4 as upgrade for my old system: Asus Z-97E + Intel I5-4590 + 16Gb RAM + NVIDIA GTX 1070TI + SSD + 7200RPM SATA drive + Cooler Master G650M 650W 80+Bronze (circa 2015) Unfortunately, after I assembled everything, system would randomly reboot, mostly when watching some videos online in the browser (i.

e Netflix). After disabling ASUS performance optimizations in the BIOS the system became more stable, would reboot once every two three days. I originally attributed this to my old PSU, and ordered a new one Seasonic FOCUS PX 850.

Unfortunately, it made system even less stable. I also tried with yet another PSU – Corsair RM750, with the same result. I disassembled everything and assembled it back, and tried yet another PSU from my other home computer ( Rosewill – BRONZE Series – 1000-Watt 80+ Bronze) that one works a little better, but I am still getting about one random reboot per day.

The last one watching the new year show. Strangely enough, running CPU stress tests (stress-ng) for hours or memory tests with memtes86 does not find any errors, and doesn’t trigger reboot. So, I am going to return this motherboard.

Having chosen on a computer system centered on a Ryzen 7 5700G, I purchased this particular board based on the impression given by other reviews here and elsewhere that it was well built. I was fully aware that there was a better than even chance it would need a BIOS flash before it would even recognize my CPU well enough to even boot into BIOS.

So I tried to do the Q-flash routine on an empty board as seen on various YouTube videos. It did not seem to work, but the only way I could be sure was to assemble and try to boot. No luck. But I had read that although Q-Flash was supposed to be done without components, I also read that hey, that’s the way it’s SUPPOSED to work, but sometimes it doesn’t.

so I installed the board in the case and added the following: (2) Intel 670p Series M. 2 2280 1TB PCIe NVMe 3. 0 x4 QLC SDSDs (4) G. SKILL Ripjaws V Series 16GB 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 3200 (PC4 25600) Modules A Seasonic PRIME FANLESS PX-450, 450W 80+ Platinum, Full Modular, ATX12V & EPS12V, True Fanless Power Supply Ryzen 7 5700G CPU Guess what? I still couldn’t q-flash.

or Q-Flash either. It seemed that the process would start but not finish; fans would spool up, LEDs would light up, etc. So I pulled the components out again. I read, in several online forums (fora?) that I should try a variety of USB drives.

and that formatting with Windows XP was the magic cure, or to use a 16Kb allocation size rather than default, or a smaller capacity older drive, etc. I tried naming the BIOS file GIGABYTE. BIN, GIGABYTE.

bin, gigabyte. bin (but not “gigabyte. BIN”), using USB 2 and USB 3 sticks I had lying about formatted (all in FAT32, of course) using Linux, Windows 10 and Windows XP, all to no avail. I didn’t really do this in a very orderly fashion, so I’m sure I missed some or many possible combinations drives, formatting, and filename.

It worked the same every time – the q-flash LED would flash quickly for a while, then stop briefly before flashing 10 times slowly and then just stopping. The board wouldn’t completely shut down and even waiting a half an hour did nothing.

Then I gave up on this process and reinstalled just the processor and two sticks of RAM. Somehow this allowed me to boot into BIOS, which I couldn’t do with the board all populated with other stuff. Then I could do the q-flash from there, although it was necessary to highlight the filename on the list of USB files and hitting the “enter” key rather than just selecting “next” or “continue” or whatever the choice was.

After that I completed the assembly process, and from then on things have worked well. I mention all of this because as good as this board seems to be, the ability to q-flash the BIOS was kind of a sine qua non necessity for my usage.

If I knew anyone from whom I could borrow a processor supported by the F11 BIOS it would have been an inconvenience but not insurmountable. But I’m not in any gaming or other computer geek circles so I needed something I could get to function on my own.

Other than that significant issue, I would think the board is worth recommending.

I’m a video editor and was looking to make some upgrades to my system. Due to editing raw video codecs I decided to stick AMD for the blunt power of many cores; but I won’t be jumping to AM5 until the platforms matures a little first to avoid any instability issues.

I needed a motherboard that offered at least two extra PCIe slots each with 4x lanes or greater for my extra cards – which is surprisingly difficult to find. Plus some m. 2 slots for fast storage. Threadripper was beyond what I could afford.

This is one of the few AM4 motherboards that allows you to fully populate all of the M. 2 slots and PCIe slots. Many others that offer 4x M. 2 slots and extra PCIe slots won’t allow you to use them all at once due to the limitations of the chipset; such as populating all m.

2 slots will turn off a PCIe slot and so on, so you have to do some careful research into the what can and cannot be used at the same time. So while this board doesn’t offer 4x M. 2 slots, it does mean that all 3x of them can be used at the same time as all the PCIe slots.

Incase you’re curious the board has been populated with a graphics card, Blackmagic Decklink 4k Monitor Card, a 10Gbe ethernet card, NVMe boot drive, NVMe scratch disk, and SATA SSD file storage. I’m hoping that someday someone will make a motherboard with heaps of bifurcated PCIe expansion to give users like me more expandability without the need to jump up to threadripper; but until then this will fit my requirements perfectly.

The board itself is very easy to build with. There are several board makers with similar competitive products such as Asrock, MSI, and Gigabyte. Most of these check off the features I want as did this board.

I didn’t need the RGB, but I’ll take it, I don’t hate it. With a BIOS update, my usb issues seemed to go away, so I’m glad that this was fixed, although I see some early adopters spent a couple months dealing with these issues.

It’s a little odd to see the update progress slowly and then 2 more reboots while it updates led firmware and something else. I like the included accessory antenna for the wifi. Overall, this board is a good competitor amongst the B550 bros out there, but not a good price for the value, especially if you’re not making use of the pci-e 4.

0. There isn’t too much of a “seat of the pants feel” benefit yet. I’ve only owned this thing for less than a week, so this is a fresh review! Ryzen 7 5800x, 32GB Geil 3200mhz, 6700xt, 960 evo, other sata ssd’s and hdds, evga 850w gold supernova.

I’ve had nothing but issues with this board since I got it. Ironically, the bad Intel NIC everyone seems to have an issue with has been the most reliable thing on this board for me. The issues first came up a day after I installed the new MB in my system, when I was playing a game and my PC just shut off, without warning.

After 3 seconds it rebooted itself into Windows like nothing had happened. I thought that was odd and proceeded to try to game again, and it happened again. First thing I did was re-seat all my components.

I then ran a CPU stress test as well as MemTest86, and everything came out great. I then tried to game again and again, the PC simply shut off and rebooted after about 5 minutes of gameplay. Next thing I did was use a different PSU, thinking perhaps it was a power issue.

Installed the new PSU and again, the PC would shut off. After a few days, a new BIOS version came out and I immediately updated to it thinking that it may fix these instability issues I was having. but it unfortunately did not.

Now, after that update, I am having issues where the PC will shut itself off multiple times when started from a complete off. Watching the PC, it will start up and all the fans will be full blast, then it will run for 10 seconds and shut off, then after a few seconds it will restart.

After doing this cycle, the LED for the RAM will light up indicating an issue with the RAM. The only way to break that loop that has worked for me is to completely unplug the system, turn off the PSU, hold the power button to clear any residual electricity and then plug the PSU back in.

After I do that, the PC will start normally. My only conclusion is that the motherboard is faulty, as every component I have has been checked as well as ran in another system. The CPU works great, the PSU is brand new (tried 3 PSU’s in total) the RAM cleared MemTest86 as well as is on the QVL for the board AND worked great on an old Gigabyte board I use to test components, the SSD is fairly new and in good shape according to the Sandisk SSD health check and my GPU works flawlessly without issue.

That leaves the motherboard as the only piece that I can possibly think of that is having an issue, as I have checked all other components pretty thoroughly. the sad thing is, once it does start the PC will work fine while doing any task besides gaming, the whole reason I built it.

I can run stress test after stress test, brose the internet, watch movies, open 20 Chrome tabs, and not have an issue but once a gaming load happens the PC just says “nah, I’m out” and shuts off. Incredibly frustrating as my other Gigabyte B550 board has worked without issue for over a year now, absolutely flawless and now this, more expensive board, completely baffles me In fact, the only reason I got this board was because it’s one of the very rare white themed board, the other being the Gigabyte Vision D which is wayyy more expensive.

Starting to think I should have saved for it.

USB 2. 0 has been a bit flaky as Sebastian R’s review notes though I only had problems at startup, a newer BIOS may be why we had a different experience. A google did confirm it as an issue but I followed advice I found to disable ErP and this appeared to fix it.

I am not 100% that this is a gigabyte issue. It is pretty rough though that USB should misbehave and my rating has the board down a whole star over it. There have been a lot of recent bios updates (late 2021) including AGESA stuff.

I only have USB issues now with coming out of sleep mode and that is with ERP on (I loaded optimsed defaults at one point). I will turn it off again and expect it will fix the sleep mode USB problem occurring too.

DDR support seems OK, I could not get the rated 3600 out of my kit without angrying up the voltage past XMP (and decided against it) but the RAM is certifed as being for Intel (despite being on the ERP) so no worries there either.

I did notice the USB problem at DDR3600 on startup again too. Weird. Love the optical audio out! Flashing the bios to support the 5700G with a bare (no RAM or CPU) motherboard worked well. Super cool feature.

I already had two ATX TUF X570’s with excellent results, so I went with Asus’s TUF family again for a more compact build, upgrading my daughter’s school+gaming PC. Installed it on an Antec NX200 M case.

Performs greatly with a 5600X CPU, and despite the form factor there’s decent clearance from the CPU to the PCIEv4x16/GPU slot to install a Noctua NH-U12S cooler comfortably in the vertical position.

This SKU doesn’t have wireless, but it has an Intel Ethernet 2. 5G NIC and it’s packed with USB ports up to 3. 2 and Type-C; it’s hard to find a Micro-ATX board with all I/O you need plus performance / price / VRM quality.

I only wanted Bluetooth so I added a $30 PCIe card for that; which I also like so I can easily upgrade the WiFi/BT AX chip in a motherboard that doesn’t have an easily-accessible M2 M-Key slot for that.

This still leaves one PCIe3x16 slot free so it’s OK for me. Only complaint is the limited number of chassis fan headers but that’s a common trait of Micro-ATX boards. Right now the available headers are just right for the build, but as soon as I can upgrade its GPU to something better and more power-hungry, I’ll probably want an extra fan at the top to help exhaust heat without much extra noise (many fans going slowly beat fewer fans going fast).

I can use the CPU_OPT header for that, or share the same header as the back fan’s with a splitter, not ideal solutions if you’re nitpicky about that stuff but again common tradeoffs of a compact build.

I’ve only had this motherboard for a few weeks and haven’t tested it to its full capacity just yet, but I love it. On a surface level, I find the design really cool and pleasing. There’s an RGB light in the bottom right that always glows and can sync up with the rest of my LEDs in my case for a seamless lighting experience.

Onto the more technical side, I had the staff at MicroCenter install this one for me (after having another motherboard in my PC that wasn’t compatible with my CPU), but from what I can tell all the slots are clearly labeled (thank goodness! on my old one the proper hookups were so hard to find and figure out) and easy to find, so setting it up would be a breeze.

The only thing I wish it had was more RGB headers, but splitters aren’t expensive, so I can deal with that in favor of a fast, reliable, and stylish motherboard. The WiFi extension was easy to figure out and set up, and despite my PC being in a basement apartment with my router in another room through thicker walls, it gets GREAT signal.

I haven’t had an issue with it not picking up a signal yet. Highly recommend this motherboard. It’s pricier than some others, of course, but you get what you pay for, and this one is certainly worth the price.

This motherboard is all-around a good performer. Build quality is high. Aesthetics are good. I have a couple of gripes with it. First, one NVMe slot is so close to the CPU socket that I couldn’t fit a drive in it with my AIO shifted to cool Ryzen chiplets.

The other NVME slot is buried under a cumbersome heat spreader with no stand-off to attach it. It’s easily fixable with some parts, but I was disappointed by the out of box NVMe compatibility. Second, the Aura Sync software is now bundled with the rather cumbersome Armory Crate software, which I’ve already uninstalled, so that was kind of disappointing as well.

On the bright side, it enabled resizable BAR with a couple of clicks, so I’m feeling positive overall.

I’m overall really happy with this board. My only real issue is that the board did not want to recognize my NVIDIA 1080 Founders card. Thankfully, the board as this great feature that shows status of each component during the boot process, and I kept getting a white light stuck on vga, indicating there was some error in booting the device.

There is really no reason this board should not recognize the 1080 card, but I’ve heard that others with 1070 cards have had the same problem. Regardless, after being able to identify the problem quickly, I was able to find a solution.

I removed the vga card and booted the system without a card. It will cycle through the boot process several times and then hold on the white vga light because there is no card installed. Turn the system off, insert the card, connect the power, and reboot.

The boot will then cycle through the vga and take you to the bios menu. I received a message that said the vga was not compatible with the UEFI, but the computer loaded the bios menu with no problem afterward and has been running fine since.

Hopefully, this solution is helpful to others that run into the same problem. The reason I gave 4 eggs instead of 5 is because of this issue. There was about 10 minutes there where I was totally bamboozled and considered returning the board.

And even though I got everything working fine, the solution I found seems pretty janky. For refence, my build is: Asus TUF B550M-Plus Ryzen 7 3700x Corsair Vengeance 16 Gb, DDR4, 3200 Mhz Nvidia 1080 Founders EVGA Supernova 650 G3.