I'm planning to upgrade to a Ryzen 7 5700X. I originally thought I would also replace my current ASRock A520M/ac WiFi motherboard with a B550M board, but I'll be purchasing the CPU first. Can I install and use the 5700X in my existing A520 motherboard, or should I wait until I buy a new board? If replacing the motherboard is worthwhile, what B550M models would you recommend?
3 Answers
A new B550M board doesn’t seem worthwhile for this upgrade. The 5700X is relatively easy for an AM4 motherboard to handle, and your current A520 board should be adequate unless you specifically need features such as PCIe 4.0, additional M.2 support, or better connectivity.
The 5700X has a fairly low power limit compared with higher-end AM4 chips, so the A520M/ac should be able to run it permanently as long as the BIOS supports the processor and your cooling is reasonable. I’d install the new CPU in the existing board rather than spending money on another motherboard.
You probably don’t need to replace the motherboard at all. The ASRock A520M/ac supports the Ryzen 7 5700X with a compatible BIOS version, so check ASRock’s CPU support list and update the BIOS before swapping CPUs if necessary.
Thanks, I’m using the ASRock A520M/ac specifically, so I’ll check which BIOS version it needs.