If you go for Ryzen, ASRock X370 Taichi is a really good motherboard.

The motherboard looks great, btw I am also considering what I should buy when I have the money, but I notice it has a built-in WiFi module, just like many other new MBs. Does the WiFi work (correctly) on Linux?

I don't use it (I have Ethernet connection at home), but it works correctly, it's the recent Intel 802.11ac chip, which is probably the best option on Linux. You'd just need to install firmware-iwlwifi (or whatever the package is called in your distro).

Note, for Ryzen you benefit a lot from faster RAM. I ended up buying this one: https://www.gskill.com/en/product/f4-3200c14d-16gfx

Quite low latency, and works with that X370 Taichi very well (you need to enable XMP profile in setup there, to run it in 3200MHz mode). Just make sure to update motherboard firmware to the latest available version.

The cooler is massive and it's a lot more colder than vishera.

I went with Noctua NH-D15 SE-AM4. It's really massive (and you need quite a spacious case to fit it in). It comes with two fans and a huge double heat sink. But it's surprisingly quiet, and even at 100% load (8 cores / 16 threads), the CPU stays around +45°C or so.

What does the "X" mean in the model number for Ryzen cpu's?
Meaning, what is the difference between a 1700 and a 1700-X?

What does the "X" mean in the model number for Ryzen cpu's?
Meaning, what is the difference between a 1700 and a 1700-X?

X here means higher clocked variant. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryzen

So I bought Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, and my current machine is not really up to the job.

That's really the 1% of gaming, right? (And CivVI/X-Plane 11 on max) That's the one that will turn your desktop into a grill, at least it did on my laptop (new desktop, see below..) To play, I had it mounted on a special rack, with a fan blasted at it, which kept it around 60-70C. I did have it on max settings, I believe, but I'm kind of a graphics snob in the sense that if I know it can be better, I really want to play it that way (except for Windows. I draw the line there... I'll take a 50% hit to never run that #$^ again) :|

I also need some tips on what kind of CPUs and GPUs I should be looking at? I was going to go with Intel i3 or i5 and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 or 1060. What delivers comparable performance in the AMD world?

It's funny you ask this - I was just thinking this exact thing this morning. I just built (base + upgrade) a new desktop and love it. But I know deep down that eventually it will need to be repurposed for a media machine, or something less demanding.

So I was thinking, driving to work, this morning.. "I wonder if the next round of gaming rigs, and the ones after that will continue to be dominated by Intel/Nvidia, or if we'll see a shift to AMD..?" Let me be clear - I am neither for or against owning an AMD machine - I just want the best experience on Linux, as noted above. If that's AMD, then sign me up and I'll take the t-shirt too. For me, it's just always been Intel/Nvidia... never owned an AMD machine.

To answer your question - and this may be a bit overboard - the one I'm sitting at now has yet to really try hard on any game I've thrown at it. I need to download Deus Ex again (such a huge game!) and try it. I have no doubt it will heat up the box. I've slowly been downloading the ones that I currently play, whereas my laptop pretty much has everything on it.

The specs on the new build: i7-7700K 4.2G/4.7GHz, Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti 11GB (OC edition), 48GB DDR4-2133, and 3 drives; 2 M.2 NVMe for daily work and a HHD for backup. Coming from a 1070 I thought it would be a slight bump, but honestly it's been a nice upgrade. I also thought the 7700K would heat up, but honestly it hasn't. It stays comfortably around 31-35C, maybe 50C in 4k (2160p, I know) gaming.

The benchmarks are what the are -- but what I care about is day-in day-out how does it feel since I work from here a lot.

I've heard that the 7th gen. i5 is very similar when overclocked (and the i7 is not) so maybe that's one way to save some $$. If I had not find a steal on this, there is no way I would have paid near sticker for the Ti (or for 1080). The 1070 is great, and really more than you'll probably need 99% of the time. With that said, it is in my opinion noticeably quicker than the 1060.

Good luck in your search ;) I'm glad I'm not the only one scared of change in the Linux desktop arena! (AMD)

Price wise you can't beat Ryzen (8 cores / 16 threads). Intel chips like that are much more expensive.

Older AMD chips have horrible TDP as far as I understand. So that's a major benefit of Ryzen too. I prefer not to overclock.

I bought it, and I have these bugs. They are pretty annoying. I have the mce freeze bug too, but it happens relatively not often. I really hope AMD will find a way to fix it. Otherwise I'd have to wait for B2 stepping, and possible make an RMA.

Building new gaming PCs for my office - AMD Ryzen 5 1600 (great performance-price point) and MSI B350 MATE motherboards. The processor is 6-core 12-thread and beats Intel's i7-7700K processor (which I'd say is the current favourite of the gamer community) at multi-core benchmarks. It also overclocks nicely, if desired.

Not a complete "AMD" build though - We use Nvidia graphics ( GTX 1060 6GB ). I am tempted by the AMD RX 580 8GB graphics cards - for personal use - but I like to play at 4K resolution, and for that I need the performance of Nvidia GTX 1080 Ti 11GB.

Hey guys, I just built my AMD gaming machine with Ryzen 5 1600 and Vega 56! I am very happy so far. Haven't tried much yet, but Dirt Rally is butter smooth on ultra on open-source drivers.

• AMD Ryzen 5 1600 processor


• Sapphire Radeon RX Vega 56 graphics


• Asrock AB350 Gaming-ITX/AC mITX WiFi motherboard


• Samsung 960 EVO 500GB M.2 PCIe SSD


• Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3000MHz 16GB RAM


• Corsair RM650x 650W PSU


• Thermaltake Core V1 case

It is a relatively tiny build that fits snuggly under my TV making a perfect sofa PC.

I did not go all in with after-market cooling, just added a single 80 mm exhaust fan to the case, in addition to the 200 mm intake that was already present in the case. Setting fans to silent mode in BIOS gives around 40-45 °C for the motherboard and the CPU and around 50-55 °C for the graphics card when relatively idle. Need to do more precise measurements under load, but it does not look like there is any risk of overheating.

I had some problems getting the system to POST the first time, but after some tinkering pulling and re-seating the components I managed to get into the BIOS setup, upgraded the firmware, and it ran fine after that. I also needed to upgrade the firmware on the SSD for it to be detected reliably. Luckily all of that could be done in a platform-independent fashion.

Installation was quite painless. I installed Debian 9, and amdgpu pro drivers, and it worked fine. But Dirt Rally would crash the system whenever shader quality was anything above very low. I was about to panic (does not take much for that to happen apparently), but then I found Vega-ready kernels conveniently pre-built for Debian and Ubuntu (use at your own risk). So I installed it, removed amdgpu pro, and the system worked and recognized the Vega 56 card. Getting Mesa and other related goodies was just a matter of upgrading to Debian Unstable.

The only thing that does not work properly is the only thing that is not AMD. Namely, the Intel Wireless 3168. Even with the latest firmware and kernel WiFi is extremely slow and unstable. It will not allow me to set the proper regulatory domain, and that is probably the root of all problems. Not only does it not work properly, it messes the connection for other WiFi devices. :(

Ouch! I also have the mce freeze but I thought it was the same bug! the bug happens sometimes when resuming from sleep?? try the patch I said, you'll have to compile the kernel yourself but it improved everything 100 percent for me, not had a crash in 5 days and counting. But yes it does not solve the mce bug. I think it's a different bug, but the cause is the same (the cpu bug). It's like the cores and the threads won't wake up and the kernel tries and tries and the cpu goes yawn!! FY let me sleep. :P

Anyway I'm quite happy with the performance I trust that AMD or the kernel developers will fix this.

I was wondering if this was ever fixed. My new Ryzen build might have this sleep bug. I leave my computer alone and come
back in the morning to find it frozen. I thought it had something to do with the wrong sleep profile.

Don't use amdgpu-pro. You are losing out. Use AMD staging kernel and Mesa.

What is your framerate in the Witcher 3 with Vega 56?

Don't use amdgpu-pro. You are losing out. Use AMD staging kernel and Mesa.

I know, never again. I only installed amdgpu-pro, because I did not know how many missing pieces were there and how much time I will be compiling stuff. It turned out that I only needed a custom kernel.

What is your framerate in the Witcher 3 with Vega 56?

Now that's not a Linux game, so I wouldn't know. :P

But I am open for requests to benchmark something from my library, if somebody is interested. :)

What is your framerate in the Witcher 3 with Vega 56?

Now that's not a Linux game, so I wouldn't know.

Obviously it means in Wine in such case.

What is your framerate in the Witcher 3 with Vega 56?

Now that's not a Linux game, so I wouldn't know.

Obviously it means in Wine in such case.

Honestly, the only way I would bother with Witcher 3 is if somebody would provide me with a copy. I have no intention of paying for a non-Linux game.

I am going to try Mankind Divided, Tomb Raider and Alien Isolation thought.