Knocking off one star because it isn't the most tolerant to very sudden power connects and disconnects, but that may just be me. Accidentally plugged in my PC while the PSU switch was on and, since i kept unplugging and plugging it, trying to get it in, it silently fried my motherboard. Got it replaced and has been working just fine. The pci-e x16 slot is a bit difficult as the clasp is nerve-rackingly tight. Other than that, it does what it needs to do.

The ability to do a bios flash with no cpu ultimately is why I went with this board.

Solid little mobo, only downside is one of the RGB connectors was bent, but I wasn't using it anyway and theres a very slim chance of another arriving that way :)

Great MOBO for beginners.. Have all the basic stuff.

This is all I ever needed. I'm not a crazy overclocker nor do I care for VRM cooling with a Ryzen 5 3600. I flashed to BIOS version 19 and it booted right away. I used all of the RAM slots (2) and all of the system fan headers (2). With thick GPUs like the 5700 XT, the PCI_E2 and PCI_E3 (both x1) are blocked so you won't be able to use a network card, not even with a ribbon cable, it's just too tight.

The BIOS for 3rd gen ryzen does not have crazy graphics, but is text based just like in the old days. For me this was all I needed. You will want to set fan curve unless you're hearing impaired.

Good budget board. Overclocked my R5 1600 to 4 ghz and my 3000 mhz RAM to 3200 (didnt try higher) same timings.

Bios was easy to update. Spent a fair amount of time attempting to get the ram to register at the correct speed but it is working perfectly now. Have not overclocked any of the components but the bios would allow a user to do so.

A good option for the price. Has M.2 boost so it transfers information faster. Only "downside" would be it only has two RAM slots and doesn't support above 32GB of RAM, but I went with 16GB, so it doesn't matter to me.

A solid choice for a microATX AM4 board. It's basically one of the few in this size with BIOS flashback, and according to that VRM tier list that floats around the web, this one isn't bad, but not amazing either. All the headers are clearly labelled. The price is pretty good, too.

All in all, it's not the most exciting motherboard, but it does the important things properly.

• MSI B450M Gaming plus : Due to not overclocking yet, little to say once again, motherboard looks good and i can hardly see the red accents through my slightly tinted glass, has 1 m.2 port which is nice, 3 fan headers, and due to the 2 available slots for ram being dual channel there is no bad side to only having 2 slots, by the time 16gb is too little for gaming ill have a job ill probably just build a new computer, that is not to say this motherboard has no ram upgradibilty, you should buy 2 new sticks of 16gb if upgrading when you even have 4 slots so you take advantage of the dual channel. Back IO has 5 total usb ports and 1 usb-c, more than enough for me. The backplate is mostly matte black with small red accents as well as labelling for all ports. The pcie x16 slot has the msi armour metal thing for your gpu, helps with GPU sagging, i have a 24cm gpu and no sagging is seen so i guess it does its job. Both the manual and the case itself have a print out with labeled pins for the front IO, i have fat fingers but still managed to do it in 2-3 mins.