AMD Ryzen 1700 and X370 Review

Aorus AX370 Gaming 5 – X370 Chipset
AMD Ryzen 1700  (3.0Ghz) Octo Core 8 x 4MB L2 Cache 16MB L3 Cache
Noctua NH-U12S SE-AM4
1x nVidia GTX 980Ti
2x GeIL EVO PC4-25600 16GB DDR4 (16-16-16-36)
Crucial  MX300 750GB SSD
HP dvd1260i Multiformat 24x Writer
Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1050 Watt PSU
Windows 10 Professional 64bit

Gigabyte GA-990FX-Gaming - 990FX Chipset
AMD FX-9590 X8 Black Edition (4.7Ghz) 4 x 2MB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache
Thermaltake Water 2.0 Extreme
1x nVidia GTX 980Ti
2x GSKill RipjawsX PC2133 4GB DDR3 (9-10-9-28)
HyperX 3K 240GB SSD
HP dvd1260i Multiformat 24x Writer
Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1050 Watt PSU
Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit SP1.

Aorus Z270X Gaming 5 – Z270 Chipset
Intel Core i7 7700K (4.2Ghz) Quad Core 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache
Thermaltake Water 2.0 Performer
1x nVidia GTX 980Ti
2x GSKill TridentZ PC4-27700 8GB DDR4 (16-18-18-38)
Micron C300 128GB SSD
HP dvd1260i Multiformat 24x Writer
Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1050 Watt PSU
Windows 10 Professional 64bit

EVGA Z170 Classified K – Z170 Chipset
Intel Core i5 6600K (3.5Ghz) Quad Core 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache
Thermaltake Water 2.0 Performer
1x nVidia GTX 980Ti
2x Corsair Vengeance LPX  PC4-21300 16GB DDR4 (15-17-17-35)
Micron C300 128GB SSD
HP dvd1260i Multiformat 24x Writer
Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1050 Watt PSU
Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit SP1

MSI Z97I Gaming AC – Z97 Chipset
Intel Core i7 4790K (4.0Ghz) Quad Core 4 x 256KB L2 Cache 8MB L3 Cache
Thermaltake Water 2.0 Performer
1x nVidia GTX 770
2x GSKill RipjawsX PC2133 4GB DDR3 (9-10-9-28)
Micron C300 128GB SSD
HP dvd1260i Multiformat 24x Writer
Thermaltake Toughpower Grand 1050 Watt PSU
Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit SP1

This review marks the first Ryzen based system in the Hardware Asylum review database which has some unique disadvantages.  First we will be pulling in some old scores and may not have numbers for certain benchmarks.  Fear not, those are included so they can be used so we can see how well the CPU scales when overclocked.  This will throw the charts off for certain benchmarks and may show very little difference in others. 

Our testing suite has been compiled to subject the system to a variety of different scenarios that help uncover some of the subtle differences between the tested systems.  Normally these differences are driven by the processor and BIOS programming but with the advent of an IMC and PCI Express moving to the CPU we have discovered that raw performance numbers are virtually identical across the systems.  

Our new approach is to look at total system performance and minimize the variances.  The results will tell us how the system responded as a total package and also give us something to use in our comparisons.