Gigabyte Expands its Range of White Motherboards with Two AMD B650 Models

[TheLostSwede]

Just over a month ago, Gigabyte launched a pair of white motherboards for Intel CPUs and now the company has quietly released a pair of white models for AMD CPUs. The two models are the B650 AORUS Elite AX Ice and the B650M AORUS Elite AX Ice, the main difference being the form factor, as the latter is a microATX board. Besides the white PCB, all of the heatsinks are silver/white in colour, although all the connectors on the boards are black, just as with the Intel boards. The rear I/O shield has also been given the white treatment to better fit into a white case.

However, the Ice boards are not identical in terms of specs to their older siblings, as Gigabyte has done a few minor changes that aren't noticeable at first look. Gigabyte has shifted away from using MTK/AMD and Intel WiFi cards and is now using the Realtek RTL8852CE on these new boards. We should mention that Gigabyte are using the RTL8852CE on later revisions of the black versions as well. It's currently unknown when these new boards will be available and how much they'll retail for.



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[bug]

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

 

[bonehead123]

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

That, in addition to calling a board "white" when all the connectors are BLACK, and using silver heatsinks instead of white, which would be great IF I wanted to build a Black, white & silver rig, but would not work if I wanted to build a true, all "WHITE" machine

This is nuthin but False advertising IMHO...

 

[dj-electric]

That, in addition to calling a board "white" when all the connectors are BLACK, and using silver heatsinks instead of white, which would be great IF I wanted to build a Black, white & silver rig, but would not work if I wanted to build a true, all "WHITE" machine

This is nuthin but False advertising IMHO...

Whose false advertising? This is not Gigabyte's PR, this post was written by a TPU staff member

 

[Chaitanya]

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

Compared to MSI(B650 Tomahawk, Pro B650-P) or Shitsus(TUF Gaming B650-PLUS, even the more expensive RoGarbage B650-A doesnt have similar USB Configuartion to Elite), Gigabyte(surprisingly even Asrock B650 PG Lightning) is extremely generous with USB connectivity. When comparing mATX boards situation is similar with MSI and Shitsus castrating rear connectivity too much.

 

[bonehead123]

This is not Gigabyte's PR, this post was written by a TPU staff member

Perhaps that is true, but it still reads like a copy/paste of a PR, so I treated as such

Maybe these types of posts could be labeled somehow to clearly distinguish a "PR" from "Commentary" or "Editorial"...what ya think @TheLostSwede ?

 

[ymdhis]

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

Keyboard/mouse/gamepads don't need 10/20/40GB USB-C connectors.

It's better to have more USB-A where it is clear they are slower from the shape and color, as opposed to 4x USB-C wired to USB2 and 6x USB-C wired to USB3 and 1x USB-C wired to 10G. That shit was annoying enough in 2003 when only 2 ports on a motherboard handled USB2.0 but none of them were marked, so you had to test every port until you found one that could run external drives at a speed exceeding floppy disks.

 

[dj-electric]

Perhaps that is true, but it still reads like a copy/paste of a PR, so I treated as such

Maybe these types of posts could be labeled somehow to clearly distinguish a "PR" from "Commentary" or "Editorial"...what ya think @TheLostSwede ?

How do you think I was able to tell its not PR? for the amount of time you spend here, you should know items do have labels.

 

[bug]

Keyboard/mouse/gamepads don't need 10/20/40GB USB-C connectors.

It's better to have more USB-A where it is clear they are slower from the shape and color, as opposed to 4x USB-C wired to USB2 and 6x USB-C wired to USB3 and 1x USB-C wired to 10G. That shit was annoying enough in 2003 when only 2 ports on a motherboard handled USB2.0 but none of them were marked, so you had to test every port until you found one that could run external drives at a speed exceeding floppy disks.

So split 50-50 between A and C. But one C port? That's ridiculous.

 

[Arkz]

That, in addition to calling a board "white" when all the connectors are BLACK, and using silver heatsinks instead of white, which would be great IF I wanted to build a Black, white & silver rig, but would not work if I wanted to build a true, all "WHITE" machine

This is nuthin but False advertising IMHO...

The BOARDS are white though. And if it's not white enough for your build then don't get it. Not like it's a mystery product you don't get to see till it arrives.

 

[Deleted member 234997]

I am white with brown hair.

 

[TheLostSwede]

So split 50-50 between A and C. But one C port? That's ridiculous.

C ports cost a lot more and so far, there doesn't appear to be a way to stack them, so you can only mount one on the PCB, unlike USB-A ports that you can stack four high.

 

[dj-electric]

C ports cost a lot more and so far, there doesn't appear to be a way to stack them, so you can only mount one on the PCB, unlike USB-A ports that you can stack four high.

Ive been hearing whispers of some ingenuity in this field which will basically have a 2/3-port tower similar in form factor to a quad Type-A tower and the hybrid Type-C + Type-A tower. If this will catch on, we might finally see some more Type-C ports.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Ive been hearing whispers of some ingenuity in this field which will basically have a 2/3-port tower similar in form factor to a quad Type-A tower and the hybrid Type-C + Type-A tower. If this will catch on, we might finally see some more Type-C ports.

It shouldn't be impossible, but might be expensive, at least to start with. I doubt we'll see that with any extra power deliver over 15 W per port though.

 

[dj-electric]

It shouldn't be impossible, but might be expensive, at least to start with. I doubt we'll see that with any extra power deliver over 15 W per port though.

I have no doubt these will be 4.5W 5Gbps ports to begin with tbh. Higher speed ports will probably remain at the Type-C + ETH tower or the Type-A + Type-C hybrid one

 

[TheLostSwede]

I have no doubt these will be 4.5W 5Gbps ports to begin with tbh. Higher speed ports will probably remain at the Type-C + ETH tower or the Type-A + Type-C hybrid one

Ah, right, yes, that should work the same as USB-A technically speaking.

 

[bonehead123]

C ports cost a lot more

Show me something that identifies the price differences please, both individually and especially for bulk purchases (1K-50K pcs), like the ones that mobo makers use in the manufacturing process

TIA !

 

[kapone32]

If you are looking at that rear I/O and complaining about 1 USB C port you have not been into Computing that long. That Rear I/O could compete with some X399 boards. In fact these boards are pretty flexible for B650.

 

[krista]

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

i disagree, and would *love* a real public discussion about usb-c and the problem associated with ”usb-c all the things!”.

to sum up a summary of a very long topic, i'll start with a simple question: what features should those 11 usb-a ports that have been magically poofed into usb-c ports have, and how are consumers going to know what features those tightly packed usb-c ports on that motherboard have?

what types of usb-c cables are compatible with them?

*there's* your reason.

------------

gigabyte's tech support would murder you in your sleep. if you managed to survive your first night, start worrying about daytime assassins.

why?

how many call, emails, and texts should they have to field regarding this?

off the top of my head and not having sleep in 53 hours (i'm moving), here's a handful of questions that'd get asked:

- i connected 12 monitors to my motherboard! why come it doesn't work?

- i connected 12 of my kids pcs and phones to the usb-c >8 x10 meter usb-c to usb-c fiber optic wires to replace our old 1gbe network, but how do i get it installed and make the printer work

- i can't charge my 8 flashlights!

- my quest 3 vr doesn't work on 8 of the 12 usc ports. why?

- where do i plug my wireless keyboard dongle?

- can i charge my laptop in like 12 minutes? that's a dozen times faster, and there's a dozen charging ports?

and so forth ad nauseam, until shotguns (or my personal favorite: thermite) are seen as a viable cure to the infection of ”usc”, ”lightning-c”, ”those new bi-sexual connectors”

 

[sLowEnd]

One rear USB-C is fine IMO, but it is a shame that these are 10gbps ports, rather than 20gbps.

 

[nienorgt]

It's nice to see more white options, but I don't get why they release the white editions later at random. This make impossible to build a white themed system and STICK with it when you upgrade it.
Would have been useful to have them when I was planning to upgrade my old B360M Motar Titanium (silver motherboard).
I had to gave up on the white/silver motherboard idea in the end.
Oh well, all white builds are near impossible anyway, you can't get away from black and gray so it's always a Panda system.

Wth, 11 USB-A and only 1 USB-C? That stuff should be illegal in 2023...

Truth be told, when it comes to plug USB-C stuff using only data, you can buy cheap USB-A to USB-C pass-through adapters on the cheap and since you put them on the back of the motherboard, they don't bother like when used on a laptop.

What bother me is the lack of USB-C with more than just data capabilities but stuff that you can't do on a USB-A port are kind of a niche feature right now.
My motherboard have a USB-C with display (via a Display Port input) which is useful to connect to USB-C displays with one cable. As I said, kind of niche.

What's less niche is USB 4.0/Thunderbolt, but this is because of the cost. Like on laptops, you see these features only on high end devices, although getting it on a desktop PC cost more than on laptops right now because of the requirements of high-end motherboards or rare add-in cards and that sucks.

 

[Minus Infinity]

I would hope even Realtek's 2.5Gb-E port is far more reliable than Intel's i225/226 trash.

 

[Totally]

That, in addition to calling a board "white" when all the connectors are BLACK, and using silver heatsinks instead of white, which would be great IF I wanted to build a Black, white & silver rig, but would not work if I wanted to build a true, all "WHITE" machine

This is nuthin but False advertising IMHO...

All the non white components get covered up in a completed build, I fail to see the issue here tbh.

 

[bug]

C ports cost a lot more and so far, there doesn't appear to be a way to stack them, so you can only mount one on the PCB, unlike USB-A ports that you can stack four high.

So one reads about USB-PD, amazing transfer speeds, Thunderbolt... goes on to buy a motherboard and gets one USB-C port that is usually just USB 3.1. More expensive or not, you can't tell me that's not whacky.

That, in addition to calling a board "white" when all the connectors are BLACK, and using silver heatsinks instead of white, which would be great IF I wanted to build a Black, white & silver rig, but would not work if I wanted to build a true, all "WHITE" machine

This is nuthin but False advertising IMHO...

They're white, but they're still inclusive

 

[TheLostSwede]

i disagree, and would *love* a real public discussion about usb-c and the problem associated with ”usb-c all the things!”.

to sum up a summary of a very long topic, i'll start with a simple question: what features should those 11 usb-a ports that have been magically poofed into usb-c ports have, and how are consumers going to know what features those tightly packed usb-c ports on that motherboard have?

what types of usb-c cables are compatible with them?

*there's* your reason.

------------

gigabyte's tech support would murder you in your sleep. if you managed to survive your first night, start worrying about daytime assassins.

why?

how many call, emails, and texts should they have to field regarding this?

off the top of my head and not having sleep in 53 hours (i'm moving), here's a handful of questions that'd get asked:

- i connected 12 monitors to my motherboard! why come it doesn't work?

- i connected 12 of my kids pcs and phones to the usb-c >8 x10 meter usb-c to usb-c fiber optic wires to replace our old 1gbe network, but how do i get it installed and make the printer work

- i can't charge my 8 flashlights!

- my quest 3 vr doesn't work on 8 of the 12 usc ports. why?

- where do i plug my wireless keyboard dongle?

- can i charge my laptop in like 12 minutes? that's a dozen times faster, and there's a dozen charging ports?

and so forth ad nauseam, until shotguns (or my personal favorite: thermite) are seen as a viable cure to the infection of ”usc”, ”lightning-c”, ”those new bi-sexual connectors”

Not one motherboard has USB 2.0 speed USB-C ports, so you can relax a bit.
The rest is usually covered by the specs page and there are also symbols on the I/O shield to let you know the capabilities of the ports.
Yes, USB-C is a bit of a mess, but it's not that hard to figure out.

So one reads about USB-PD, amazing transfer speeds, Thunderbolt... goes on to buy a motherboard and gets one USB-C port that is usually just USB 3.1. More expensive or not, you can't tell me that's not whacky.

Well, Thunderbolt has nothing to do with USB-C for starters, that was Intel appropriating the same connector and it's on them.
As for the other features, it's not entirely straight forward for sure, but it's even worse on phones, where most phones only support USB 2.0 speeds.
The issue once again comes down to cost though, how much are people willing to pay for the extra features?
What sucks is that both AMD and Nvidia dropped USB-C connectors from their cards, which lead to the OEMs doing it as well, so from two generations ago, we've gone backwards and lost connectivity.
Notebooks seem to be somewhat better when it comes to USB-C at least, but still not great.
I guess we're going to have to wait for USB4 to gain some ground until all the features you want are commonplace, but even so, it'll only be on a port or two, due to cost and the amount of bandwidth required from the host system side.

As you can see, on higher end boards, things like DP support is clearly labelled.