No AMD ITX mobo for you?

[Neo_Morpheus]

From Moore's Law is Dead short:

Is Intel BLOCKING High End AMD ITX Motherboards?

Steve from Hardware Unboxed discloses a story that unveils some Intel practices to prevent better competition from AMD.#shorts #amd #cpu #intel #motherboard ...

www.youtube.com

If this is true, (which I personally don't doubt, since its something that Intel has done before), reinforce my decision of why I don't buy anything from Intel and really don't care if they do offer a better product.

I cant support such companies that resort to illegal tactics like this, that ends up affecting me as a consumer by limiting my options.

Whole video here:

 

[dgianstefani]

They exist, I'm using one.

I doubt there's a conspiracy like you're suggesting.

More likely that dual chipset boards don't fit well with ITX layouts.

 

[tabascosauz]

From Moore's Law is Dead short:

Is Intel BLOCKING High End AMD ITX Motherboards?

Steve from Hardware Unboxed discloses a story that unveils some Intel practices to prevent better competition from AMD.#shorts #amd #cpu #intel #motherboard ...

www.youtube.com

If this is true, (which I personally don't doubt, since its something that Intel has done before), reinforce my decision of why I don't buy anything from Intel and really don't care if they do offer a better product.

I cant support such companies that resort to illegal tactics like this, that ends up affecting me as a consumer by limiting my options.

Whole video here:

There are plenty of non-grotesquely colored ITX AM5 mobos, so I'm really not sure what Steve's smoking with this one. PG-ITX, Lightning, Strix, Aorus Ultra, to name a few.

MSI hasn't exactly been the one setting the bar for AMD ITX boards either for the past few years, so sucks to suck I guess.

I'd imagine AMD's move towards own branded network hardware might be causing some friction with board vendors and Intel (e.g. their RZ616 wifi cards). There I can certainly believe that Intel put pressure on board vendors, but that still didn't stop all of them collectively from putting RZ616 in AM4 and AM5 boards. Despite how utterly dogshit that MediaTek rebranded nonsense is compared to Intel AX200/210 that used to be prevalent in AMD boards.

You gain nothing from choosing X670 in an ITX form factor while causing a massive packaging headache for yourself. So that's why it's all B650 and B650E. Sounds to me like you haven't actually been using ITX, as the selection of AM4/5 boards isn't all that different from the other side.

Now whether Intel is forcing vendors to put i225 in high end AMD boards, that's both a more prevalent and more pertinent issue as Intel 2.5Gbe does suck big time. And maybe Intel did get mad at Asus for making the C8 Impact an AMD exclusive, so that's why we won't see it ever again.

 

[Redwoodz]

Every single motherboard I have used with Intel network has experienced constant drop outs. I pick motherboards specifically because they don't have Intel network installed.

 

[_roman_]

I had Issues with old mainboard with intel wlan. And the current mainboard has also issues with Intel WLAN. Different Intel Wlan chips on each mainboard. the error exists permanently with a certain selection of operating systems.

 

[Neo_Morpheus]

They exist, I'm using one.

I doubt there's a conspiracy like you're suggesting.

More likely that dual chipset boards don't fit well with ITX layouts.

Never said, neither they did that they don’t exist.

simply a more limited selection.

Steve claim he was told that money exchanged hands for this, not me, yet we are making excuses.

There are plenty of non-grotesquely colored ITX AM5 mobos, so I'm really not sure what Steve's smoking with this one. PG-ITX, Lightning, Strix, Aorus Ultra, to name a few.

MSI hasn't exactly been the one setting the bar for AMD ITX boards either for the past few years, so sucks to suck I guess.

I'd imagine AMD's move towards own branded network hardware might be causing some friction with board vendors and Intel (e.g. their RZ616 wifi cards). There I can certainly believe that Intel put pressure on board vendors, but that still didn't stop all of them collectively from putting RZ616 in AM4 and AM5 boards. Despite how utterly dogshit that MediaTek rebranded nonsense is compared to Intel AX200/210 that used to be prevalent in AMD boards.

You gain nothing from choosing X670 in an ITX form factor while causing a massive packaging headache for yourself. So that's why it's all B650 and B650E. Sounds to me like you haven't actually been using ITX, as the selection of AM4/5 boards isn't all that different from the other side.

Now whether Intel is forcing vendors to put i225 in high end AMD boards, that's both a more prevalent and more pertinent issue as Intel 2.5Gbe does suck big time. And maybe Intel did get mad at Asus for making the C8 Impact an AMD exclusive, so that's why we won't see it ever again.

Why are you accusing me of making this up?

i simply used the same title that MLID used and added an observation.

Funny enough, when is convenient of course, anything that a YouTuber says is taken as absolute truth.

Every single motherboard I have used with Intel network has experienced constant drop outs. I pick motherboards specifically because they don't have Intel network installed.

I had Issues with old mainboard with intel wlan. And the current mainboard has also issues with Intel WLAN. Different Intel Wlan chips on each mainboard. the error exists permanently with a certain selection of operating systems.

At my previous job, we had endless Dell Latitudes with their Intel Wifi simply getting dropped by Windows.

Really tiresome to constantly reinstalling those drivers.

 

[tabascosauz]

Why are you accusing me of making this up?

Who accused you of anything?

that ends up affecting me as a consumer by limiting my options

I only said that if this is what you believe, then you either don't sound like you actually have been in the ITX market in the past 3 generations of hardware, or are only choosing to see what you want to see. If anything, it's Intel that's been experiencing a dearth of decent ITX boards in all except the increasingly irrelevant ultra high end, ever since X570/B550 turned the tables in this space.

We all know what the kind of underhanded deal you're alluding to looks like, because it is happening right now in the RDNA2/3 space for the AIBs that dabble in both Geforce/Radeon (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI), and it's not what's happening in the ITX space.

Funny enough, when is convenient of course, anything that a YouTuber says is taken as absolute truth.

Funnily enough, you are the only one here who has actually built the rest of your reasoning on that presumption

 

[Neo_Morpheus]

Who accused you of anything?

Every response insinuated that I absolutely accused intel, when i said it possible since they have done it in the past.
Hell, when we had a functional DOJ, they were found guilty of exactly that.

I only said that if this is what you believe

Reading comprehension failed you, i actually gave them a bit of benefit of the doubt, but as said above, they have done this before.

We all know what the kind of underhanded deal you're alluding to looks like, because it is happening right now in the RDNA2/3 space for the AIBs that dabble in both Geforce/Radeon (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI), and it's not what's happening in the ITX space.

There you go, i’m simply sharing their thoughts yet i am the one making things up.

Funnily enough, you are the only one here who has actually built the rest of your reasoning on that presumptio

And now you are projecting, because, again, i simply said that because there is precedence, it could be possible.

 

[tabascosauz]

And now you are projecting, because, again, i simply said that because there is precedence, it could be possible.

"Projecting", "reading comprehension", oh the irony are we gonna keep going down this road?

I never said Intel did or did not, I was addressing your doomposting about limiting ITX options. It's perfectly within the range of things they could potentially do, but Intel doesn't need to do anything for X670E to be unviable for this form factor.

Weren't you the one who wanted discussion on this topic, and said that it's nothing more than food for thought because Youtubers aren't an ultimate arbiter of truth? So discussion that doesn't conform to your view is accusing you of making things up? Never accused you of anything.

 

[Dr. Dro]

What's this?

ROG STRIX X670E-I GAMING WIFI | Gaming motherboards｜ROG - Republic of Gamers｜ROG Global

ASUS ROG Strix X670E-I Gaming WiFi features 10 + 2 power stages, ROG Strix Hive, EZ mode PBO button, DDR5 support, PCIe® 5.0, onboard Wi-Fi 6E, two M.2 slots and M.2 Gen 5 & chipset heatsink, and two USB4® Type-C ports. It also features AI Cooling II, AI Networking, Two-Way AI Noise Cancelation...

rog.asus.com

Or this?

ROG STRIX B650E-I GAMING WIFI | Gaming motherboards｜ROG - Republic of Gamers｜ROG Global

The ROG Strix B650-I Gaming WiFi combos with AMD Ryzen 7000 Series processors for huge performance in tiny builds. Featuring PCIe 5.0®, DDR5, WiFi 6E, and USB 3.2 Gen 2x2, it packs a ton in its mini-ITX frame. Its specs are supported by ASUS-exclusive technologies like PBO Enhancement, AI...

rog.asus.com

Perhaps this

B650I AORUS ULTRA Key Features | Motherboard - GIGABYTE Global

Lasting Quality from GIGABYTE.GIGABYTE Ultra Durable™ motherboards bring together a unique blend of features and technologies that offer users the absolute ...

www.gigabyte.com

What I do know is that there is no Maximus Gene board. HMMM, is AMD paying off ASUS not to release high performance mATX Intel boards?

Now whether Intel is forcing vendors to put i225 in high end AMD boards, that's both a more prevalent and more pertinent issue as Intel 2.5Gbe does suck big time. And maybe Intel did get mad at Asus for making the C8 Impact an AMD exclusive, so that's why we won't see it ever again.

Foxville series NIC is garbage, they've long since been known for having many hardware-level design faults that can't be fixed, patched at best - and word is Intel's basically giving them away, very competitive pricing. That's why it ends up on practically every single motherboard, even the Z790 Apex Encore has the i226-V which is basically the i225 "rev 4".

 

[tabascosauz]

Foxville series NIC is garbage, they've long since been known for having many hardware-level design faults that can't be fixed, patched at best - and word is Intel's basically giving them away, very competitive pricing. That's why it ends up on practically every single motherboard, even the Z790 Apex Encore has the i226-V which is basically the i225 "rev 4".

Are you having better luck on the latest drivers? I had lots of trouble with E3100 (i225 in disguise) dropping connection until recently with the latest ones fetched from intel website, dunno if it's a definitive fix of some kind in there

I can certainly believe that Intel is doing some shady business to get vendors to adopt i225. At least on the AM4 side, adoption of that trash fire was pretty low except on the top end, yet with AM5 it's somehow everywhere and previously ubiquitous RTL8125 up and vanished

Makes me wonder if some people are confusing i225 with AX200/210/BE200, because on the WLAN side they have been the benchmark for reliability since ac. Not so much with wired. Why couldn't Intel just let them have Realtek LAN and instead coerce them to keep using WLAN instead lol

 

[Dr. Dro]

Are you having better luck on the latest drivers? I had lots of trouble with E3100 (i225 in disguise) dropping connection until recently with the latest ones fetched from intel website, dunno if it's a definitive fix of some kind in there

I can certainly believe that Intel is doing some shady business to get vendors to adopt i225. At least on the AM4 side, adoption of that trash fire was pretty low except on the top end, yet with AM5 it's somehow everywhere and previously ubiquitous RTL8125 up and vanished

I haven't had issues with the i226 so far. The rev 3 i225's on my Z690 Ace would reset every now and then (maybe once a month, maybe less), nowhere near as bad as the rev 2 i225 that my old ROG B550-E board had. That one was crap, it'd have problems all the time even just sticking to 1Gb link

 

[Neo_Morpheus]

"Projecting", "reading comprehension", oh the irony are we gonna keep going down this road?

Simply responding to your comment.

your doomposting

Like this “very subtle “ accusation.

It's perfectly within the range of things they could potentially do,

Exactly what I said.

but Intel doesn't need to do anything for X670E to be unviable for this form factor.

Logically, true but do remember that one of their tactics back then was to limit the ways that AMD could make money by blocking their chances of selling their wares. This is another possible way and given the beating they are getting, I can see them doing it again.

I mean, why is Dell still not selling Latitudes, Optiplex systems with Ryzen Pros?

Weren't you the one who wanted discussion on this topic, and said that it's nothing more than food for thought because Youtubers aren't an ultimate arbiter of truth? So discussion that doesn't conform to your view is accusing you of making things up?

I did and see how the responses implied that i made an opinion about it.

Now the responses did sound like intel wouldn’t do that because they are saints or something similar and again, i simply said, they did it before, they can do it again.

@Dr. Dro if you watched the video, they clearly mentioned Asus as being one of them still having several models



Now, for arguments sake, I dont see why the high end chipsets would be that good in an ITX mobo, but thats because its not my need, hence i cant comment if its good or not but clearly, other do.

 

[Dr. Dro]

ASUS is pretty much the only manufacturer that has a board that caters to every single niche, Gigabyte comes close, but not quite

I don't think there's any hard evidence for such a heavy claim IMO. It's clickbait

 

[tabascosauz]

Logically, true but do remember that one of their tactics back then was to limit the ways that AMD could make money by blocking their chances of selling their wares. This is another possible way and given the beating they are getting, I can see them doing it again.

I mean, why is Dell still not selling Latitudes, Optiplex systems with Ryzen Pros?

Dell is last OEM that would, even if the laptop market didn't reek of dirty Intel money. Others are open to AMD (Lenovo, Asus), but Intel has known ways to ensure specific lines stay Intel-exclusive. Knowing how laptops and GPUs are, I would simply expect there to be visible effects if Intel is doing the same in the mobo space, which there aren't.

If you keep a popular high end laptop line as Intel-exclusive (e.g. Thinkpad X1), it denies AMD a lot of opportunities and revenue.

If you keep a high end mobo line as Intel-exclusive......big deal, it never sold nearly as much anyway, and unlike in laptops AMD and Intel already generally have distinct board lines.

Asus has probably the most brand recognition for its mobo lines, and it's already allowed both Impact and Gene to migrate to AM5. I will admit that XOC is still an outlier (Apex, OCF, Tachyon), and might be an area where Intel's money could have real benefits. But even that's not really cut-and-dry, and nothing to do with far more popular ITX boards.

Steve tries to avoid naming names but really, it sounds like MSI. Arguably the board vendor with the most lacking AM5 lineup, and if they did listen to Intel then honestly it's their dumb loss. It's been business as usual for the rest in the ITX space and elsewhere.

 

[Neo_Morpheus]

I don't think there's any hard evidence for such a heavy claim IMO

I think it will take either a data leak or a subpoena to gather such evidence.
The damming part, if you will, its the precedent.

It's clickbait

It’s entirely possible but to what end would they want to expose themselves to a possible retaliation?
That i dont know.

If you keep a high end mobo line as Intel-exclusive......big deal,

Thats a possible good point, given the current prices, which I’m pretty sure might have translated to lower sales, if it doesnt remove must have features .

Steve tries to avoid naming names but really, it sounds like MSI.

Agreed.

 

[AusWolf]

Seems a bit far-fetched to me.

Most AMD boards have a PCI-e x1 slot wedged between the CPU and the x16. No one ever mentioned why that is. Could be some electrical reasons like signal stability / interference or whatnot. This could prevent, or make it harder to make good ITX AMD boards with an x16 slot.

 

[tabascosauz]

Seems a bit far-fetched to me.

Most AMD boards have a PCI-e x1 slot wedged between the CPU and the x16. No one ever mentioned why that is. Could be some electrical reasons like signal stability / interference or whatnot. This could prevent, or make it harder to make good ITX AMD boards with an x16 slot.

Is that an AMD thing? I swear that's been pretty common everywhere for (m)ATX boards after say, 2016. And if anything, shorter traces aid signal integrity. Doesn't really have anything to do with ITX board layout.

The only related thing I can think of is how Gigabyte and MSI love that accursed offset-north socket placement, which makes a bit more room for PCH/M.2 cooling south of the socket but causes air cooler clearance issues above it. But ASRock and Asus are smart enough to avoid it, so clearly it's just an optional layout consideration.

x1 as first slot was just a safe design choice, older symmetric 140mm coolers like D15 can't fit with x16 as first slot. And there's also room to cram in the first M.2 in-line with the x1, whereas putting x16 first means M.2 gets smothered under the GPU. Although nowadays it seems like the x1 gets dropped entirely in favor of the M.2.

 

[Bill_Bright]

I cant support such companies that resort to illegal tactics like this

Then I guess that means you will never go to McDonald's, Burger King, Wendy's, Arby's, Outback, Applebee's, Taco Bell, or any other restaurant - ever.

These exclusivity deals are common among many industries. Coke promises to supply the restaurant with Coke products at huge discount prices as long as they only sell Coke products and not Pepsi. Same deal with their meat supplier or condiments supplier. This QWIK Shop convenience store will only sell fuel from that fuel supplier.

As long as the supplying company is not holding a gun at the retailer's head, forcing them to sign the exclusivity contract, it is NOT illegal.

 

[SL2]

Funny enough, when is convenient of course, anything that a YouTuber says is taken as absolute truth.

What a load of bs.

MLID isn't really popular here, there are a lot of people who doesn't take his videos as an absolute truth. (I'm talking about in general, not what Steve said)

In the short version, MLID deliberately cut out the part where Steve says "it was so long ago now" (at 1:25:15 in the long version), so later when he says "Computex this year" (1:25:55) it sounds like 2024.

Steve tries to avoid naming names but really, it sounds like MSI.

"Network gear that uses Intel and AMD CPU's"

Does that sound like MSI products?

Arguably the board vendor with the most lacking AM5 lineup, and if they did listen to Intel then honestly it's their dumb loss.

Then again, their Radeon lineup is just as weak. I doubt Intel has anything to do with that, and Nvidia doesn't have to pay anyone to get their own GPU's sold.

 

[A Computer Guy]

Seems a bit far-fetched to me.

Most AMD boards have a PCI-e x1 slot wedged between the CPU and the x16. No one ever mentioned why that is. Could be some electrical reasons like signal stability / interference or whatnot. This could prevent, or make it harder to make good ITX AMD boards with an x16 slot.

It's probably fairly easy to squeeze a x1 slot there compared to a longer slot.

 

[tabascosauz]

"Network gear that uses Intel and AMD CPU's"

Does that sound like MSI products?

Then again, their Radeon lineup is just as weak. I doubt Intel has anything to do with that, and Nvidia doesn't have to pay anyone to get their own GPU's sold.

I was not talking about the years-ago anecdote about network hardware, more about vaguely alluding to MSI and alleging the "backdoor deals". For some time now it's been pretty obvious as to the gap in quality and effort between non-exclusive AIBs (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI) and Radeon-exclusive AIBs (Sapphire, XFX, Powercolor).

I guess one could argue either way as to whether money is actually involved (could also just be a reflection of the difference they expect in popularity), but when comparing to the latter three it's pretty stark how the AMD lineups from the former three are always rather sparse and just recycled versions of last-gen products.

 

[Dr. Dro]

Money is obviously involved - customers' money.

Spoiler: OT GPU-related rant

For all it's worth, Radeon buyers are generally averse to spending money - yet they have this strange and foolish notion that somehow, some way AMD is gonna "beat NVIDIA" and "gain the AIBs' favor". Couple this relative frugality - they don't upgrade every generation, avoid side-stepping like the devil avoids the Holy Cross, unwillingness to spend money with high customer expectations to the fact that Radeon simply doesn't measure up in overall user experience (the drivers and functionality are substantially and materially worse, with inferior release schedules, missing game ready drivers for entire quarters, lots of technical issues - many things are either broken or never worked to begin with, others are of visibly lower quality than their competition's offerings), and it's not hard to see where this is going.

Even AMD themselves know this, which is largely why they won't try to compete with the RTX 5090 this generation. They need time to sort things out. Releasing a high-end card to repeat the 7900 XTX is just shooting themselves in the foot once again - except this time they won't look like clowns, they'll look like the entire circus once the 4090, by then an older model, beats out their hypothetical new flagship.

Premium and hyper-premium segment boards (such as the ROG Strix and ROG Matrix, Gigabyte's Aorus Xtreme or Galax Hall of Fame/OC Lab series) become utterly senseless as the source product itself is unable to match the expectations of people who are willing to spend that much money on a graphics card to begin with, and being lower-volume, lower-demand products means the remaining models just don't get the same spotlight. Why would anyone go out of their way to craft a particularly great AMD model if the NVIDIA equivalent will sell ten, twenty units for each one they shift, regardless of the cost? They'll just reuse or ever so slightly modify the board design to fit the AMD model, and the quality priority is clearly targeting the segment that sells better - and it ain't AMD.

The very few folks left who absolutely insist on a premium segment Radeon card (either out of sheer foolishness or a silly loyalty to AMD - I doubt most of the favored Linux crowd actually buys super high end aftermarket boards) will be perfectly satisfied with Sapphire's Nitro+ or PowerColor's Devil series. And they should be thankful that these actually still exist.

A lot of people will be ticked off by this, but I'd say my perspective isn't that far off the mark, however ruthless it may be. And yes, cue "Dro hates AMD!!!! he's spreading propaganda!!!" rebuttals, I know they'll come. You'll see me praising Ryzen any day now, but Radeon still has to prove itself in my eyes. At least try to bring up something beyond conspiracy level with some actual market analysis to counter my statement

 

[QyInvoLing]

These AM5 itx motherboards are too expensive compared to h610i/b760i/z790i in my region. Maxsum's h610i is currently $84, z790i is $183, aorus z690i is $154.The cheapest fine b650i is msi's one for $197, strix's x760e-i is $506, b650e-i is $352.
Besides there're gigabytes' b650i ax, an $140 trash which can only carry 7500f. ASrock's a620i is also a trash of $170
It's all about the price.

 

[SL2]

I was not talking about the years-ago anecdote about network hardware, more about vaguely alluding to MSI and alleging the "backdoor deals".

I see, yeah I thought that was obvious.