AMD Readies X870E Chipset to Launch Alongside First Ryzen 9000 "Granite Ridge" CPUs

[AusWolf]

It is not that 8 lanes Gen4 plus up to 8 lanes Gen3 or up to 8 SATA is so bad (I could do with 4-8 lanes Gen4 more for PCIe Slots), it is the waste of space and resources needed to achieve that.

I agree if you're talking about X670, but how is B650 a waste of space?

 

[Tigerfox]

@AusWolf : I was talking about X670. Double the silicon for just 4 additional lanes Gen4, 4 lanes Gen3/4xSATA and some USB. You loose 8 lanes Gen4 just for the connection of the chipsets. Plus it makes no sense to connect more than one SSD with the chipset at all because of the narrow connection to the CPU.

But you can divide the Gen5 lanes of the CPU into 6x4 and either use x16 for GPU an 2x4 for SSD, or x8 for GPU and 4x4 for SSD or all 6x4 for SSD, so that's much better than Intel.

 

[AusWolf]

@AusWolf : I was talking about X670. Double the silicon for just 4 additional lanes Gen4, 4 lanes Gen3/4xSATA and some USB. You loose 8 lanes Gen4 just for the connection of the chipsets. Plus it makes no sense to connect more than one SSD with the chipset at all because of the narrow connection to the CPU.

But you can divide the Gen5 lanes of the CPU into 6x4 and either use x16 for GPU an 2x4 for SSD, or x8 for GPU and 4x4 for SSD or all 6x4 for SSD, so that's much better than Intel.

That's why I went with B650. X670 brings me no benefit whatsoever. I'm not interested in PCI-e Gen 5, either.

Double of the same silicon saves money on the R&D side of things, I guess (you only make one design instead of two). Just like with chiplets, it is meant to benefit AMD, not us.

 

[Makaveli]

let's hope the price of these motherboards aren't pricier than the current ones... many were put off because the boards were expensive...
the lowered ram prices helped but now they are going up... i hope the price will be placed accordingly...
if the price is right i might pull the upgrade trigger.... and finally ditch intel

if you are expecting these to cost less than current stock you aren't going to be happy.

We should see a price drop on 670 boards but this new series will just take their place in pricing.

What I do want to see is increased IF speed on the new boards and better 1:1 speed for higher tier DDR5.

 

[kapone32]

I wish they would do this, but since your avarage user only uses one m.2 drive, I doubt it will happen

I currently have 6 M2 drives on my X670E and 3 SSDs. I have room for one more SSD. 2 of my drives are 5.0 but I can install a total of 4.

 

[Assimilator]

I did, to, but would have wanted 6xSATA, too.

PCIe x1 quad SATA add-in cards are dirt cheap and AFAIK you can get x4 models so that the drives each get decent bandwidth, but again... this requires a board with an x4 slot.

 

[Tek-Check]

B840 this one grab my attention, will it be an A820 with overclok enable or a very similar to b850 ?

Alegedly, it has Prom19 chipset from A620. It's just "bigger better" numbers.

 

[AusWolf]

What I do want to see is increased IF speed on the new boards and better 1:1 speed for higher tier DDR5.

1. These new chipsets aren't new. They're not adding anything extra other than the ASMedia USB 4 controller, which is a separate entity.
2. The IF is governed by the CPU and its IO die, as far as I know. The chipset has no effect on it.

 

[Makaveli]

1. These new chipsets aren't new. They're not adding anything extra other than the ASMedia USB 4 controller, which is a separate entity.
2. The IF is governed by the CPU and its IO die, as far as I know. The chipset has no effect on it.

So our only hope is an improved memory controller on Zen 5?

 

[AusWolf]

So our only hope is an improved memory controller on Zen 5?

Yep, which I don't think we'll get, if the rumours about Zen 5's IO die being the same as Zen 4's are true.

Personally, it doesn't bother me - Zen 4 X3D isn't memory-constrained at all as it is.

 

[Assimilator]

So our only hope is an improved memory controller on Zen 5?

Improved memory controller and incrementally better IPC, which will come primarily from higher clocks. Standard Intel formula which AMD is now copying.

 

[AnotherReader]

Improved memory controller and incrementally better IPC, which will come primarily from higher clocks. Standard Intel formula which AMD is now copying.

Let's wait for the reviews before condemning them. With Zen 4, despite focusing on clock speed, AMD managed a respectable increase in average IPC. I would expect Zen 5 to do better than that on the IPC front, but I don't expect much increase in clocks which are already pretty high. I would be pleasantly surprised if they managed to increase clock speed by 5%.

 

[AusWolf]

Let's wait for the reviews before condemning them. With Zen 4, despite focusing on clock speed, AMD managed a respectable increase in average IPC. I would expect Zen 5 to do better than that on the IPC front, but I don't expect much increase in clocks which are already pretty high. I would be pleasantly surprised if they managed to increase clock speed by 5%.

Even without reviews, we can conclude that Zen 5 won't be worth an upgrade from Zen 4, unless one likes to tinker with new stuff. +10-15% IPC sounds cool, but isn't worth spending money on, in my opinion.

Edit: The last really good single generational upgrade was between Zen 2 and 3, as it was a completely new architecture with new core and cache layout. Since then, AMD has really been "Intel-ing".

 

[kapone32]

PCIe x1 quad SATA add-in cards are dirt cheap and AFAIK you can get x4 models so that the drives each get decent bandwidth, but again... this requires a board with an x4 slot.

I have found that using those cards can lead to non boot. Admittedly I was using one from like 2017. Those are the ones I have.

 

[Makaveli]

Even without reviews, we can conclude that Zen 5 won't be worth an upgrade from Zen 4, unless one likes to tinker with new stuff. +10-15% IPC sounds cool, but isn't worth spending money on, in my opinion.

For me, I'm looking at Zen 5 because I'm going to be moving up from Zen 3 but I agree with this above.

The only question will be on how I can time the resale of my Zen 3 parts with the timing of the launch of new boards I would prefer to hold out until the Zen 5 X3D chips but those will come 6 months after so I may not have a choice.

 

[kapone32]

Even without reviews, we can conclude that Zen 5 won't be worth an upgrade from Zen 4, unless one likes to tinker with new stuff. +10-15% IPC sounds cool, but isn't worth spending money on, in my opinion.

I hope they are actually cheaper. We know what will probably happen though. Just like when the Ryzen 2 come out lots of us got the 2600 instead of the 2700. I did skip the 3 series and then got 5th Gen. Now AM5 is here and I might get next year's X3D. I guess the next CPU I buy will be at 6 GHZ

 

[mechtech]

I wish they would do this, but since your avarage user only uses one m.2 drive, I doubt it will happen

If 4TB and 8TB nvme were cheaper and available ya but I can buy three 2TB for the price of one 4TB drive. I have 3/4 slots filled.

 

[AusWolf]

For me, I'm looking at Zen 5 because I'm going to be moving up from Zen 3 but I agree with this above.

The only question will be on how I can time the resale of my Zen 3 parts with the timing of the launch of new boards I would prefer to hold out until the Zen 5 X3D chips but those will come 6 months after so I may not have a choice.

I wouldn't worry about the board too much, just get any B650 that suits the needs, unless you absolutely can't live without USB 4.

I hope they are actually cheaper. We know what will probably happen though. Just like when the Ryzen 2 come out lots of us got the 2600 instead of the 2700. I did skip the 3 series and then got 5th Gen. Now AM5 is here and I might get next year's X3D. I guess the next CPU I buy will be at 6 GHZ

I was on Intel for roughly a decade until Ryzen 5000, which blew my mind with the 5950X. It was a waste of money, though, so I sold it not long after I bought it.

I tried AM5 first with the 7700X, and now the 7800X3D, which are entirely different CPUs in behaviour, although I'm not noticing any extra performance. This is probably the last time I spent money on the "10% superior gaming powah" instead of saving it for a better GPU. I could have had a 7900 XTX with the 7700X instead of the 7800 XT, and it would have given me a much better gaming experience. Oh well...

I might still get a 9800X3D just for shits'n'giggles, but I'll think twice before I pull the trigger this time. If mid-range RDNA 4 comes to be better than my 7800 XT, I'll get that instead.

 

[mechtech]

Eh. No where good to put that many on the MB, and nvme drives throttle too much anyway. I wish they would keep 1-2 for people who don't need more than one main drive for the pc and then remove all sata and replace those ports with 6 or more u.3 ports. Go back to that 2.5 form factor for nvmes and allow higher capacities and no throttling from the extra heat sinking capacity. U.3 allows sata through it anyway so technically they aren't losing capability for older, slower drives, but rather replacing far outdated ports with ones that have higher speed and more functionality.

Indeed. As I said elsewhere 4TB and 8TB nvme drives at better prices and availability would be a better option.

 

[Makaveli]

I wouldn't worry about the board too much, just get any B650 that suits the needs, unless you absolutely can't live without USB 4.

i've been looking at this but still to expensive need it to hit the CAD $350 range which probably won't happen until the new boards launch

 

[TheLostSwede]

Thats interesting. Pretty much every product that uses that chip is advertised for "up to 40Gbps". If the technical max is 32Gbps, then saying "up to 40Gbps" is straight up lying. How are they allowed to get away with that?

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Up to in this case means a muxed USB4/Thunderbolt signal with DisplayPort, a single lane of DP 1.4a is 8.1 Gbps, so 32 + 8.1 is up to 40 Gbps...
Please ask Intel about that though.
However, the ASM4242 doesn't have this limitation as already pointed out and can thus do 40 Gbps of data, but it can also be used to mux the DP signal if needed.

 

[DV2FOX]

What they must do is also add TWO USB 3.2 headers along the Type C header into any newer motherboard. That way people who gets a tower with 4 USB 3.2 + Type C ports will be able to plug it all in without having limitations (Like the "Be Quiet! DARK BASE PRO 901"). Sure, Asrock's X670E STEEL LEGEND is a great board for it's price, but some people say it has some defects...)

And include a beeper for old school users, and, just in case, the error number LED or keep the "RAM/CPU/etc" LED thing

 

[TheLostSwede]

Not sure if any of you remember this old leak, but this is pretty much X870E. Obviously this says PCIe Gen4 in a lot of places, which since this was leaked, we know is Gen 5.

 

[trsttte]

Mandating it is good I suppose

Allow me to disagree and use one of your quotes further down for it:

at least it's not taking faster PCIE priority for a port that's already faster than anything I'll connect to it

That's the issue, USB4 on a desktop is not that interesting when you are able - or should be - to simply put a pcie card inside that does whatever you want. It's a cool option, but it should be an option. Having it mandated imo means every X870E will SUCK! because the x4 lanes that could be used for anything else are reserved for an interface that's largely unnecessary on a desktop form factor.

What happend to X770 B750 and A720?

Were you expecting a consistent and logical naming scheme?

How about RDNA 4/5? Are they gonna be on PCI-e 4.0?

Maybe in name only, we're not anywhere near of maxing out PCIe 4.0, PCIe 5.0 would be cool if boards still had bifurcation to make use of x8 lanes for something else but as they don't seem to want to continue to do those kinds of things it only ammounts to another reason for a price bump when both GPUs and MOBOs are already very expensive

 

[TheLostSwede]

What they must do is also add TWO USB 3.2 headers along the Type C header into any newer motherboard. That way people who gets a tower with 4 USB 3.2 + Type C ports will be able to plug it all in without having limitations (Like the "Be Quiet! DARK BASE PRO 901"). Sure, Asrock's X670E STEEL LEGEND is a great board for it's price, but some people say it has some defects...)

Anything above 10 Gbps can't be stacked like that with current designs, so don't expect to see it.