AMD just lately teased a spread of recent motherboards their companions have been cooking up. Yesterday’s Meet The Experts webinar revealed key particulars about X670 and X670E motherboards from the likes of ASUS, MSI, ASRock, Gigabyte, and Biostar. These boards leverage the brand new AM5 socket which can be required to help AMD’s Ryzen 7000 Series of processors as they launch within the coming months.
The AM5 socket transitions away from the PGA configuration utilized by AMD via AM4. PGA, or Pin Grid Array, is where the rows of tiny pins lengthen from the CPU bundle. Instead, AM5 joins Threadripper and rival CPUs from Intel in utilizing LGA. LGA inverts the setup with pins coming from the motherboard whereas the CPU bundle has solely contact pads. PGA has benefits for energy supply via elevated contact however doesn’t scale as densely as LGA when pin counts improve. With 1718 pins to bridge between CPU and motherboard in AM5, LGA is the good selection.
With these motherboards, Zen 4 CPUs will be capable of draw as much as 170 watts natively. The socket additional helps DDR5 and PCI-e 5.0 for function parity with Intel. These new motherboards will help 24 lanes of PCI-e 5.0, by the way in which, which seems to be a bonus over Intel Raptor Lake’s rumored 16 lanes. The AM5 platform rounds out its connectivity with as much as 14 USB 3.2 Gen 2 (20Gbps) ports, native Wi-Fi 6E, and as much as 4 HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort 2 ports.
The motherboards coated right here fall underneath the X670 and X670E monikers. The latter is AMD’s most premium providing. It is differentiated with “Unparalleled Capability” and “Extreme Overclocking” whereas supporting PCI-e 5.0 on two graphics playing cards and an NVMe slot concurrently. The X670 chipset guarantees simply “Enthusiast Overclocking”, help for a single NVMe slot on PCI-e 5.0 with the graphics slots optionally related. We hope to qualify precisely what the distinction between “Extreme” and “Enthusiast” overclocking is once we can get our arms on these boards.
On to the celebrities of the present. This is just not the primary time we’ve glimpsed a lot of them, however new particulars are rising. We first get an in depth breakdown of the ROG Crosshair X670E Extreme and X670E Hero boards from ASUS. Both choices are positively loaded with I/O, however the Extreme brings a further 10Gb Marvell AQtion community port along with the two.5Gb Intel NIC discovered on each fashions and extra premium lighting.
The boards have as much as 22 paired 110-amp energy levels (20+2 for the Extreme and 18+2 within the Hero) which ought to guarantee energy supply stays steady underneath probably the most demanding overclocks. ASUS additionally contains some good Q-Design options to enhance high quality of life. These embrace the Q-Latch for toolless M.2 drive set up, the Q-Connector to ease entrance panel connections, and Q-Release to make swapping a graphics card that a lot simpler.
ASRock was much less forthcoming about specifics, although it did tout 5 completely different fashions of X670E motherboards alone. This steady will embrace the X670E Taichi Carrara, X670E Taichi, X670E Steel Legend, X670E Pro RS, and X670E PG Lightning. We hope that is an indicator of getting some extra pockets pleasant choices within the combine.
MSI confirmed off 4 fashions themselves. The MEG X670E Godlike, MEG X670E Ace, MPG X670E Carbon Wi-FI, and PRO X670-P Wi-Fi. MSI’s energy designs high out with the Godlike’s 24+2 section (105A) VRM. Even the PRO X670-P which is much less more likely to be overclocked makes use of a wholesome 14+ 2 configuration.
MSI additionally supplied a breakaway take a look at its cooling VRM setup for its MEG X670E Ace. Along with many of the different boards seen at the moment, it lacks any lively cooling which was a mainstay of AM4 motherboards. Not solely does eradicating the fan go away one much less factor to interrupt, however it additionally makes for a quieter system.
Gigabyte is touting help for a brand new, longer 25110 M.2 formfactor, which is able to probably be required by some Gen 5 SSDs. The specification corresponds to a drive that’s 25 mm large and 110 mm lengthy, which is a considerable improve over the prevailing 22 mm by 80 mm formfactor favored by present Gen 3 and 4 SSDs.
Gigabyte can also be within the 10 Gb ethernet enviornment with their X670E Aorus Xtreme motherboard through a tenGbE Aquantia NIC. The different boards of their lineup, the X670 Aorus Elite AX, X670 Pro AX and X670E Master all make the most of Intel 2.5G for his or her wired networking wants.
Finally, Biostar has detailed their X670E Valkyrie motherboard. This board additionally advertises help for 22110 M.2 drives. Biostar highlights 22 section energy supply (20 + 2, we assume), however not a lot else stands out.
All of those motherboards ought to be out there alongside Ryzen 7000 collection’ launch which is approaching quickly. Dr. Lisa Su said they need to ship earlier than Q3 is completed and different leaks have pinpointed mid-September.