AMD X670/B650 Motherboard Overview: 20-Plus Motherboards for AM5

4/17/2023 Update:
Since the initial launch of AMD's first Ryzen 7000  motherboards, there have been plenty of complaints from PC builders (and us) that AMD's latest motherboards cost too much. But recently, a few B650M motherboards launched in the $125 range, and even more-affordable A620 boards are also on the way (though they lack PCIe 5.0 and official overclocking support). Be sure to check out our best motherboards page, as we are in the process of testing and reviewing some of AMD's more affordable motherboard options.

Lining up with AMD’s Ryzen 7000 CPU announcements, many motherboard partners are showing off their new X670E/X670-based motherboards, featuring the new AM5 socket, to go along with the new Zen 4 chips. The new motherboards come with a slew of updates and improvements to support the new CPU platform. This includes moving from DDR4 to DDR5 (no DDR4 options, unlike Intel), a shift from PCIe 4.0 to PCIe 5.0, and upgraded power delivery to support the socket capable of using up to 230W.

I look forward to all the new hardware bits and functionality, but I get most excited about the new designs board partners come up with. Over the coming months, we’ll review many of these boards, with the best models earning spots on our best motherboards page.

Until we get started with reviews, we’ve created a list of Ryzen 7000 motherboards, with as much information directly from partners as possible. Many details, including the all-important price, will arrive later. So there’s some speculation on our end below. We’ll provide everything we have regarding official facts and update the information here as we get it.

AMD’s X670 Chipset: AM5 goes LGA, PCIe 5.0 and DDR5

Just as with our Z690 overview article earlier this year, when we started this one, AMD had not released the full details of the X670 chipsets. But what we do know is AMD has moved away from the PGA (Pin Grid Array) socket to an LGA (Land Grid Array) socket, like Intel processors. The new socket contains 1,718 pins, 18 more than Intel’s LGA 1700 socket for its Z6x0 motherboards and Alder Lake processors. The good news is that AM4-compatible cooling will fit the AM5 motherboards. Many mounting kits work natively, though some will need new ones for best results. Reach out to the company that made your cooler to confirm compatibility.

Along with the flagship-class X670E chipset, AMD is also releasing X670 (no “E”), B650E and B650 chipsets. X670E supports all the new bells and whistles, including PCIe 5.0 slots and storage, along with AMD EXPO memory technology (essentially an AMD-specific version of Intel’s XMP). X670, on the other hand, supports EXPO, but only PCIe 5.0 on the NVMe storage (not the PCIe slot). The other chipsets, B650E and B650, offer users a less-expensive path into the new AM5 platform. The “E” variant has comprehensive support for PCIe Gen 5 (slot and NVMe storage), while the ‘base’ X650 chipset only supports PCIe 5.0 on storage/NVMe. Both chipsets support overclocking the processor and memory.

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The B650E motherboards target the mid-range to higher ‘budget’ options, so there will likely be some pricing overlap between the higher tier B650E and X670, as they share some of the same internals, including PCIe redrivers and the necessary space to support them. While most motherboard partners haven’t disclosed pricing, AMD did mention that AM5 motherboards will be available for as low as $125. However, we imagine this is likely the MSRP of the least expensive B650 motherboard(s). That said, we expect a price increase compared to X570 and perhaps even Z690, regardless of the chipset tier. It’s nice to see graphics cards coming down in price, but getting into a new DDR5 platform will cost you.

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Along with the jump to DDR5, AMD is also releasing AMD EXPO (EXtended Profiles for Overclocking) memory technology, a one-click overclocking profile for Ryzen 7000 series memory. Similar to integrated XMP profiles for Intel, you’ll have EXPO profiles to select in the BIOS to run your kit at the rated speeds. AMD partnered with several memory manufacturers, including ADATA, Corsair, Geil, G.Skill and Kingston to help bring DDR5 memory kits to the market with the new features. According to AMD, upon launch on September 27th, you should see at least 15 kits of DDR5 with AMD EXPO functionality at speeds up to DDR5-6400. We’ve already covered kits from G.Skill and TeamGroup.

One of the more unique features of the X670E boards is their dual PCHs. The chipset (actually a chipset, defined as multiple chips) uses two Promontory 21 (PROM21) chips. Instead of exclusive access to the CPU for each, the two chips connect to each other through four PCIe 4.0 lanes, which then connect to the CPU directly, sporting the same PCIe 4.0 x4 bandwidth as X570 for DMI. Combined, the chipset provides three PCIe 4.0 x4 interfaces (12 lanes total) and eight PCIe 3.0, the latter reserved for slower connectivity like networking. Board partners have the flexibility to configure the PCIe 3.0 to SATA ports, which yields a mix and match of six SATA plus two PCIe (x4 + x4).

A benefit of using a multi-chip configuration (both 7W TDP, note), is that they can be spread out and cooled passively, forgoing the fans that many despised (few with good reason, as they weren’t noisy) on the first batch of X570 motherboards. Thankfully, we haven’t seen any chipset fans on Micro ATX or larger boards, but we do expect to see them used with high-end Mini-ITX motherboards since real estate is so limited on those tiny boards. Check out our article from a few months back for more detailed information. AMD hasn’t released an official chipset diagram at this time, but we have one for the Aorus Master, which gives you an example of how things can be split up.

On the USB front, the chipset offers quite a bit of native USB connectivity. X670/X670E supports up to eight USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10 Gbps) ports and another four ports that can be configured as two USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 (20 Gbps) ports. If that isn’t enough, the chipset also supports up to 12 more USB 2.0 ports.

Some high-end boards support USB Power Delivery (PD) and output up to 60W at 20V/3A. Not only can you fast charge your smartphone with these ports, but larger devices like tablets and some laptops, too. To support that much power, you’ll need to plug a spare 6-pin PCIe connector to plug into the board. Otherwise, you’ll be limited to the 20V/1.5A and 30W. For the midrange B650 chipset, just one of the PROM21 chips is used. On some boards, you’ll find USB 4 support via an ASMedia ASM4242 controller, which outputs two USB 4 ports from four PCIe 4.0 lanes via the CPU, while also supporting DisplayPort v1.4 (thus video) through the interface.

Moving to networking, there isn’t too much of a change here, especially when compared to the updated B550 boards (or Intel Z690), which added 2.5 GbE port(s), with high-end boards using up to 10 GbE. The new chipset also includes integrated Wi-Fi 6E, akin to Intel’s CNVi implementation, which is included on most boards.

Here’s a look at how X670 compares with AMD’s previous mainstream flagship chipsets. You’ll notice some question marks remain; remember that we don’t have an official chipset diagram from AMD. We’ll update any information below once we have official information from AMD.

AMD X670E/X670, B650E/B650 and X570 Chipset Specifications

AM5 CPUs

We’ve already covered the Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 details, so we won’t get into all of the CPU nitty gritty here and keep it high level. AMD will release four new Zen 4 Ryzen series (Code name “Raphael”) processors at launch. Up top is the 16-core $699 Ryzen 9 7950X flagship, followed by the 12-core $549 Ryzen 9 7900X, a $399 8-core Ryzen 7 7700X, and finally, the budget chip of the group, the $299 6-core Ryzen 5 7600X. Pricing is solid overall, with the Ryzen 7 7700X the only processor increasing in price, by $100, over the last-generation Ryzen 7 5700X it replaces. The 7950X is $100 less than the 5950X’s launch price, while the 7900X and 7600X cost the same as the 5700X and 5600X launch prices. While that’s a positive across most SKUs, the real cost increases will almost certainly come from the motherboard and the shift to DDR5. It does though, seem likely that DDR5 prices will continue to fall, especially on lower-end kits.

The new CPUs are built on TSMC’s 5nm process node for the Core Compute Die (CCD) and a 6nm process for the I/O die (IOD). Although the core/thread counts remain the same, Zen 4 also doubles the L2 cache (L3 remains the same). Along with the clock speed increase, this helps with overall performance. With the new architecture though, TDP and power goes up. The Ryzen 9 chips have a TDP of 170W, with peaks (PBP/MTP) allowed up to 230W, a healthy increase from Zen 3. The Ryzen 7 7700X and 7600X both sport 105W TDPs, but their PBP/MTP power limit is currently unknown. In short, you’ll probably need a good cooling solution to get the most out of these chips (same as Intel), and you may need to spring for a new power supply.

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The good news is that with the power increase comes a significant performance uplift. According to AMD, the processors achieve up to 13% improvement in IPC (Instructions Per Clock). Along with the notable IPC increase, AMD also raised the ceiling on clock speeds, boosting up to a blazing 5.7 GHz on two cores. Some simple napkin math results reveal around a 29% improvement in single-threaded performance over Zen 3. AMD also notes up to 45% more performance in multi-threaded applications. AMD also claims it’s 11% faster in games, 44% faster for compute functionality, and 47% greater efficiency than the Intel Core i9-12900K. Of course, these chips will obviously be competing with 13th Gen Raptor Lake chips, like the Core i9-13900K. The new AMD processors also support AVX-512 and, for the first time in a long time, include integrated graphics based on the RDNA 2 architecture. Note though, that the integrated graphics here are basic, meant primarily to handle displaying the desktop, not running games.

Unlike Intel, AMD chose to go all in with DDR5 and so does not support DDR4 on its new platform. Since DDR5 is available in greater volume and prices are coming down (though still a lot higher than DDR4), this was arguably a good choice on AMD’s part. The highest in-spec frequency for the existing AM5 SKUs is DDR5-5200. But AMD did share that DDR5-6000 will be the sweet spot for Zen 4.

X670 (and rumored B650) Motherboards: The Full List (So Far)

With the chipset details out of the way, we’ve provided a list of all X670 and X650 motherboards kown so far below, doing our best to ignore unsubstantiated rumors and leaks. As usual, not all partners responded or had updated web pages in time for publication, so there's a strong chance that some things will change. We’ll break things out on the following pages and offer some thoughts on the respective launch lineups after. Unfortunately, pricing is an essential piece of information that no vendors have provided yet. But we’ve filled in the tables with what data we have. Any models listed in bold are confirmed through the board partner, while any that are not bold and italicized (most B650), are unconfirmed but heavily speculated around the web.

X670/B650 Motherboard Product Stack by Partner

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