Sapphire launches Pulse B650M motherboard with just two DIMM slots — the $112 AM5 motherboard supports RAM up to DDR5-7400 and higher

Sapphire B650M Pulse
(Image credit: IT Home)

IT Home reports that Sapphire has officially launched a new B650 micro-ATX motherboard based on the AM5 platform: the Pulse B650M. This motherboard features a unique two-DIMM slot configuration.

It is not uncommon for budget micro-ATX motherboards to remove two DIMM slots to save money. Still, the Pulse represents a more upbeat/premium micro-ATX motherboard, suggesting the two-slot configuration was done for performance reasons over price. The board features a built-in I/O shield and a cover over the entire left area of the power delivery area, a configuration generally reserved for mid-range and premium motherboards.

The Sapphire B650M Pulse has a 7+2+1 phase power delivery system featuring 60 amp power stages, powered via a single EPS 8-pin connector. The two DIMM slots are purportedly optimized for memory overclocking with support of up to "DDR5 7400+," making it more than adequate to run memory speeds Ryzen 7000 and Ryzen 9000 chips are best suited towards (i.e., DDR5-6000 to DDR5-6400).

Sapphire B650M Pulse

(Image credit: IT Home)

PCIe connectivity comes in the form of a single shielded PCie 4.0x16 slot and just one PCIe 4.0x4 slot at the bottom. Sandwiched between the two slots is a secondary M.2 slot rated at PCIe Gen 4x4 speeds. The primary M.2 slot is between the AM5 socket and primary x16 slot, with a cover attached and operating at PCIe Gen 5x4 speeds. Additionally, there are four SATA 3 connectors for adding additional slower storage.

The rear I/O consists of dual USB 3.2 ports, six USB 2.0 ports, a single HDMI port, and a single DisplayPort connector for video output through AMD Ryzen APUs. Networking comes in the form of a single Realtek RTL8111K Gigabit ethernet port at the rear and a Wi-Fi 6 card featuring Bluetooth 5 functionality.

Compared to competing AM5 B650 motherboards, Sapphire's Pulse model stands firmly in mid-range territory (or less) based on features and power delivery. For example, the Pulse features better power delivery than Gigabyte's B650 Gaming Wi-Fi, which comes with a 5+2+2 configuration but falls short of Gigabyte's more premium B650M Aorus Elite, which features a 12+2+1 power delivery configuration. The same trait applies to official memory overclocking compatibility.

Wi-FiPricing for the B650M Pulse is 899 Yuan with WiFi and 799 Yuan without Wi-Fi, which translates to $127 and $112, respectively. It remains to be seen if this board will make its way to Western markets, but at the very least, it will be available in the Asian sector.

Aaron Klotz
Contributing Writer

Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.

  • -Fran-
    I want these in the UK so badly :(

    Sapphire, y u no EU with mobos? Gib Nitro+ X870E, pls.

    Regards.
    Reply
  • tracker1
    Nifty... This may be a great go to option. Especially since 4-dimm ddr5 memory configurations have been problematic anyway.
    Reply
  • das_stig
    Realtek 1 Gigabit NIC really, you could just slap in a Realtek 2.5 for pennies and the board would make a nice low cost solution, as it is, no thanks no appeal.
    Reply
  • HideOut
    das_stig said:
    Realtek 1 Gigabit NIC really, you could just slap in a Realtek 2.5 for pennies and the board would make a nice low cost solution, as it is, no thanks no appeal.
    I agree. 1GbE today is just a fail. But hey, I'm sure this will be updated with a link that THG gets a cut of if it comes to western markets.
    Reply
  • Amdlova
    For me what looking good is the 4x at end of the board :) good to place an u.3 drive
    Reply
  • snemarch
    Give me something with two DIMM slots (or perhaps CAMM?), a quality 10gbit NIC, and the PCI-e lanes split between a bit of NVMe, some U.2/U.3, and perhaps a single x4 slot – for cheap homelab server use, I'm not really interested in an x16 GPU :)
    Reply