B450 and X470 Motherboards Now Supporting Zen 3

[Mchart]

Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.

OK

 

[wizzi01]

OK

You have something else to say or just want to be a troll?

 

[Mchart]

You have something else to say or just want to be a troll?

You sure are getting angry over a fan.

 

[1_rick]

Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.

Ditto, but you can't get people to stop retiring to their fainting couches about it. I've got an Asus x570 and it's never on except at boot--if even then, it's hard to tell as the video card spins up its fans like it thinks it's a server--and I've had that board since July 10th.

 

[1_rick]

You sure are getting angry over a fan.

I can hear you clearly over the sound my chipset fan isn't making.

 

[mda]

I'm not really sure I plan on upgrading to Zen3, but this is the right move.

Not launching B550 alongside Zen2, and 0 announcement about X570/B550's future compatibility made the upgrade path lockout look bad.

 

[TheSlySyl]

If someone is cost conscious enough that they are buying the low end mobos, how often can they really afford a cpu upgrade? Better off selling the cpu/mobo and ram even, and replacing those as a set imho.

I bought an X370 board and one of the highest end generation 1 Ryzens on launch day. Is it the best Motherboard? No. But it was literally the only X370 that I actually could find in stock at the moment I bought it.
Now, 3 years later, i can absolutely afford to slot a 3900X into this machine and keep my same overabundance of RAM. Buying a new mobo and new ram WOULD cost too much at the moment.
Likewise, my fiance has an even cheaper B350 system that's currently only running an R5 1400, so she's gonna get my 1700. We both win, and I only have to buy one new CPU.

 

[CraigHB]

Because of the problems with B550's availability thousands of people who build low end and midrange systems had no choice but to either buy B450

The whole issue probably could have been avoided with better timing. If the B550 had been out in earnest when they attempted this truncation, there probably would not have been that much grumbling.

This is where a removable BIOS chip would be handy.

I seem to remember motherboards way back when with removable BIOS ROM chips. Motherboard makers could sure save everyone a lot of grief it they want back to that. If a board bricks, you just order a new BIOS ROM. Makes it possible to upgrade and swap ROMs if needed, no need for dual BIOS.

I was in the same boat with the active cooling on the chipsets. But then I realized the fans on the two X570 boards I had (MSI and GIGABYTE) never turned on aside from boot-up. Not once in the 2 months I've had the boards so far

I have an x570 with a compact video card (single fan 1660 Super). I have lots of room around the x570 chip so I put an old passive cooler on there I had from way back when. It immediately knocked 10C off the PCH temperature, typically 40C and have not seen it run over 45C. So active cooling is not necessary with the x570, just a good passive cooler. BTW, I'm running two PCIe 4.0 drives so the PCH is seeing a good load.

A big flat hunk of aluminum with few fins is not a good cooler. A passive heat-pipe cooler with a stack on the side would work just fine. Relatively speaking the x570 chip itself does use a lot of power (15W TDP), but that's not beyond passive cooling either. It's just how motherboard makers decided to deal with it, vanity over function.

 

[MaZa]

The whole issue probably could have been avoided with better timing. If the B550 had been out in earnest when they attempted this truncation, there probably would not have been that much grumbling.

Precisely. I might even go as far as say that when Zen 2 got released AMD could have warned early that Zen 2 was going to be the last CPU that B450 is going to support. It would have helped system builders to plan ahead and decide if B450 really was good enough or should they buy X570 just in case B550 gets delayed, which it did over and over again. But no, this information came out of the blue as a surprise to everyone, mobo manufacturers included, so it should not have been a surprise to AMD that people would raise their voices and call this a dick move.

 

[JAB Creations]

AMD wanted to do the asshole move and got called on it. Competition is great.

When Zen 1 was launched Asus's stock was about 45 times greater than AMD's which left AMD in a hopeless position to get manufacturers to use ROMs larger than 16MB.

Why was AMD so powerless?

Probably because the complete lack of critical thinking by people like the person I quoted who "buY iNtel for thE fPs! lOL".

The only person/group/etc that people should be pissed at are Intel for their shady practices and brainless fanboys who blindly chose Intel to the point of almost destroying AMD. Those people should feel complete and utter shame for their utter lack of critical thinking and personal responsibility.

 

[MaZa]

When Zen 1 was launched Asus's stock was about 45 times greater than AMD's which left AMD in a hopeless position to get manufacturers to use ROMs larger than 16MB.

Why was AMD so powerless?

Probably because the complete lack of critical thinking by people like the person I quoted who "buY iNtel for thE fPs! lOL".

The only person/group/etc that people should be pissed at are Intel for their shady practices and brainless fanboys who blindly chose Intel to the point of almost destroying AMD. Those people should feel complete and utter shame for their utter lack of critical thinking and personal responsibility.

Come on don't even start with that foot. AMD almost destroyed themselves alone with Bulldozer, they did not need Intel fanboys for that.

 

[c3k]

How so, since earlier Ryzen cpu's could not access anything beyond 16MB on the bios chip. Now, I suppose popping in a chip with the updated bios might work but......

To enable the purchase of a board with the "wrong" bios for the cpu. Now, (for boards like this) you need a cpu installed to boot the bios. THEN you flash the bios to the new one. Well, if the new bios is incompatible with the old cpu, and the old bios is incompatible with the new cpu, your board is worthless for an upgrade. You need to call "rent-a-chip" every time you flash (either "up" to the new, or "down" to the prior generation of cpu).

With a swappable BIOS chip, you pick the BIOS chip to match the cpu generation you're using.

That was the point I was making.

 

[drescherjm]

I am very happy with my X570 + 3900X purchase 2 months ago. I expect to have this combination for a decade or so. To me its doubtful that I would replace the CPU in that ever. Maybe if a 12+ core Zen3 offered more than expected and was $250 in 2025.

 

[Ready4Dis]

Ah, fair enough.

Yah, was a bit more that I was going to post, lol. It just gave me a reason to explore other options since my original plan got thrown a curve ball. The lack of b550 is killing me though... Just a couple more weeks, lol.

 

[vegeta535]

Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.

People need to stop crying about the stupid little fan. I have never notice it ever coming on in my system.

 

[CraigHB]

I expect to have this combination for a decade or so.

Don't know if I'll run my 3700x/x570 quite that long, but I expect to get several years off it before I change anything. I mean it runs really good, almost surprised by how well it runs. By the time I upgrade again I'll be on to a new motherboard anyway.

The only time socket and chipset longevity matters is if you upgrade your CPU when new ones come out. I've never done that. Always sit on a platform for a while then upgrade the whole thing. It's usually beyond a time where any one socket would be on retail shelves.

Intel typically doesn't carry a particular socket very long and I really wouldn't expect much more from AMD either. I mean it's nice of them to do that for people that want to keep the latest CPU, but it won't mess up my plans either way.

I think the smart thing for AMD would be to plan ahead better for CPU and chipset compatibility. If you can't support everything with one socket, move to a new one. I don't think people will get upset with that.

 

[ManofGod]

My wife uses her MacBook and my daughter loves her iPad. Nobody uses the PC besides myself so having another PC in the house would be a waste 😢.

You could be right but, I have 3 PC's, am a single guy who live alone and none of those PC's have gone to waste.

 

[doublejack]

Different pin functions, different microcode, different security...lots of things.

Absolute. BS.

There is nothing that will prevent 300 series boards from supporting Zen 3 besides the will to make a suitable BIOS available. None of the things you identified are deal breakers. All can be handled via BIOS. We know it is possible for a fact. Features like PCIE 4.0 obviously won't work, but the CPU itself could boot up fine.

What did AMD give as their official excuse? BIOS ROM size. They openly admit there are no technical limitations besides the ability to support multiple generations of Zen CPUs with a 16mb ROM.

With this in mind, based on the news that Zen 3 is coming to the 400 series I highly suspect that one way or another we will see Zen 3 working on 300 series boards. Maybe board partners will release beta BIOS that has support built in, or maybe it will be done through the modding scene. Either way it is likely to happen now, at least for some boards.

 

[Mchart]

What sucks is that a lot of the older boards could support the newer CPU's just fine with the 16mb ROM size if they'd drop support of the older CPU's. Most people with these boards will be upgrading in steps anyways, so it's a bit frustrating that AMD won't support this again this time around.

There is no reason I need my X470 board to still support Gen 1 Ryzen and some old crappy Athlon's when i'm already running a 3900x.

 

[doublejack]

People need to stop crying about the stupid little fan. I have never notice it ever coming on in my system.

Well, it is a valid complaint. Little fans suck. My rig is dead silent so I absolutely would hear it and it would be a deal breaker. However, there's always the option of putting a block on it and adding it to the loop. I'm sure there are also aftermarket air cooled options with larger fans or no fans. Going with these options is going to mean not all x570 boards will be a good choice, and it becomes a bigger PITA to piece a rig together. Then there's the price factor of buying a replacement cooler for a platform that already has a price premium.

Honestly, this whole thing is a screw up. Since x570 is already more money, quite a bit more than the B series boards (makes sense as the premium platform), they should have all come with better chipset cooling that does away with the tiny, noisy fan. x570 should be superior to B450/B550 in every single way. They are not, because of the active cooling on the chipset, and that's an issue.

 

[vegeta535]

Well, it is a valid complaint. Little fans suck. My rig is dead silent so I absolutely would hear it and it would be a deal breaker. However, there's always the option of putting a block on it and adding it to the loop. I'm sure there are also aftermarket air cooled options with larger fans or no fans. Going with these options is going to mean not all x570 boards will be a good choice, and it becomes a bigger PITA to piece a rig together. Then there's the price factor of buying a replacement cooler for a platform that already has a price premium.

Honestly, this whole thing is a screw up. Since x570 is already more money, quite a bit more than the B series boards (makes sense as the premium platform), they should have all come with better chipset cooling that does away with the tiny, noisy fan. x570 should be superior to B450/B550 in every single way. They are not, because of the active cooling on the chipset, and that's an issue.

My system is also dead quite. Custom water cooled with it right next to me on my desk. Only thing I hear is when my spinning rust decides to spin up. It is not a valid claim. If you pushing the system hard enough for the fan to be audible then the rest of your fans and stuff are spinning up to a higher rpm and will likely drown out the dingy little fan. Have you even heard a x570 system with the fan or you just jumping on the hate bandwagon? I am speaking from experience with gigabyte master x570 board.

 

[Axman]

There is nothing that will prevent 300 series boards from supporting Zen 3 besides the will to make a suitable BIOS available.

No one's saying a new BIOS can't secure compatibility. It's just that someone has to make these new BIOSes.

If that's so easy, then why are you upset? Just go make your own BIOS that does all of that.

 

[Rvenger]

Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.

I changed the fabric thermal pad off my chipset fan and replaced with thermal paste and now my fan no longer spins. It runs too cool for the fan to ever come on.

 

[exlink]

My system is also dead quite. Custom water cooled with it right next to me on my desk. Only thing I hear is when my spinning rust decides to spin up. It is not a valid claim. If you pushing the system hard enough for the fan to be audible then the rest of your fans and stuff are spinning up to a higher rpm and will likely drown out the dingy little fan. Have you even heard a x570 system with the fan or you just jumping on the hate bandwagon? I am speaking from experience with gigabyte master x570 board.

This is pretty much spot on. As I mentioned in a previous post, I've had a Gigabyte and MSI X570 board over the past 2 months and other than boot-up the chipset fan never turned on so it creates exactly zero noise. I've also been around a PC with an ASUS X570-E motherboard that had the fan always on (I think around 40%) and I couldn't hear it over the rest of the system.

I was part of the bandwagon that initially hated the thought of the active coolers on the X570 but after using the boards for a few months and seeing that the fan rarely turns on, and is basically inaudible when on, changed my mind. I'd still prefer a passive solution but I don't think anyone should steer clear of the X570 motherboards because of an active cooling solution on the chipset that is hardly ever utilized.

 

[MaZa]

Absolute. BS.

There is nothing that will prevent 300 series boards from supporting Zen 3 besides the will to make a suitable BIOS available. None of the things you identified are deal breakers. All can be handled via BIOS. We know it is possible for a fact. Features like PCIE 4.0 obviously won't work, but the CPU itself could boot up fine.

What did AMD give as their official excuse? BIOS ROM size. They openly admit there are no technical limitations besides the ability to support multiple generations of Zen CPUs with a 16mb ROM.

With this in mind, based on the news that Zen 3 is coming to the 400 series I highly suspect that one way or another we will see Zen 3 working on 300 series boards. Maybe board partners will release beta BIOS that has support built in, or maybe it will be done through the modding scene. Either way it is likely to happen now, at least for some boards.

B350 could support Zen 3 indeed, but releasing official support for it could be even more problematic than B450. Yes they could drop the support for older CPU's but on the other hand they do need a motherboard chipset that can OFFICIALLY still run those older CPU's, the CPU's that were designed for those mobos from day 1, no matter what BIOS is installed in one. B350 had a good run, I am satisfied with what performance gains I from Ryzen 5 1600 to 3600. Unless someone reverse engineers the AMD bios l would not expect Zen 3 support on B350 anytime soon.

 

[sc5mu93]

I applaud AMD for at least trying to listen.

I have a b450 and I will probably just get another board with B550. the "solution" sounds like it is going to be really kludgey and hackish. I dont want to run production on a beta bios.

 

[exlink]

I wouldn't be surprised if only the motherboard brands that made Zen 3 compatibility claims for their B450/X470 series boards (namely MSI) will move forward with supporting Zen 3 to avoid lawsuits. While the other motherboard brands such as ASUS who seems to oppose to adding Zen 3 compatibility to the 400 series boards just won't move forward with allocating resources to add the support.

 

[doublejack]

My system is also dead quite. Custom water cooled with it right next to me on my desk. Only thing I hear is when my spinning rust decides to spin up. It is not a valid claim. If you pushing the system hard enough for the fan to be audible then the rest of your fans and stuff are spinning up to a higher rpm and will likely drown out the dingy little fan. Have you even heard a x570 system with the fan or you just jumping on the hate bandwagon? I am speaking from experience with gigabyte master x570 board.

I think this is purely subjective. We all hear things differently. I personally would not be able to run an x570 board with a tiny chipset fan. The pump and my 120mm fans make so little noise they are silent, they would not cover the noise of a chipset fan. My GPU also stays so cool that the fans don't really spin much unless my case needs a cleaning. Pushing my system or idling makes no difference in noise levels.

 

[Gideon]

I think this is purely subjective. We all hear things differently. I personally would not be able to run an x570 board with a tiny chipset fan. The pump and my 120mm fans make so little noise they are silent, they would not cover the noise of a chipset fan. My GPU also stays so cool that the fans don't really spin much unless my case needs a cleaning. Pushing my system or idling makes no difference in noise levels.

Your a enthusiast, just remove the dang chipset fan if it bothers you that much and put on a passive heat sink. People used to do that all the time back in the day and one of the main reasons was not even the noise, it was the fact that the crappy fan would fail.

 

[doublejack]

No one's saying a new BIOS can't secure compatibility. It's just that someone has to make these new BIOSes.

If that's so easy, then why are you upset? Just go make your own BIOS that does all of that.

What upsets me is not the fact that 300 series boards can support Zen 3 but may not be given BIOS updates to do so, it is the excuse making. I hate dishonesty. If AMD can't tell the truth they should just not say anything. Same goes for covering for them.

Is it too hard these days to say "We don't want to enable Zen 3 support on 300 series boards" and leave it at that? Or maybe add "we don't think it is a good idea" or "we don't think the effort is worth it"? No, instead they have to grasp at straws and spin away like a child trying to find a reason they didn't get their homework done. It's BS. I like to live in a world where words have meaning and facts matter... while the world is increasingly headed in the direction of facts not getting in the way of "truth".

For the record, I very well may put in some effort to get Zen 3 working on my specific motherboard, the Tomahawk B350. It really depends on how big the jump will be between my 3600 and something like a 4600. I skipped the Zen+ generation because the jump wasn't big enough. If Zen 2 to Zen 3 is like that, I'll take a pass and be waiting for the next major platform update. If it is more like going from Zen 1 to Zen 2 then I'll be very interested. I have two Tomahawk B350s and several interchangeable components, so I'm not really concerned with bricking my board. I also have a history of similar modding, adding UEFI support to a GPU and injecting NVMe boot support into another bios.

Also, what will really chap my backside is if my wife's motherboard does not get Zen 3 support. She's currently running a 1600x on an Asus B450-F Gaming. If Asus pulls some crap and doesn't enable Zen 3 that will be the last Asus board we ever buy. She tweeted this at them yesterday. She's in line for our next upgrade and will be getting a Zen 3 one way or another.

 

[wizzi01]

I changed the fabric thermal pad off my chipset fan and replaced with thermal paste and now my fan no longer spins. It runs too cool for the fan to ever come on.

I never even did that.

 

[Unknown-One]

Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.

I actually had issues with this in a recent build I did for someone with a Gigabyte Aorus X570 Elite motherboard.

The chipset fan would, seemingly at random, go from 0 RPM to full-blast during normal operation of the system. The UEFI offers no way to adjust the fan curve on this particular fan (it shows the RPM, that's it). Not something I would want in any build focused on silence.

I eventually wound up working around the issue by making an adapter to connect the chipset fan to a normal fan header, and setting my own custom fan curve based on chipset temperature. With the fan set to always run at low RPM, it basically never gets hot enough to need a sudden ramp to full speed.

Gotta love poorly implemented 0 RPM modes...

 

[pendragon1]

Your a enthusiast, just remove the dang chipset fan if it bothers you that much and put on a passive heat sink. People used to do that all the time back in the day and one of the main reasons was not even the noise, it was the fact that the crappy fan would fail.

blorb!

 

[Unknown-One]

You're an enthusiast, just remove the dang chipset fan if it bothers you that much and put on a passive heat sink.

Nah, not hardcore enough. Disconnect the stock fan and 3D print a custom fan duct to funnel a portion of an existing case fan directly into the chipset heatsink

 

[pendragon1]

Nah, not hardcore enough. Disconnect the stock fan and 3D print a custom fan duct to funnel a portion of an existing case fan directly into the chipset heatsink

can you print me a 120 to 40mm adapter please
a "hood scoop" to catch some front intake air would probably be enough for it.

 

[exlink]

I never even did that.

Probably because it's not necessary. Mine won't turn on until the chipset reaches 55*C with the fan profile set to balanced. If I set it to the silent profile it won't start spinning until 70*C. Haven't played with the manual profile.

I have yet to see mine go above 48*C under synthetic load, but that's likely because I have intake fans from the bottom of my case blowing cool air over it at all times. I could see issues with cases that have poor airflow though.

 

[Unknown-One]

can you print me a 120 to 40mm adapter please
a "hood scoop" to catch some front intake air would probably be enough for it.

I mean, I can, but when I said that I was more thinking of a duct that would just fit over a corner (one quarter) of a 120mm case fan, and duct that into the chipset heatsink. Don't need to grab the whole thing, it doesn't need THAT much airflow

 

[cjcox]

Nah, not hardcore enough. Disconnect the stock fan and 3D print a custom fan duct to funnel a portion of an existing case fan directly into the chipset heatsink

Or plug a custom AIO into your (expensive) remaining x16 slot and use that (hoping for some laughs).

 

[drescherjm]

think the smart thing for AMD would be to plan ahead better for CPU and chipset compatibility. If you can't support everything with one socket, move to a new one.

I believe if AM5 supports PCIe5 it could be a very long lived socket.

 

[horrorshow]

I reckon, if this lets me grab a 4900x 12-core that puts out less heat than the 3900x with even just a 5% IPC/mhz bump - totally worth waiting for..