B450 and X470 Motherboards Now Supporting Zen 3

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GreenOrbs

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https://hexus.net/tech/news/mainboard/142726-amd-decided-change-course-zen-3-b450x470-support/?

Great News! Community outcry has caused AMD to change course and support Zen3 on B450 motherboards that have bios chips big enough to support the new CPUs. Up to board partners to support. The MSI B450 Tomahawk Max I purchased recently is now looking like a good choice.

From AMD Official Reddit Statement:
  1. We will develop and enable our motherboard partners with the code to support “Zen 3”-based processors in select beta BIOSes for AMD B450 and X470 motherboards.
  2. These optional BIOS updates will disable support for many existing AMD Ryzen™ Desktop Processor models to make the necessary ROM space available.
  3. The select beta BIOSes will enable a one-way upgrade path for AMD Ryzen Processors with “Zen 3,” coming later this year. Flashing back to an older BIOS version will not be supported.
  4. To reduce the potential for confusion, our intent is to offer BIOS download only to verified customers of 400 Series motherboards who have purchased a new desktop processor with “Zen 3” inside. This will help us ensure that customers have a bootable processor on-hand after the BIOS flash, minimizing the risk a user could get caught in a no-boot situation.
  5. Timing and availability of the BIOS updates will vary and may not immediately coincide with the availability of the first “Zen 3”-based processors.
  6. This is the final pathway AMD can enable for 400 Series motherboards to add new CPU support. CPU releases beyond “Zen 3” will require a newer motherboard.
  7. AMD continues to recommend that customers choose an AMD 500 Series motherboard for the best performance and features with our new CPUs.
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The actual performance gains is probably more then you will get out of a Intel Chip so this is good news. You can size up a good motherboard in advance instead of plug and pray that you get a good motherboard.Then the drop in upgrade would be really easy without having to screw with your setup.
 
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I'll just copy paste my thoughts from the older thread.

This was the right decision. I understand that supporting older chipset into the far future was problematic, but the timing for dropping the support was just wrong. 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, which would have meant no upgrade path, or splurge a little and buy an expensive X570 which would have made no sense for 3600 and especially the lately released 3300X.

There may be growth pains like there was with B350 and Zen 2 but in the end this is still the the most consumer friendly option in this situation. And I am sure that the people who would upgrade their CPU's on their own also understand to check the bios compatibility. If not then that is entirely their problem and a learning experience on how "to do computer things".
 
Yay, now I'm happy and can start buying AMD parts now. They really messed up my plans and I almost started looking at an Intel build since I had to replace both MB and CPU.... Now that it's just CPU, I can commence ordering rather than waiting.
 
I'm thinking this is more about saving MSI than anything else.

I mean, it's a kludgy workaround for a legacy AMD problem (support of <16MB BIOS only).

(AMD: 16MB BIOS should be large enough for anybody)

But still, MSI is probably worth preserving. They would have been sued to death, if their inventory losses didn't kill them first.
 
cjcox said:
I'm thinking this is more about saving MSI than anything else.
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Agreed. Gamers Nexus pointed out that MSI was pushing hard for AMD to do this as opposed to ASUS which was against support. MSI marketed future support as a reason to buy their 32MB MAX series (https://www.msi.com/blog/msis-max-motherboard-lineup) making a no-strings attached promise of support. Notice how the AMD statement doesn't actually guarantee that all motherboards or motherboard suppliers will have Ryzen 3 support. Its up to the board partners to support it as an OPTIONAL feature. If I had to guess, for legal reasons, any MSI Max board is almost certain to get support. But I wouldn't necessarily bet on Asus boards for example getting it unless customer outcry becomes too great.
 
I hope people remember the high of this power the next time Intel does this exact same bullshit.

AMD wanted to do the asshole move and got called on it. Competition is great.
 
Twisted Kidney said:
I hope people remember the high of this power the next time Intel does this exact same bullshit.

AMD wanted to do the asshole move and got called on it. Competition is great.
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What do you mean? We complained about it every single damn time Intel did this. Intel even had balls to lie about the reasons why the change of mobos was absolutely needed and people called foul on this. However, the difference is that Intel does not listen. They were too big to care about us and had a complete monopoly over the enthusiast market. We couldn't even vote with out wallets because they knew there was no choice until Ryzen started to catch up with Intel.

Kudos for AMD for actually listening, we really appreciate it.
 
MaZa said:
What do you mean? We complained about it every single damn time Intel did this. Intel even had balls to lie about the reasons why the change of mobos was absolutely needed and people called foul on this. However, the difference is that Intel does not listen. They were too big to care about us and had a complete monopoly over the enthusiast market. We couldn't even vote with out wallets because they knew there was no choice until Ryzen started to catch up with Intel.

Kudos for AMD for actually listening, we really appreciate it.
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Add to this that Intel really doesn't care, at least from a product perspective, about the enthusiast market. That makes up such a small percentage of their overall sales, that if "enthusiasts" never bought Intel again, the OEM and corporate sales would still keep them very profitable. So what if the "enthusiasts" are upset with a decision Intel makes? If it keeps HP, Dell, and Lenovo happy, Intel is fine.
 
MaZa said:
What do you mean? We complained about it every single damn time Intel did this. Intel even had balls to lie about the reasons why the change of mobos was absolutely needed and people called foul on this. However, the difference is that Intel does not listen. They were too big to care about us and had a complete monopoly over the enthusiast market. We couldn't even vote with out wallets because they knew there was no choice until Ryzen started to catch up with Intel.

Kudos for AMD for actually listening, we really appreciate it.
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Yeah, you're probably right. Intel gotta Intel I guess.

I'm still pleased to see AMD respond this way.
 
Ready4Dis said:
Yay, now I'm happy and can start buying AMD parts now. They really messed up my plans and I almost started looking at an Intel build since I had to replace both MB and CPU.... Now that it's just CPU, I can commence ordering rather than waiting.
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You almost started looking at an Intel build because AMD wasn’t going to support an older generation motherboard? Intel wrote the book on not supporting older generation motherboards lol.
 
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HockeyJon said:
You almost stared looking at an Intel build because AMD wasn’t going to support an older generation motherboard? Intel wrote the book on not supporting older generation motherboards lol.
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yup. we got three series of chips and 6-7 chipsets all on socket am4 in three years. compared to new chip = new socket/chipset every year.
 
Are X570 and X550 gonna be the final chipsets for AM4? I haven't heard anything about a 6 series, but i'm trying to plan my upgrade path. Probably gonna upgrade my X370 to a 3900X (hopefully used and cheap) and give that to the lady and then get a 4000~ series with a new motherboard for myself...
 
Twisted Kidney said:
I hope people remember the high of this power the next time Intel does this exact same bullshit.

AMD wanted to do the asshole move and got called on it. Competition is great.
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I suggest people get used to the idea that AMD isn't their friend. This feels more like AMD dipping their toes in and giving their comunity a taste of things to come. Like peeling off a band-aid bit by bit instead of all in one go.
 
Aside from supposed lack of BIOS chip space .. what would limit 300 series chipset from getting the new Ryzen chips?
 
Well good. AMD was probably just trying to test the waters.....the salty salty waters.
 
Twisted Kidney said:
I hope people remember the high of this power the next time Intel does this exact same bullshit.

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

I don't think I would call it an asshole move. Imagine the PITA this is going to be.... if as it sounds BIOS support for Zen3 requires almost an entire 16mb rom chip.

There are A LOT of people running Zen+ chips with B450. I imagine the new Zen3 bioses.... are going to support Zen2/3 and that's it. Perhaps not even Zen2.

Does AMD want new bioses floating for board where if a customer flashes it with there 2600 chip there machine is a brick.
or
Where even someone that mostly knows what there doing flashes Zen 3 support.... knowing their old Zen+ chip won't work after if the flash doesn't go down right.

Its sort of a nightmare. People got winy about less then 100% perfect Zen2 support on X400s at launch. This still has the potential to be a shit show. I forsee a lot of wine when Zen 3 launches and x400 support is announced for a month or two after launch.

In my case I was expecting to drop a Zen 3 in a B450.... and I may still if Gigabyte drops a decent bios that supports it properly. If not I probably will still upgrade and my Zen 2 system will be my wives system... and her 2200g will end up as one of the kids. haha AMD is still doing a far better job vs Intel where 3 or 4 machines in the same house would be 100% completely incompatible. Its nice to know I can vulture parts out of 3 or 4 machines around the house if need be. lol
 
HockeyJon said:
You almost started looking at an Intel build because AMD wasn’t going to support an older generation motherboard? Intel wrote the book on not supporting older generation motherboards lol.
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No, it's a much longer story. My desktop is am4 ITX. I want to upgrade my desktop to zen3. I want to replace my dated server at the end of this year and put a new cpu/MB (ATX b550 most likely) in my son's desktop (and pass his 6600k CPU down to my daughter, who has a b250m MB already). My intention was to put my ryzen 1600 into a server with an ATX or EATX board for the extra slots. If I couldn't update my CPU easily, then I wasn't going to bother upgrading since x570 itx doesnt have good availability and b550 isn't even out. So I can't pass my CPU to my server. I use it for a lot of dev work as well as a Plex server, so if I have to buy a CPU+MB anyways, I could get an intel chip with QSV and not need to put in a video card. This saves me some money and a PCIE slot. This was the reason, not because AMD didn't support it, just because it could make more sense if I wasn't able to easily drop my 1600 in. Now that my b450 *should* get updated to zen3, and I will have the 1600 already and can drop in a cheap b350 or similar it's a no brainer. In all reality I probably would have still stuck with AMD anyways, but QSV for transcoding is pretty nice if I had to pay for all the parts anyways. Anywho, it wasn't the decision by AMD so much my specific situation and what my requirements are.
 
pendragon1 said:
no one knows.
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Not releasing a new chipset seems like a pretty big departure from tradition. That said, a putative x670 would have to offer big gains to get me to replace my current x570 if I buy a Zen 3 cpu.
 
1_rick said:
Not releasing a new chipset seems like a pretty big departure from tradition. That said, a putative x670 would have to offer big gains to get me to replace my current x570 if I buy a Zen 3 cpu.
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A new chipset doesn’t make sense if it doesn’t offer DDR5 and/or not requiring active cooling for the chipset.

I’m glad for my x470 purchase. No active cooling required, and the better boards have the appropriate power requirements to handle the higher wattage parts anyways. PCIE 4.0 is pretty meaningless right now as well.
 
Thats great news yay! I hope my 3800x will still have some resale value when Zen3 releases. Gonna use that money towards another 8c/16t or maybe even a 12c/24t Zen3 chip and call it a day.
 
how expensive can a 1GB bios rom space cost? is it so low just because you'll probably never need more than 16/32MB?
 
The idea that old mobos/chipsets can support newer CPU's is nice, but it is a feature that has outlived it's prime. 15 to 20 years ago, you could get a new cpu every 6 months... this kind of support made more sense and was taken advantage of by many. But these days a good build will last 5 to 7 years, and all you need to upgrade is the gpu every year or 2. 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.

Trying to extend the support of the older chipsets just adds to the engineering challenges, and AMD doesn't really have those to spare.

I think both AMD and AMD fans would be better off if they started doing it like Intel does, with a chipset for each CPU generation. Helps to achieve a stable system, something I want for my pc.

AMD has some pretty decent CPU's now, but I am still skeptical of the platform.
 
Mchart said:
A new chipset doesn’t make sense if it doesn’t offer DDR5 and/or not requiring active cooling for the chipset.

I’m glad for my x470 purchase. No active cooling required, and the better boards have the appropriate power requirements to handle the higher wattage parts anyways. PCIE 4.0 is pretty meaningless right now as well.
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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 think ASUS is the only brand that doesn't seem to offer a "passive" mode at lower chipset temperatures.
 
Ready4Dis said:
No, it's a much longer story. My desktop is am4 ITX. I want to upgrade my desktop to zen3. I want to replace my dated server at the end of this year and put a new cpu/MB (ATX b550 most likely) in my son's desktop (and pass his 6600k CPU down to my daughter, who has a b250m MB already). My intention was to put my ryzen 1600 into a server with an ATX or EATX board for the extra slots. If I couldn't update my CPU easily, then I wasn't going to bother upgrading since x570 itx doesnt have good availability and b550 isn't even out. So I can't pass my CPU to my server. I use it for a lot of dev work as well as a Plex server, so if I have to buy a CPU+MB anyways, I could get an intel chip with QSV and not need to put in a video card. This saves me some money and a PCIE slot. This was the reason, not because AMD didn't support it, just because it could make more sense if I wasn't able to easily drop my 1600 in. Now that my b450 *should* get updated to zen3, and I will have the 1600 already and can drop in a cheap b350 or similar it's a no brainer. In all reality I probably would have still stuck with AMD anyways, but QSV for transcoding is pretty nice if I had to pay for all the parts anyways. Anywho, it wasn't the decision by AMD so much my specific situation and what my requirements are.
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Ah, fair enough.
 
c3k said:
This is where a removable BIOS chip would be handy.
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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......
 
n370zed said:
Thats great news yay! I hope my 3800x will still have some resale value when Zen3 releases. Gonna use that money towards another 8c/16t or maybe even a 12c/24t Zen3 chip and call it a day.
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Considering what the costs of previous generation cpu's have been, at least initially, I would not hold my breath. Besides, why sell it when you can build another computer around it, instead? :)
 
My motherboard can flash without a chip anyway, couple of the higher end boards are built that way over have a backup bios.
 
ManofGod said:
Considering what the costs of previous generation cpu's have been, at least initially, I would not hold my breath. Besides, why sell it when you can build another computer around it, instead? :)
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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 😢.
 
Mchart said:
A new chipset doesn’t make sense if it doesn’t offer DDR5 and/or not requiring active cooling for the chipset.

I’m glad for my x470 purchase. No active cooling required, and the better boards have the appropriate power requirements to handle the higher wattage parts anyways. PCIE 4.0 is pretty meaningless right now as well.
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Lol, the only time my 570 chipset fan comes in is during a boot. That argument isn't even worth the words.
 
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