AMD says it's exploring adding Ryzen 5000 support on 300-series motherboards

[nanoguy]

Something to look forward to: If you've been contemplating buying a Ryzen 5000 series CPU but aren't too excited about the need to purchase a newer motherboard, you may be in luck. AMD is currently exploring ways to allow people with B350 and X370 motherboards to use a Zen 3 CPU, which was previously out of the question.

AMD’s CES 2022 event was packed with announcements of new hardware as well as software enhancements for existing and upcoming Ryzen and Radeon products. The company revealed a new top gaming CPU in the form of the Ryzen 7 5800X3D, as well as Ryzen 6000 mobile processors based on a Zen 3+ architecture, a new budget Radeon RX 6500 XT graphics card, Radeon Super Resolution, and more.

However, some Team Red fans are also interested in potential support for Ryzen 5000 series CPUs for older motherboards equipped with 300-series chipsets. David McAfee, who is AMD’s Corporate VP and GM of the Client Channel division, told Tom’s Hardware in a recent interview the company is currently exploring options on how to officially enable Ryzen 5000 series CPUs to work on 300-series motherboards.

McAfee explained “it's definitely something we're working through. And it's not lost on us at all that this would be a good thing to do for the community, and we're trying to figure out how to make it happen.”

However, this is likely in response to criticism received from AMD enthusiasts after the company reportedly blocked motherboard manufacturers from adding support for Ryzen 5000 series to B350 and x370 motherboards. This happened soon after some companies enabled this level of support on A320 motherboards, which aren’t particularly high-end.

AMD has been in a weird position ever since it launched its Zen 3 CPUs, as the company promised to support the AM4 ecosystem as long as possible. At the time, its plan was to only support Ryzen 5000 series CPUs on 500-series motherboards. However, it wasn’t long before it caved in to public pressure and allowed Zen 3 to be supported on B450 and X470 motherboards via BIOS updates that came with some caveats. Now it feels compelled to extend the same treatment to 300-series motherboards, mostly because it’s been criticized by a “vocal part of the community.”

To AMD’s credit, the AM4 is an old socket and it’s not easy to deal with the limited capacity of 16-megabyte SPI ROM used to store the BIOS along with the AGESA microcode for an increasing number of CPUs. And according to McAfee, the company is worried about the possibility that some 300-series motherboards may hold some Zen 3 CPUs back. Now that AMD is at least considering adding support, maybe you won’t have to resort to using bootleg x370 firmware or purchasing a newer motherboard.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/92893-amd-exploring-adding-ryzen-5000-support-300-series.html

 

[wiyosaya]

Interesting. It sounds somewhat like AMD might be listening to its customers.

 

[hahahanoobs]

AMD didn't want Zen 3 on anything but 500 series boards. Only changing their mind after massive backlash.

Now they are claiming they are looking into going all the way back to 300 series for their customers? Didn't they put a stop to mobo makers adding 300 series support when mobo makers tried this before? But now it's okay??

Meanwhile from the beginning they said they weren't Intel who only allows 1-2 years per socket. What a joke.

AMD is doing this for AMD, because those plans weren't working as well as they hoped they would. They sold everyone on how AMD wasn't Intel and AM4 would last as long as it was the newest socket available.

 

[Julio Franco]

I have been doing that for a few months now on an Asrock X370 motherboard + 5800X. Works well. I was going to say this is too late for offering this option but actually if Ryzen 5000 gets cheaper this year, you can have a painless upgrade from your old hardware for a small price (and in the process have you not switching to Intel which has competitive options this generation).

 

[Irata]

I have been doing that for a few months now on an Asrock B350 motherboard + 5800X. Works well. I was going to say this is too late for offering this option but actually if Ryzen 5000 gets cheaper this year, you can have a painless upgrade from your old hardware for a small price (and in the process have you not switching to Intel which has competitive options this generation).

Which is why this would make perfect business sense. ADL exists as an option but a cheap and easy upgrade of an existing system can be tempting.
As plus, going from e.g. a 1600x to a 5600x would result in noticeably better performance at lower power consumption.

 

[Sausagemeat]

So they are considering honorouring their original promises?

 

[Nobina]

They know people using B350 motherboards are looking to change platforms and they're probably picking Intel so this is a nice way to distract them from that and keep some of the market share.

 

[VaRmeNsI]

Bit late now unless I can get a very cheap 5000 series CPU, otherwise I'll wait for 6000 series.

 

[Mr Majestyk]

Why bother at this stage? The ship has long sailed. I wouldn't even want to use a 5000 series on my X370.

 

[GamerNerves]

The two reasons for this move are stiff competition by Alder Lake and a marketing stunt. Still, I really hope this happens so AMD can reputably say they indeed in the end kept their promise - and maybe even some customers are going to benefit from this. I would definitely like to know how many people currently use a 300 series motherboard. I guess it's a significant number in the end, though the first generation Ryzens didn't sell as much as the later ones.

It's a big day when someone upgrades from, let's say, R5 1600 to R7 5800X3D on a 300 series board. :O

 

[grvalderrama]

I'd definitely upgrade my R3600 for a 5600x. I'd actually love to see a 5600 non x cpu coming, that should be great!

 

[zamroni111]

This is to prevent 300 series owners buy alder lake.
But, motherboard manufacturers won't like it

 

[ZedRM]

I think this is a very good move by AMD. It shows that they care about their customer base and to a degree, the environment.

 

[Tantor]

This is fantastic, and just more of the excellent value goodness that you invariably get from AMD. My daughter has an nice old mini-itx x370 board. I would happily give my 5800x over to her, which would allow me to upgrade to Zen4. Nothing wrong with her x370, it should easily handle a 5800x. Presently she has a very old 2400g. Talk about a performance boost!

 

[koblongata]

Good company.

 

[nodfor]

This should have happened ages ago. B350 are not that different from b450 ...

 

[Knot Schure]

I flat out refuse to accept a bios can't be held in 16MB of ROM.

 

[hahahanoobs]

This should have happened ages ago. B350 are not that different from b450 ...

Which doesn't look good for AMD when they claim the plan all along was to keep supporting AM4 for years. How do you mess it all up with your very first Zen supported chipset?

Because 300 and 400 series boards were never meant to support Zen 3.

People think AMD is this price to perf champion by choice. I called it after Zen 2 that if Zen 3 was really good, prices would go up. They did. CPUs and [500 series] motherboards.

 

[HardReset]

Which doesn't look good for AMD when they claim the plan all along was to keep supporting AM4 for years. How do you mess it all up with your very first Zen supported chipset?

AMD promised support for AM4 at least until 2020. It's 2022 now and yet another CPU coming. Promise more than fullfilled. AMD never promised anything long term about CPU compatibility on older AM4 boards.

 

[Gimp65]

AMD didn't want Zen 3 on anything but 500 series boards. Only changing their mind after massive backlash.

Now they are claiming they are looking into going all the way back to 300 series for their customers? Didn't they put a stop to mobo makers adding 300 series support when mobo makers tried this before? But now it's okay??

Meanwhile from the beginning they said they weren't Intel who only allows 1-2 years per socket. What a joke.

AMD is doing this for AMD, because those plans weren't working as well as they hoped they would. They sold everyone on how AMD wasn't Intel and AM4 would last as long as it was the newest socket available.

And still, AM4 has been the best platform we ever had for consumers, don't forget that. And yes I agree it seems odd that they now would be considering broader CPU support for the 3xx series chipset, I totally get your point here.

 

[Danny101]

AMD made a marketing statement against Intel for only supporting a socket for 1 or 2 years. So they should keep supporting the first generation until the end of the socket even if it doesn't keep up with all the features of the new nodes. Will still benefit from the smaller nm manufacturing process.

 

[Dharan]

Interesting. It sounds somewhat like AMD might be listening to its customers.

They have to do this to boost the Ryzen 5000 sales as Intel's Alder Lake is more appealing now for new system builders. Every company is for business.. They will work for customer's benefit only if there is a profit...

 

[Crunch]

I've been holding off upgrading my 3700X to 5800X because of the Asus X370 Prime pro wasn't bestowed support. Being superior to some 400 boards, this support is long overdue.

 

[Danny101]

I've been holding off upgrading my 3700X to 5800X because of the Asus X370 Prime pro wasn't bestowed support. Being superior to some 400 boards, this support is long overdue.

I have the Prime A. I was disappointed in the VRM rating though. Something I'll pay more attention to before I purchase another motherboard,

https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/c7qj5e

VRM Table

AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4 (2019-11-07)

AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4 AM4 Vcore VRM Ratings v1.4 (2019-11-07) By Cr1318 (Reddit) Cautilus#5912 (Discord) (I don't accept random friend requests on Discord, but you can send me a question on there if you share a server with me, you can find me on the discord.gg/overclock server, otherwise...

docs.google.com

 

[Dharan]

I've been holding off upgrading my 3700X to 5800X because of the Asus X370 Prime pro wasn't bestowed support. Being superior to some 400 boards, this support is long overdue.

I hold the Asus X370 Prime Pro too... I had the MSI option when I built the system back in 2017 but chose Asus over it... I now regret that decision after seeing MSI's X370 boards now support Ryzen 5000...