Budget-friendly AMD B550 motherboards are now being listed, starting at $100

[midian182]

Highly anticipated: AMD’s partners are expected to launch the AM4 B550 motherboards on June 16. With that date drawing closer, vendors have started listing models of the upcoming mobos, which offer many of the features found in the more expensive X570 platform.

News that AMD would be axing Zen 3 support on its 400-series motherboards didn’t go down well with owners of those boards, who hoped to upgrade without having to spend extra on a new mobo. But the company later backtracked, saying that it would supply board partners with a beta BIOS for B450 and X470 motherboards that enable Zen 3 support. But those who do opt for a 500-series board will have the advantage of PCIe 4.0 and full support for Zen 3.

Other B550 improvements over its predecessor include support for up to two USB 3.1 gen2 ports, dual GPUs, and the bandwidth of the motherboard’s general-purpose PCIe lanes doubling.

While the X570 platform that launched last year does have a few advantages over B550, including increased bandwidth, most gamers are unlikely to need the extra bells and whistles, especially as they can grab the upcoming boards at more reasonable prices—starting at $100.

As is usually the case with new-chipset motherboards, each manufacturer offers several models of B550 mobos with different features and at various price points.

Asus says it has eleven new B550 boards listed on its website at the moment. Covering the ROG, TUF, and Prime families, they include PCIe 4.0 M.2 and 16x slots, WiFi 6 (on ROG boards), 2.5Gbps Ethernet, and USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C, among other features.

Gigabyte/Aorus has six boards listed. These include up to Direct 16 phases of digital power design, pre-installed I/O shields, and advanced thermal solutions.

MSI has ten B550 motherboards on its website covering its MPG, MAG, and PRO series brands. These boast “aggressive” VRM power designs (up to 21 + 2 + 1), component shielding, and aRGB interfaces.

ASRock has the choice of 12 mobos. They include the B550 Taichi as the high-end flagship, which features a 16 Phase VRM design and support for memory speeds up to 4,733 MHz.

Finally, Biostar will be selling the B550GTA—an ATX board—and the B550GTQ for those after a mATX build. Both are part of the company’s Racing series.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/85341-budget-friendly-amd-b550-motherboards-now-listed-starting.html

 

[Nobodysfool]

The designs are so eye-catching. Classic AsRock.

 

[ColdDeck]

Just launch the damn things already...I really wonder what the hold up was.

 

[Joseph Norris]

I live in the USA and I so far have found no listings for this board.

 

[Irata]

Gigabyte‘s B550 Aorus Master sounds really interesting - three x4 PCIe 4.0 nVme slots. When all are used that leaves eight PCIe 4.0 lanes for the GPU which should still be fine for the upcoming upper mid range GPU from nVidia and AMD since that‘s the same bandwidth as 16 PCIe 3 lanes.

The rest of the specs sound interesting, too. Love when a board has tons of USB ports.

Many nice board options. If I had not gone for a 2700x on special offer I‘d be slightly upset B550 was not released a few months earlier.

 

[Evernessince]

To me it looks like the B550 series are targeted at not just the mainstream but also enthusiasts judging by the board lineup. Not entirely surprising given the pricing of X570, which is really enthusiast / prosumer. $100 entry price is not cheap. AMD needs to release those A520 boards.

 

[toooooot]

I live in the USA and I so far have found no listings for this board.

June 16th

 

[JonesLaw]

Just launch the damn things already...I really wonder what the hold up was.

AMD is supposed to launch B550 on June 16th, not too far away now

 

[SG736F6]

Is AsRock any good? I've bought ASUS for my last five motherboards because I got burned a couple times on other brands. So far I've never had a single bad ASUS board. I wouldn't mind trying something else though.

 

[foxfauxfree]

Is AsRock any good? I've bought ASUS for my last five motherboards because I got burned a couple times on other brands. So far I've never had a single bad ASUS board. I wouldn't mind trying something else though.

There one of my perfered brands my prefance is in this order AsRock, MSI, ASUS, and Gigabyte
I have had a lot of good boards from these companies I had a couple of DOA B450 boards from MSI resently but had good exprence with it on my old FX chip

 

[wiyosaya]

Is AsRock any good? I've bought ASUS for my last five motherboards because I got burned a couple times on other brands. So far I've never had a single bad ASUS board. I wouldn't mind trying something else though.

I have four of their boards the newest of which is about four years old, and I have been very happy with them. I opted for a Gigabyte Aorus Elite X570 for a new build for my wife (a serious Excel user) mainly because it had features that I felt were best for her requirements. That board also seemed to get good reviews from many tech sites. I looked at AsRock for that build, and for me, they did not have the features I was looking for in that price range.

The next build I do for myself, I will consider other manufacturers, too. I have had MSI, ASUS, Tyan, Supermicro, and Gigabyte over the years. I had a bad experience with ASUS once, though I did consider them for the wife's build. I would not hesitate to recommend any of the other manufacturers.

 

[SG736F6]

Thanks for the input guys. I've been buying ASUS for a long time but I'm open to new brands, and I've always been particularly interested in ASROCK because I like their quirky boards. They tend to make stuff no one else is making from what I've seen. I remember seeing a board that supported two different types of RAM years ago. I was always impressed they were willing to come up with things like that.

If I remember way back the last before I owned before as ASUS board was a Soyo KT333... and before that, a FIC SD11. So I've been using ASUS for a long, long time.

 

[Random1]

I've had excellent luck overall with ASRock boards, but they also have pretty much lost me as a customer due to their short warranty period - one year vs. the usual three from other manufacturers. That's worth keeping in mind as you make your next decision.

 

[Shadowboxer]

Lol “Budget” B550 boards. Before Ryzen came along $350 was the top end price of a consumer CPU and the premium motherboards are the time were cheaper than these budget boards. That was only 3 years ago!

But I guess this explains why AMD now have a massive multi-billion dollar revenue. Go AMD!

 

[koblongata]

Stop those stupid decorations that serve little function, the circuit board itself look far more cool and advanced.

 

[lna2000]

The Asus web site is nearly impossible to use. Filter does not work, too many choices, difficult to compare Mboards

 

[BoboOOZ]

Is AsRock any good? I've bought ASUS for my last five motherboards because I got burned a couple times on other brands. So far I've never had a single bad ASUS board. I wouldn't mind trying something else though.

All big companies make mistakes from time to time, normally they also correct them quickly. The best idea to watch out for duds is to just wait from reviews from Steve on this site or on Hardware Unboxed before buying.

 

[wiyosaya]

I remember seeing a board that supported two different types of RAM years ago.

That sounds like a previous gen AMD cpu. Don't quote me on this, since I do not remember exactly which generation it was, but I think it was between sockets AM2+ and AM3. I believe AM2+ procs supported DDR2, and AM3 procs supported DDR3; however, if one had an AM2+ board, one was able to run either an AM2+ cpu with DDR2, or, with the requisite bios update, an AM3 cpu with DDR3.

The module pin-out between the two DRAM types is essentially the same; it was the memory controller on the CPU that made the difference. I would not be surprised if other MB makers also supported the different DRAM types for that generation of AMD cpus.

Maybe someone else has the details handy if my memory has not served me well enough.

 

[Pop Mihai Ioan]

I am tempted by an Asus ROG STRIX B550-E since I own a B450-E, but the scarcity of USB 3.0, 3.1, 3.2 is a lackluster for me. I guess those ports are very, very expensive, since MSI and Gigabyte followed the same path. It feels like the old days, when USB ports first appeared.