At Computex 2022, AMD also unveiled the ecosystem for Ryzen 7000: the X670E, X670 and B650 chipsets for motherboards that accommodate 170-watt TDP CPUs. Like its predecessor AM4, the new LGA socket AM5 with 1,718 contact surfaces should also have a long service life, which is why many construction sites have been tackled and room for improvement has been left free “>AMD Ryzen switches to LGA with AM5
An LGA socket has many advantages over PGA, so the change was also inevitable for Ryzen. However, AMD is not entering unfamiliar territory, the high-end solutions Epyc for servers and Ryzen Threadripper for workstations have been using LGA for years. A better signal quality, a better supply of electrical power and thus higher efficiency are major advantages for AMD. But the socket can officially cope with more electrical power: AMD also confirmed CPUs with an official 170 watt TDP at Computex 2022 – to date, Ryzen had a TDP of 105 watts (142 watts maximum). At least previous AM4 coolers can still be used on the AM5 socket.
Three chipsets for the AM5 ecosystem
The rumor mill had already mentioned them just before the weekend, now they are also official: The new chipsets for the platform around the socket AM5. The lineup is led by the X670 Extreme (X670E), further options are the X670 and for the mainstream market the B650.
With the change from AM4 to AM5, AMD also seems to have worked on the basic platform concept, which resulted in cuts in the feature set of the chipsets, some of which are surprising. AMD is primarily advertising today with PCI Express 5.0 for storage (NVMe-SSDs), but not for graphics cards – the old platform with the current chipsets for graphics cards always offered what the CPU had to offer. This obviously won't be the case in the future – the chipset sets the tone.
-
AMD motherboard with PCIe Gen5 SSD in CrystalDiskMark (image: AMD)
Image 1 of 2
AMD- Mainboard with PCIe Gen5 SSD in CrystalDiskMark 
AMD mainboard with PCIe Gen5 SSD PCIe 5.0 also with Ryzen 7000 is only set for M.2-SSD
The only constant in all new chipsets, in combination with a Ryzen 7000 on the new AM5 boards, is the support of a PCIe 5.0 SSD in the first M.2 slot, also up to four DDR5 memory banks, up to four display outputs for the iGPU alone, 14 USB ports with up to 20 Gbit/s (USB 3.2 Gen 2) and potentially Wi-Fi 6E are standard.
AMD mainboards with a rich range of features (image: AMD) The up to 24 PCIe 5.0 lanes for storage and graphics cards mentioned for the platform only come into their own when using the processor together with the X670E chipset. Then, in addition to PCI Express 5.0 for an M.2 SSD, there is also PCI Express for the graphics card in up to two slots, as AMD explains. However, the platform does not offer two times PCIe 5.0 x16, here it is necessary to wait and see the individual solutions of the partners, the typical division into two times eight lanes is realistic. The question of who will need two PCIe 5.0 slots for graphics cards at the end of 2022 is a completely different one anyway.
Even with the X670, PCIe 5.0 for graphics cards is only “optional”, but not for mass storage, which is set for an M.2 slot after PCIe 5.0. Here, too, it should be interesting to see whether there will be cheap X670 boards in the fall that explicitly only advertise PCIe Gen 4 graphics.
AMD mainboards with the new socket AM5 and three chipsets (image: AMD) No PCIe 5.0 for graphics cards with B650
Until now, the B550 series was considered outstanding, offering almost all the features of the large solution X570, but more compact and suitable for almost every user more adequate form – PCI Express for GPUs and SSDs was not from the chipset, but directly from the Ryzen 3000/5000 CPU. With the B650, AMD is now removing PCI Express 5.0 support for graphics cards from the platform, only PCI Express 4.0 is supported on the boards – even if a Ryzen 7000 is used.
Thus, the chipset, in combination with a socket AM5 CPU, now acts as a kind of successor to the current A series, which was previously also significantly slimmed down and, as the A520, is still only PCIe 3.0 instead of 4.0 for graphics cards of the higher-end chipset models, even if the CPU could.
In the end it all becomes a question of price and what the mainboard manufacturers make of it and how they implement it. However, a lot of new circuit boards should be ready for autumn, today there are some first teasers, which mainly relate to the X670 Extreme.
AMD motherboards with the new socket AM5 (image: AMD) ComputerBase has information about this article from AMD received under NDA. The only requirement was the earliest possible publication date.