AMD Announces X300 and X370 AM4 Motherboards For Ryzen, All CPUs Unlocked (hothardware.com) 71
MojoKid writes: AMD has a lot riding on Ryzen, its new generation CPU architecture that is supposed to return the chip designer to a competitive position versus Intel in the high-end desktop X86 processor market. Late last week, at CES 2017, AMD has lined up over a dozen high-performance AM4 motherboards from five hardware partners, including ASRock, ASUS, Biostar, Gigabyte, and MSI. All AM4 motherboards are built around one of two desktop chipsets for Ryzen, the AMD X370 or X300. Motherboards based on the X370 chipset are intended for power users and gamers. These boards bring more robust overclocking controls and support for dual graphics cards, along with more I/O connectivity and dual-channel DDR4 memory support. The X300 is AMD's chipset for mini-ITX motherboards for small form factor (SFF) system platforms. The X300 also supports dual-channel DDR4 memory, PCIe 3.0, M.2 SATA devices, NVMe, and USB 3.1 Gen 1 and Gen 1. Finally, AMD representatives on hand at CES also reported that all Ryzen processors will be multiplier unlocked, hopefully for some rather flexible overclocking options. There will also be several processors in the family, with varying core counts depending on SKU, at launch.
No surprise (Score:2, Insightful)
Nothing surprising here. Its not about the motherboard for ryzen, its all about the new CPU architecture and until we see benchmarks, there's Nothing To See Here.
Re:No surprise (Score:4, Insightful)
That depends entirely on what benchmark you're looking at.
If you're goal is to play GooSplatter 2017 at 3840x2160@144Hz, then staring at a benchmark that reports the frame rate of GooSplatter 2017's rendering engine, with representative scenes from the game is an entirely reasonable thing to do.
Don't assume that all people staring at benchmarks don't understand what each test is actually measuring.
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"Benchmarks" are a marketing device written in no small part by Intel or people directly depending on them, no more and no less. Drooling fanboys love them because they give simple numbers which usually confirms all their biases - which is their entire purpose - while sane people avoid them like the plague or write their own which tests for their own specific needs. OP does not appear to belong to the latter category.
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WTF? How do you decide which graphics card to buy? Let me guess, you just look at the tech specs and your massive brain can work out how well a particular game will run taking the bus size/frequency/no. of texture units etc. etc. into account?
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You can stick a nvidia card on it, and relive the early, early days of 3D, where it was optimal to either use an AMD CPU + Nvidia card or intel + 3Dfx card, because the nvidia drivers were optimized with the 3Dnow, while the 3Dfx drivers relied on the FPU.
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And will they support ECC-RAM? My current System with a Phenom II does, and I really don't want to go back to RAM without ECC.
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There are other chipsets for AM4 boards (Score:3, Informative)
"All AM4 motherboards are built around one of two desktop chipsets for Ryzen, the AMD X370 or X300."
That's wrong. If you look at the article the most common chipset will probably be the B350. The X370 is for "enthusiasts" who want to use multiple graphics cards.
Re:There are other chipsets for AM4 boards (Score:4, Informative)
But the same original article stated it verbatim: "All 16 AM4 motherboards that are on tap are built around two desktop chipsts for Ryzen, X370 and X300." so OP has an excuse for being mislead (he did omit the "on tap" part though).
My interpretation is that what they meant by "on tap" is what was being displayed at CES. OP failed to quote an important part, but at the same time, what they display at CES is likely what's coming to market first (it's what they prototyped easier), so if the market starts with those 2 chipsets, you will likely see them first on retail.
I also believe that, unlike Intel's chips and chipsets, you will see more of the enthusiast stuff from AMD's CPU in the wild simply because the target market is gonna be the cost-saving enthusiast, so you will either have the "cheap-o gaming rig" type enthusiasts going for the x350 or the the "small gaming rig " type enthusiasts for the x300. You will rarely see the IT admin type going for the stable, "unoverclockable" B350 - those guys will still favor Intel for some years, they favor stability that goes beyond the first batch of reviews. I'm guessing the B350 is more for pre-built, run-off-the-mill, low-cost machines from OEMs like Dell, HP, Asus and whatnot. These sell a lot but they also make pay less to individual parts makers (margins go mostly to the assembler OEM). A good example is AMD having the golden share of the latest gen console CPU/GPU (both xbox one and ps4 sport AMD chips all around), yet Intel AND Nvidia both are miles ahead of profit from single part sales (notebook hegemony also helps).
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If you continued reading after stepping into the murky phrase "on tap", you've become so fixated on tracking prey that you've loss all sense of chivalry.
These are not the tea leaves you're looking for.
The correct response is to step back, throw your cape over the sticky filth to protect the innocence, thence to spend a calm half hour working your power squats, while chewing a grass stem and scraping the crud out of your
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As a non-native english speaker, I have trouble understanding stuff like "on tap" so I might sound stupid over-analyzing it. SORRY
About the tracking prey argument, tea leave, and the innocent filth-proof cape, I honestly have no fucking idea what you're talking about. If it's some sort of fallacy, I should mention that the last time I studied "hard" philosophy was some good 12 years ago. If it's not the case, its also good to note that, since Real Life (tm) caught up to me, my depths-of-the-web dictionary p
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wait what? Nobody in the consumer business needs ECC RAM for any reason other than bragging rights or outright need to burn money...
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As you can see, this AMD Zen/Ryzen will be pointless without support for ECC memory.
http://ark.intel.com/Search/Advanced?s=t&RetailSkuAvailable=true&FilterCurrentProducts=true&ECCMemory=true&VTD=true&AESTech=true
There is a reason why ECC is becoming more prevalent across processor lines.
What that list does not show is the chipset requirements. Intel is very careful to implement market segmentation by allowing ECC only on low performance processors or Xeon processors and in all cases, they require a "server" chipset like the C series for ECC to be enabled.
So the only Intel processors and motherboards an AMD ECC system would need to compete with are Xeon E3 with socket LGA1150 and Core i3 with LGA1151 and the Intel systems will be more expensive.
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The X370 is for "enthusiasts" who want to use multiple graphics cards.
Altcoin miners.
Just unlocked CPU multipliers... (Score:4, Interesting)
Or unlocked/unsigned management processors as well?
I don't know about you, but the latter is reason enough for me to pass on new AMD processors in the post AM3+ generation.
Does anyone else feel the same way?
Given that a probable method for disable is available for Intel ME hardware today (although not for GPU and other cores in the newest chips), newer Intel chips make slightly more sense than AMD's versions without full audits of both.
For the non-sheeple, none of the current-gen desktop-competitive processors that cost less than a used car are available without some form of potential DRM or system compromise. Is that really what you want in a central and overly relied upon part of your life?
Re:Just unlocked CPU multipliers... (Score:5, Informative)
I applaud your criticism of management co-processors (Intel vPro, Intel ME, Intel AMT, AMD PSP) as while they may have a place in the enterprise world (assuming those IT techs can secure them properly) they are an anathema to home users. I don't support the idea that we all have to be lumped with these back-doors to our systems and believe we should all be able to either choose CPUs that lack them, or disable them entirely (motherboard jumper anyone?) as we wish. Of course I'm voting with my wallet, but the options are shrinking year by year...
Can you expand on why you think Intel is the lesser of two evils here?
For those unsure of what this is about, there is a discussion here [slashdot.org] and some really good info here [libreboot.org]. But look out for Leah Rowe at that last link: that bitch be crazy [libreboot.org]!! [Citation [zammit.org]]
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"the handful of us (who are too time-poor to maintain libreboot) a.k.a the *actual* libreboot community"
If you can't and won't maintain the package, you are not the *actual* libreboot community. That last link is merely the flip side of the problem that the linked material is complaining about -- a person, at best formerly involved in the project, pretending that they speak for a larger community, but unwilling to *actually* do anything about the problem.
Re:Just unlocked CPU multipliers... (Score:4, Insightful)
and believe we should all be able to either choose CPUs that lack them, or disable them entirely (motherboard jumper anyone?) as we wish.
If anyone can enable it via malware, they've already totally rooted your PC. If there is a secret NSA knock from the outside, it'll just ignore the jumper. Even if you buy one of the CPUs that lack this feature, you don't really know if Intel has fused it off. If they reuse design blocks it's quite possible entire product lines that don't offer that functionality have it anyway. If you're that paranoid maybe the easiest is a to use a third party NIC? Install a hardware firewall to monitor your connection? Personally I think a hack like that would be way too valuable a secret to risk exposing by going after consumers. There's probably a ton of military, big industry and infrastructure servers that run Intel and full, virtually undiscoverable backdoor access to that would be an espionage gold mine.
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He already has. IME has a flaw that can allow an enterprising hacker to completely disable it. No work around for AMD has been found.
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On intel's side, at least, In order to use AMT/vPro you need both an enabled processor *AND* an enabled chipset. Most intel chipsets (as in everything but the high end and maybe one level below) don't support vPro. Most "K" i7/i5 also don't. Many i3 don't. Most (all?) pentiums/celerons don't. So if you're not confortable with vPro all you have to do is play around with intel ARK and select a CPU+chipset combination that doesn't support it.
Or if you MUST have that shiny new processor and motherboard and don'
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Some of it's true, some of it's crazy rumors.
With a compatible motherboard/chipset and the correct secret key and access to your network, someone can manage your computer remotely over any built-in networking option supported by the chipset, and by manage, we mean turn it on and off, read/write to the drives, install drivers or operating systems, wipe the system and so on. This is the documented feature set for vPro and is the selling point for it for enterprise networks. I believe AMD's Secure Management
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Given that a probable method for disable is available for Intel ME hardware today
Probable? So you're just spreading FUD here, huh? Since you have no substantive difference to offer?
For the non-sheeple, none of the current-gen desktop-competitive processors that cost less than a used car are available without some form of potential DRM or system compromise. Is that really what you want in a central and overly relied upon part of your life?
I don't see how you get to call sheeple when there's no real choice. When was the last time any of us were offered any system without substantial security compromises, for any money?
Not clear enough (Score:4, Funny)
Not clear to me whether it supports USB 3.1 Gen 1 or USB 3.1 Gen 1
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Not clear enough...
Me, too!
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It's actually a direct quote from the article that way. As a direct cut and paste:
The X300 is no exception—like the X370, the X300 supports dual-channel DDR4 memory, PCIe 3.0, M.2 SATA devices, NVMe, and USB 3.1 Gen 1 and Gen 1.
Read more at http://hothardware.com/news/am... [hothardware.com]
What's funny is the link wasn't even part in the selection that I cut; which means that the article page has javascript that inserts additional text to the clipboard. It actually requires looking at AMD's [amd.com] page to realize for certain that they mean to say USB 3.1 Gen 1 and Gen 2. Perhaps what should have been added is an [sic] tag after the line to indicate that this piece of quality writing is on Paul Lilly's and HotHardware
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Yes, yes it does.
USB 3.1 Gen 1 and Gen 1? (Score:1)
Seems redundant, much like this comment.
Power! (Score:2)
Will they still be power hogs like that 220 watt behemoth currently in production?
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According to http://wccftech.com/amd-am4-opga-socket-1331 [wccftech.com] the use of the OPGA 1331 pin socket supports processors with a TDP of up to 140 watts.
However, it is claimed http://wccftech.com/amd-zen-8-core-4-core-cpus-leaked/ [wccftech.com] that the 8 core Ryzen processor will have a TDP of 95 watts while the 4 core variant will have a TDP of 65 watts.
There are reports http://wccftech.com/ryzen-ces-2017-3-6-ghz-base-clock-f4-stepping-4-0-ghz/ [wccftech.com] that an Ryzen 8 core processor shown at CES was clocked at 3.6 GHz with the ability
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Will they still be power hogs like that 220 watt behemoth currently in production?
According to AMD it will be 90 watts :-) FYI the i7 from Intel is 120 watts. Looks like AMD might be quite competitive if rumors are true for the first time since 2002
Hooray! New stuff for people like me (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Hooray! New stuff for people like me (Score:4, Informative)
My favorite part is how Intel CPU prices "magically" drop in price whenever AMD releases a new CPU.
Any one have an block map / pci-e lane layout? (Score:2)
Any one have an block map / pci-e lane layout?
I know I'm not alone... (Score:5, Interesting)
...but when I hear of new technology in this arena, I don't really think "Ooh Dual Channel DDR400!" or "Finally USB 3.1!" or whatever.
I just want to get my hands on some of this stuff and build a new system with it. Or several.
I don't even need to replace any of my current computers. I just love building them, and getting to build stuff with new components (be they AMD- or Intel-based) is just fun.
The last system I built was my gaming rig, and it's the most powerful machine I've ever made. As soon as it was up and running I wanted to sell it so I could use the money to build another one.
Kinda wish I could do that for a living, really, but the market for Artisanal Hand-Crafted Desktops is kind of rough ):
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I actually don't build a completely new system so that I can do some smaller upgrades every year.
That's been my strategy. The problem with it is that motherboards change every 3 CPU generations or so, and generally memory tech every 2nd motherboard generation or so as well. What that means is that by the time CPU's have advanced far enough that I'll get notable improvement from upgrading mine, I also have to replace the motherboard, and likely all the RAM.
Sure, there are important parts to a PC aside from those 3. But really they are the heart of it. And that's about $300 (assuming you cheap out, and
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I've designed some machines that would run well over $10K... I'd loooove someone to pay me to build them...
Actually there's 5 chipsets (Score:3)
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The summary is basically a lie. There's the X370, B350, A320, X300, and A300 chipsets. By the way, is anyone else concerned about the 8 lanes of PCI-E? Intel Z170 has 16-20 if I remember correctly.
Most probably the CPU will host the main GPU at x16, and the mobo chipset the second one at x8
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How about MVS ? (Score:2)