AM4 motherboards with SFF chipset? (X300, B300, etc)

[cbn]

Are these coming? Anytime soon?

 

[Diagrafeas]

Why do you need a chipset with Ryzen at the first place?

 

[Jimie]

X370, B350, A320 all are out for awhile if thats what you're asking

 

[cbn]

X370, B350, A320 all are out for awhile if thats what you're asking

These are different:

Some slides show a B300 also:

 

[Jimie]

my bad

 

[cbn]

Maybe there will be a name change to X400 and B400 now that X470 and B450 are arriving next month?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Maybe AMD is afraid that if they release those "chipset-less chipsets", that ... their chipset sales will go down, because people won't really need much of a chipset, except for enthusiast boards.

Or maybe they're already selling them to OEMs?

I don't know. It is rather is mystery, where those chipsets are.

 

[cbn]

Maybe AMD is afraid that if they release those "chipset-less chipsets", that ... their chipset sales will go down, because people won't really need much of a chipset, except for enthusiast boards.

Or maybe they're already selling them to OEMs?

I don't know. It is rather is mystery, where those chipsets are.

Well in some ways X300/B300 (or X400/B400) is higher performance in that it allows two PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs while allowing PCIe 3.0 x 16. (X300 (X400?) can also allow three PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs if the PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 with one used by a PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD)

In contrast, X370 can only allow two PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSDs if PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split up into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 (with one of the PCIe 3.0 x 8 used by the PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD).

 

[cbn]

I found out the B300 actually does exist.

It is being used in a SFF Lenovo desktop:

http://psref.lenovo.com/syspool/Sys/PDF/ThinkCentre/ThinkCentre M715q Tiny/M715q Tiny.pdf

 

[EXCellR8]

yea, just stripped down chipsets for run-of-the-mill OEM PC's with minimum expandability. no surprise there.

 

[cbn]

One reason I am interested in B300 and X300 is because there isn't a good selection of Mini-ITX boards for AM4 (also see my comments in post #8 on potential performance improvements that could be had via the X300 and B300 over the X370 and the B350).

Also these chipsets (X300, B300) would be good for PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe + Thunderbolt III (The Titan Ridge controller would get the lanes that normally go to the chipset on X370 and B350).

 

[Insert_Nickname]

yea, just stripped down chipsets for run-of-the-mill OEM PC's with minimum expandability. no surprise there.

There is nothing stripped down. The X/B300 "chipset" is integral to Ryzen. Its a full-on SoC. It doesn't need an additional "chipset" as such, because those functions are already integrated.

Ryzen "chipsets" are nothing more then glorified I/O breakout boxes. The additional "chipset" is just a PCIe 3.0 x4 SATA3 and 10Gbit USB3.1 on-board controller which happens to provide a PCIe splitter for additional lanes.

This means from an architecture point of view, AMD is actually ahead of Intel, since Intels big cores require an external PCH to provide critical functions. Ryzen does not require an additional PCH/FCH. Intel do provide full x86 SoCs but they're limited to Atom derivatives.

 

[Veradun]

I wonder why they all use a "chipset" at all.

Looking especially at Raven Ridge for mobile and the fact you don't really need the PCIe demux to support more USB ports than the four already exposed by the SoC. You glue in a (W)LAN chip and you are done with even less power consumption. Meh.

 

[cbn]

Although I mentioned X300 and B300 for higher performance earlier in the thread, a B300 would also be good for the new 35W 2C/4T Athlon 200GE APU:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/1281...s-exist-amd-athlon-200ge-and-athlon-pro-200ge

(NOTE: Would very much like to see X300 or B300 compatible with AMD StoreMI*. If not X300/B300 then maybe a new X400/B400 for AMD StoreMI?)

*Very interested to see how StoreMI handles paging out (for internet browsing) with either Optane and NAND (as fast tier).

P.S. Would also like a 65W 2C/4T with a larger iGPU (maybe this will happen when AMD perfects getting all the quad core APUs on BGA mobile? 35W APUs in laptops)

 

[VirtualLarry]

I'd love to see an "Integrated" ITX board, with B300 / X300, and that 200GE Ryzen APU, all together on one board, just add RAM and a SATA SSD or whatnot. (Or maybe M.2 PCI-E, if there's room on the back?)

 

[Veradun]

They should definitely add GbE to the SoC, that way SFF could very well be done without a chipset at all

 

[Insert_Nickname]

They should definitely add GbE to the SoC, that way SFF could very well be done without a chipset at all

?

Chipset is already there.

Just hook up a GbE chip to PCIe and you're done. Or if one was being creative about it, use a USB3-to-GbE chip onboard.

 

[PingSpike]

Well in some ways X300/B300 (or X400/B400) is higher performance in that it allows two PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs while allowing PCIe 3.0 x 16. (X300 (X400?) can also allow three PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs if the PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 with one used by a PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD)

In contrast, X370 can only allow two PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSDs if PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split up into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 (with one of the PCIe 3.0 x 8 used by the PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD).

I'm a little confused.

My understanding was Ryzen has 24 cpu pci-e 3.0 lanes.

On x370/x470 16x goes to one more more GPU slots, 4x goes to a 3.0 M.2 slot and the remaining 4x feed the chipset which typically shows up as some additional 3.1 USB ports, 1x PCI-e slots, SATA controller and often a M.2 PCI-e 2.0 slot.

But Ryzen is also a SoC design, having at least one onboard USB controller and SATA controller which are directly attached to the CPU, possibly some other things I'm forgetting.

The only board with two 3.0 m.2 slots I'm aware of is the crosshair 7, which gets the second slot by taking bandwidth from one of the gpu slots. So its 8x GPU, 4x GPU and 4x for second M.2 slot.

The SFF chipsets don't have any extra bandwidth, but I guess you're just saying that since they have no chipset the chipset lanes can now be used as an exclusive M.2 slot.

I saw today there's cards out though that combined with bifrucation support can slice up the 16x slot into 4 m.2 ports. There's also ones that use a bridge chip that don't require bifrucation.

-----------------

Anyway, the main reason I haven't updated to Ryzen yet is the chipset doesn't do IOMMU group separation. I was hoping they would fix it with the 400 series but it looks like all they really did was die shrink the 300 series and the issue remains.

I'm sort of interesting in this topic because if they threw the chipset away and just hooked 1x pci-e slots directly through the DMI (or whatever AMD calls them) interface the groups would work fine.

 

[Veradun]

?

Chipset is already there.

Just hook up a GbE chip to PCIe and you're done. Or if one was being creative about it, use a USB3-to-GbE chip onboard.

I know you can bridge anything, the point is NOT doing it and having everything needed on the SoC.

 

[cbn]

Well in some ways X300/B300 (or X400/B400) is higher performance in that it allows two PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs while allowing PCIe 3.0 x 16. (X300 (X400?) can also allow three PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe SSDs if the PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 with one used by a PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD)

In contrast, X370 can only allow two PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSDs if PCIe 3.0 x 16 is split up into two PCIe 3.0 x 8 (with one of the PCIe 3.0 x 8 used by the PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSD).

I'm a little confused.

My understanding was Ryzen has 24 cpu pci-e 3.0 lanes.

On x370/x470 16x goes to one more more GPU slots, 4x goes to a 3.0 M.2 slot and the remaining 4x feed the chipset which typically shows up as some additional 3.1 USB ports, 1x PCI-e slots, SATA controller and often a M.2 PCI-e 2.0 slot.

But Ryzen is also a SoC design, having at least one onboard USB controller and SATA controller which are directly attached to the CPU, possibly some other things I'm forgetting.

The only board with two 3.0 m.2 slots I'm aware of is the crosshair 7, which gets the second slot by taking bandwidth from one of the gpu slots. So its 8x GPU, 4x GPU and 4x for second M.2 slot.

My example for X370 and X300 didn't factor in bifurcation support in the second PCIe 3.0 x 8.

With that noted, I would really like to see that happen. (Then that slot could use two PCIe 3.0 x 4 NVMe SSDs rather than one).

As a matter of fact, even better (in some cases) would be a PCIe 3.0 x 16 slot with 4x PCIe 3.0 x4 bifurcation. Then use PCIe 3.0 x 4 (open ended) for GPU and the last PCIe 3.0 x4 either for Thunderbolt III or PCIe 3.0 x 2 + 2 x SATA.

The SFF chipsets don't have any extra bandwidth, but I guess you're just saying that since they have no chipset the chipset lanes can now be used as an exclusive M.2 slot.

Yes.

Thunderbolt III is another option.

I saw today there's cards out though that combined with bifrucation support can slice up the 16x slot into 4 m.2 ports.

Yep, and those are becoming fairly common....

Here is the ASRock card.

But ASUS, Gigabyte and MSI have their own version as well.

 

[cbn]

I'd love to see an "Integrated" ITX board, with B300 / X300, and that 200GE Ryzen APU, all together on one board, just add RAM and a SATA SSD or whatnot. (Or maybe M.2 PCI-E, if there's room on the back?)

I like the idea and since there is no chipset I'll bet a single M.2 slot would fit the front without crowding the board.

P.S. Any ideas of what enclosure you would use?

 

[cbn]

DIMM.2 looks like something that would work well with these boards:

https://www.bit-tech.net/reviews/tech/motherboards/asus-rog-zenith-extreme/1/

The other two ports come courtesy of a DIMM.2 riser card that uses a ninth DIMM-like slot on the right of the board to provide two fully fledged PCIe x3 M.2 slots as well as fans for better cooling. We think this is a great idea as it not only looks better than the hideous vertical arrangements we've seen that have the SSD standing up like a skyscraper, but it's also likely they've benefit more from your case or cooler's airflow too. The module makes it much easier to get at the SSDs too and clips in place just like a memory module would.