Discussion Next gen will be expensive whether you go X670E or Z790...

[IEC]

Zen 4 and Raptor Lake are going to be expensive at the high end.

MSI X670E Pricing

You want the "future proof" PCIe 5.0 graphics lanes *and* your PCIe 5.0 storage lanes? Don't spend all those Benjamins in one place...

PCIe 5.0 increases complexity of manufacturing (e.g. more PCB layers) which in turn increases cost. These manufacturers have seen that at the high end people are NOT price sensitive, so they will gladly use early adopters to subsidize the cost of bringing next gen products to market.

Me? Going to wait until the early adopter tax expires. Whenever the X3D chip(s) launch should allow plenty of time for the dust to settle...

 

[SteinFG]

people around the world have less and less money to spend on unnecessary stuff, we are in recession. so I think this price won't hold for long.
Manufacturers are milking fanboys with those release day prices, but they won't sell a lot.

 

[In2Photos]

people around the world have less and less money to spend on unnecessary stuff, we are in recession. so I think this price won't hold for long.
Manufacturers are milking fanboys with those release day prices, but they won't sell a lot.

I think you underestimate the spending potential of the "fanboys".

 

[fleshconsumed]

Yeah, DDR5 prices seem to be coming down faster than expected, 7950x MSRP is $100 less than 5950x, but new gen motherboard prices are nuts. I jumped on first gen zen right away since I needed more than just 4 cores and I've had some early adopters issues. Overall I don't regret it as AM4 turned out to be a great choice for me personally, but I'm not jumping the gun on AM5. I'm still on 3950x, I'll just pick up 5950x on sale and it'll provide me enough performance until AM5 figures out early adopters issues and platform prices come down.

 

[Markfw]

Zen 4 and Raptor Lake are going to be expensive at the high end.

MSI X670E Pricing

You want the "future proof" PCIe 5.0 graphics lanes *and* your PCIe 5.0 storage lanes? Don't spend all those Benjamins in one place...

PCIe 5.0 increases complexity of manufacturing (e.g. more PCB layers) which in turn increases cost. These manufacturers have seen that at the high end people are NOT price sensitive, so they will gladly use early adopters to subsidize the cost of bringing next gen products to market.

Me? Going to wait until the early adopter tax expires. Whenever the X3D chip(s) launch should allow plenty of time for the dust to settle...

For me, since I am getting the 7950x, the 2 in the middle are both reasonable.

BUT... That just MSI, what is the whole platform going to do ?

 

[fleshconsumed]

For me, since I am getting the 7950x, the 2 in the middle are both reasonable.

BUT... That just MSI, what is the whole platform going to do ?

$480 and $700 for consumer grade socket is reasonable? I still remember when everyone was aghast at $699 price tag for MSI x570 Godlike just two years ago. Since when $700 price tag has become reasonable? Asus ROG Crosshair used to top out around $400, now it's low midrange all of a sudden?

I get that PCIe5 requires more traces and more layers, but damn, that is a steep motherboard price increase.

I mean I'm fine if someone can afford to throw that kind of dough on motherboard, personally I'll wait and see if there are more affordable options/if prices come down in few years time.

 

[FangBLade]

I'm curious, who will buy z790 that doesn't have support for pcie 5.0 M2 and basically no support for future generations cpu? I think most RPL buyers will be existing ADL owners, users that build completely new platform will very likely choose AM5 with full pcie 5.0 and support for next gen cpu-s.

 

[Markfw]

$480 and $700 for consumer grade socket is reasonable? I still remember when everyone was aghast at $699 price tag for MSI x570 Godlike just two years ago. Since when $700 price tag has become reasonable? Asus ROG Crosshair used to top out around $400, now it's low midrange all of a sudden?

I get that PCIe5 requires more traces and more layers, but damn, that is a steep motherboard price increase.

I mean I'm fine if someone can afford to throw that kind of dough on motherboard, personally I'll wait and see if there are more affordable options/if prices come down in few years time.

I don't know what you consider consumer grade, but for a 7950x, if you don't get a good motherboard with good power delivery, you are wasting your money.

For the 7600x, that $289 is a little steep, but again, that is still one heck of a chip. One claim is that it can beat a 12900k in almost everything, except full MT type apps. For a $300 CPU thats great.

For anything less, a nice AM4 beat and CPU is the ticket, I am glad AMD is sticking with that for a while longer.

 

[fleshconsumed]

I don't know what you consider consumer grade, but for a 7950x, if you don't get a good motherboard with good power delivery, you are wasting your money.

Consumer grade as not server (Epyc) and not Workstation (Threadripper). AM4/5 is the lowest end socket that is currently produced, on a total hierarchy of pc hardware AM4/AM5 sockets are the lowest end sockets. They're not server socket, they're not even workstation sockets, they're consumer sockets...

 

[Markfw]

Consumer grade as not server (Epyc) and not Workstation (Threadripper). AM4/5 is the lowest end socket that is currently produced, on a total hierarchy of pc hardware AM4/AM5 sockets are the lowest end sockets. They're not server socket, they're not even workstation sockets, they're consumer sockets...

OK, so an enthusiast CPU needs an enthusiast motherboard, how about that ? You don't put a $50 motherboard on a high end PCIE5.0 fully supported DDR5 motherboard. You want a $50 motherboard ? get AM4.

You usually get what you pay for.

 

[gdansk]

Dreadful pricing. And the pages are not yet clear on memory support.
I might go Gigabyte/Aorus instead of MSI this time.

 

[CakeMonster]

I think you underestimate the spending potential of the "fanboys".

Agreed. We're just assuming there will be a financial crisis and runaway inflation, and I mean I'm not saying there won't be, but it certainly hasn't hit people properly yet.

 

[CakeMonster]

I'm still confused by the MSI site, it doesn't say much about PCIE5 support on the M2 slots, and additionally combining the x16 slots with M2 and what support you get then.

 

[In2Photos]

I'm still confused by the MSI site, it doesn't say much about PCIE5 support on the M2 slots, and additionally combining the x16 slots with M2 and what support you get then.

Got to the specifications tab. They list the PCI info on there: https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/MPG-X670E-CARBON-WIFI/Specification

 

[CakeMonster]

Cool, so 1 PCIE5 x16 GPU slot, and 2 PCIE5 M2 slots (CPU!) on that mobo. That's great. But from what I've understood there are not enough free lanes to run all those at the same time.. If so, I hope at least 1 GPU and 1 M2 drive is possible at the same time on PCIE5 with no downsides.

 

[coercitiv]

As I already mentioned in the Zen 4 thread a while ago, the cheaper MSI board in the OP is a good point of comparison versus one of the best value Z690 boards.

All I can tell is the prices will be higher than Z690 on average, and this is based on exactly one of those early listed boards, the MSI’s PRO X670-P WIFI at around $300.

When compared with the Z690-A PRO WiFi, which started out as a $220 board, the newer X670-P comes with an upgraded VRM of 14+2+1 80A stages versus 14+1+1 55A stages. The VRM cooling also loks to be improved in terms of metal mass, as does the chipset cooler. On top of that the AMD board seems to be a 7-layer PCB design, versus 6-layer on the Intel board (we need confirmation on this though). Last comes the audio part, which gets an upgrade as well.

So we have a "low cost" X670 board that is already an upgrade over the $220 board from last year, with higher BOM. On top of that we add inflation. Even if we take into consideration the "early adopter tax", I think the MSI PRO X670-P WIFI will hover around $250-270 after the price settles to a reasonable level. And as you already said, this is mostly a PCIe 4.0 board, only one M2 slot is PCIe 5.

 

[coercitiv]

Cool, so 1 PCIE5 x16 GPU slot, and 2 PCIE5 M2 slots (CPU!) on that mobo. That's great. But from what I've understood there are not enough free lanes to run all those at the same time..

We already covered this topic a month ago:

My understanding is Zen4 offers enough PCIe 5.0 lanes so that won't be an issue:

View attachment 65769

• 16 lanes for the GPU slot
• 4 lanes for an M2 drive
• 4 lanes for another M2 drive or Thunderbolt 4 / USB4
• 4 lanes for chipset (which will function at 4.0 speeds due to chipset limitations)

What we might see happen on some boards such as this will be exposing the second set of 4x PCIe 5.0 lanes from the CPU through an expansion slot, giving the user another degree of freedom towards I/O use. Other boards will offer 2 PCIe 5.0 M2 slots with independent access to CPU and call it a day.

The MSI Carbon uses the two sets of General Purpose PCIe 5.0 lanes for those 2x M2 slots, which are independent from the GPU lanes. So you get to run 1 GPU + 2 PCIe 5.0 SSDs from the CPU and also 1 PCIe 4.0 SSD from the chipset.

 

[CakeMonster]

Thanks, I guess that got lost in all the other chatter. 1xGPU+2xM2 with PCI5 will at least be one solid argument for an expensive but long lasting mobo.

 

[In2Photos]

Dropping down to the x670-P only provides 1 PCI5 m.2. All other m.2 and GPU are PCI4 or below. So that likely means that B650 will not have any PCI5.

 

[fleshconsumed]

OK, so an enthusiast CPU needs an enthusiast motherboard, how about that ? You don't put a $50 motherboard on a high end PCIE5.0 fully supported DDR5 motherboard. You want a $50 motherboard ? get AM4.

You usually get what you pay for.

Yes, you do get what you pay for. However, this feels more akin to nvidia Turing release when they raised priced because they felt they could. Yes, BoM is higher for the new gen, but it's not that much higher.

 

[maddogmcgee]

After goods and services tax I am going to be paying over 500 AUD for a mobo without PCIe 5.

5800X3d is looking better and better

 

[thigobr]

For this generation B650E will probably be the best option... Maybe when Zen5 arrives we will get Gen 5 lanes from the chipset as well? The CPUs already support a 4X Gen5 link to the chipset that's being downgraded to Gen 4 when connecting to this generation's chipset.

 

[AdamK47]

I was budgeting $500 for a high end board. Looks like I'll have to up that to $700. The MSI X670E ACE is looking good.

 

[Markfw]

I was budgeting $500 for a high end board. Looks like I'll have to up that to $700. The MSI X670E ACE is looking good.

You are getting a Zen4 ?

 

[AdamK47]

You are getting a Zen4 ?

Yes