B550 release - Motherboard manufacturer are taking VRM seriously!

[GoodBytes]

5 hours ago, Nicnac said:

Sweet! Finally there are mATX boards with two full size x16 slots for AMD!

Yea. Every board "generation" I am noticing motherboard manufacture putting more and more effort in them. If AMD can continue its winning streak in not only performance but growing popularity in the DIY space, it will reach Intel level of care. Depending on the manufacture, I think it has reached that level or is just a hair bellow, assuming that no new boards are announced.

[Nicnac]

4 minutes ago, GoodBytes said:

Yea. Every board "generation" I am noticing motherboard manufacture putting more and more effort in them. If AMD can continue its winning streak in not only performance but growing popularity in the DIY space, it will reach Intel level of care. Depending on the manufacture, I think it has reached that level or is just a hair bellow, assuming that no new boards are announced.

I just looked into the new board closer and am even more hyped for the one that supports SLI. not because SLI but the ability to split lanes into two 8x slots. Can't believe it took them until now. with pcie 4.0 that will make a sweet folding platform as well.

[GoodBytes]

3 hours ago, paddy-stone said:

I might not bother with a new mobo now 'til they have ddr5/ddr6 and USB 4 (some say ddr5 might be skipped as ddr6 is getting close, but who knows). Imagine having 2/4 or more USB 4.0 ports that could in effect carry serious bandwidth from a USB 4 hub with all your peripherals plugged in, leaving the remaining USB 4 ports for data transfer/USB C alt modes.

Yea I don't know... I suspect that the first motherboards with USB 4, will have exactly 1x USB 4.0 port. That is pretty much the case with past USB ports. Heck, only a hand full of boards have USB 3 - 40Gpbs. We barely have any motherboard with front USB Type-C connector (20-it connector, aka: Type-F) for 10GBps USB. You are very lucky to have 1 on the back and the Type-F connector for 1 of them at the front.

 

Instead, I see, graphics cards delivering USB 4.0 instead. Why?

• GPUs are already on PCI-E 16x directly connected to the CPU for absolute max performance.
• GPUs aren't even using PCI-E 3.0 16x to its full potential (not even close). They are a lot of bandwidth is available, especially now with PCI-E 4.0.
• GPUs that have additional power connectors already, are ready for sharing the USB 4 high power deliver feature, especially those with 2x power connectors, as often times the second one is used only for stability reasons or just needs a tad more power if the GPU is under max load.
• Graphics cards, well, do graphics, so it is the only clean and easy way to have video out from USB 4.0.
• Graphics cards already have an audio chips for HDMI and DisplayPort audio support. So they are ready for audio out on USB 4.0 already.
• We know that USB 4.0 can switch to DisplayPort mode, so that means that a simple adapter (which I expect to see in the box with these new graphics cards) can be used to convert to DisplayPort, HDMI and single-link DVI. So I suspect that such GPUs will have 2 or 3 USB Type-C on the back (USB 4.0 of course), and maybe 1x dual Link-DVI for backwards compatibility, as DisplayPort can't do dual link DVI. You can only convert DisplayPort to Dual Link DVI via an active adapter, which aren't cheap to include in the box.

 

[paddy-stone]

18 minutes ago, GoodBytes said:

Yea I don't know... I suspect that the first motherboards with USB 4, will have exactly 1x USB 4.0 port. That is pretty much the case with past USB ports. Heck, only a hand full of boards have USB 3 - 40Gpbs. We barely have any motherboard with front USB Type-C connector (20-it connector, aka: Type-F) for 10GBps USB. You are very lucky to have 1 on the back and the Type-F connector for 1 of them at the front.

 

Instead, I see, graphics cards delivering USB 4.0 instead. Why?

• GPUs are already on PCI-E 16x directly connected to the CPU for absolute max performance.
• GPUs aren't even using PCI-E 3.0 16x to any anything near... lots of bandwidth is available... and now with PCI-E 4.0, there is massive amount of room.
• GPUs have additional power connectors already, ready for sharing this for high power deliver to USB 4.0. ALL GPUs today, with 2x GPU 6/8-pin connector is more used for stability or just needs a tad more power under absolute max load that a single connector can't deliver.
• Graphics cards, well, do graphics, so it is the only clean way to have video out from USB 4.0.
• Graphics cards already have audio chips for HDMI and DisplayPort audio support. So they are ready for audio out on USB 4.0 already.
• We know that USB 4.0 can switch to a DisplayPort, so that means that simple adapter (which I expect to see in the box with these new GPUs) can be used to convert to DisplayPort, HDMI and single-link DVI. So I suspect that such GPUs will have 2 or 3 USB Type-C on the back (USB 4.0 of course), and maybe 1x dual Link-DVI for backwards compatibility, as DisplayPort can't do dual link DVI. It needs an active adapter (which aren't cheap to include in the box).

 

Yeah, good points actually. Would be nice though, in a perfect world

 

Even 1 USB 4.0 port would be great to have, much less cabling mess if combined with a USB 4 HUB that'd split it into USB type A ports, and say a USB 3.2 type C at full speed... still should be plenty of bandwidth. That would definitely make desktops less cluttered anyway, if things could get all get plugged into the HUB instead... then just the one USB type C cable from PC to hub.

I'm thinking that if they used 4x pcie 4.0 lanes for roughly 8GB/s that should be plenty for a hub use, even using USB 3.2x2 type C at roughly 5GB/s max, should be plenty for other USB devices like mouse/keyb etc. And it's not like you'd be using the USB 3.2 at max all the time either.

That I'd like to see anyway, a neat solution to cabling for almost the entire PC, 1 cable to a HUB, 1 to the display.

[Doobeedoo]

They are really very good boards. Also a broad range and feature set, some even overlap with X570 ones in that regard. So it will depend on user which specific features and ports will be more valuable. But a ton of choice. 

[porina]

3 hours ago, GoodBytes said:

• GPUs aren't even using PCI-E 3.0 16x to its full potential (not even close). They are a lot of bandwidth is available, especially now with PCI-E 4.0.

While I don't disagree with the potential to deliver USB 4.0, there's one use case where this is not so clear cut. In observing some compute workloads, the bus utilisation is a good proportion e.g. 50%. This is on PCIe 3.0 16x. While still not at saturation, we shouldn't assume all workloads don't need such dedicated bandwidth.

 

It is interesting we kinda have some precedent in the idea of providing USB on GPU. I forget the name, whatever the VR link combining video and USB you find on nvidia GPUs. Does anyone use it? I have no idea, but that could be a simple upgrade to USB 4 in a future generation.

[GoodBytes]

Just now, porina said:

While I don't disagree with the potential to deliver USB 4.0, there's one use case where this is not so clear cut. In observing some compute workloads, the bus utilisation is a good proportion e.g. 50%. This is on PCIe 3.0 16x. While still not at saturation, we shouldn't assume all workloads don't need such dedicated bandwidth.

 

It is interesting we kinda have some precedent in the idea of providing USB on GPU. I forget the name, whatever the VR link combining video and USB you find on nvidia GPUs. Does anyone use it? I have no idea, but that could be a simple upgrade to USB 4 in a future generation.

The new GPUs will be on PCI-E 4.0 by the time USB 4.0 is actually out. Personally, I don't expect Nvidia new GPUs at the end of the year to even have USB ports of any kind. Maybe the highest end model has USB Type-C for VR and that one person with a monitor with it (which probably he uses with his laptop), and it won't be USB 4.0. USB 4.0 is more for the following release of GPUs.

 

So your workload, assuming nothing changes beside a new GPU on PCI-E 4.0, will be now around 25% (assuming no performance differences between old and new GPU) thanks to the doubling bandwidth of PCI-E 4.0 (31.5 GB/s) over 3.0 (15.75 GB/s)

[porina]

41 minutes ago, GoodBytes said:

So your workload, assuming nothing changes beside a new GPU on PCI-E 4.0, will be now around 25% (assuming no performance differences between old and new GPU) thanks to the doubling bandwidth of PCI-E 4.0 (31.5 GB/s) over 3.0 (15.75 GB/s)

Since my main interests remain CPU workloads, the GPU load is not one I characterised in detail. It may well be that if next gen GPUs bring with them an increase in compute capability, that'll drive up the IO usage also. It may be a balancing point which increases faster.

[kpluck]

Quote

B550 release - Motherboard manufacturer are taking VRM seriously!

 

And just think, it 4-6 months we may actually be able to buy one! 

 

-kp

[dfsgsfa]

hang on

asrock still have some b550 to be released on 19th

[SpaceGhostC2C]

12 hours ago, TheDankKoosh said:

So what you're saying is that the B550 Aorus Master is a step in the wrong direction even with nearly the exact same feature set as the X570 version for over $100 less? 

Words not in my post:

- Aorus

- Master

- Gigabyte

What I'm saying is in my post. Use yours for what you are saying

[TheDankKoosh]

3 hours ago, SpaceGhostC2C said:

Words not in my post:

- Aorus

- Master

- Gigabyte

What I'm saying is in my post. Use yours for what you are saying

I'm inferring what you have said by your own words, you said that the b550 lineup was bad, I gave a counterpoint, simple.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

Just now, TheDankKoosh said:

 you said that the b550 lineup was bad

I definitely didn't say "the B550 lineup is bad".

I think this conversation has run its course.

[TheDankKoosh]

18 minutes ago, SpaceGhostC2C said:

I definitely didn't say "the B550 lineup is bad".

I think this conversation has run its course.

To quote you directly "B550 motherboards at X399 prices isn't exactly progress" even though the highest end b550 boards are only reaching price parity with super low end x399 boards that are barely capable of driving a 16 core. Meanwhile something like the b550 aorus master that I mentioned before could easily drive a 3970x and has a great feature set to boot. You argued that the pricing was bad even with the feature set that some of these boards are providing compared to older hardware, which I find to be disingenuous; I argued back, so if you want to be in an echo chamber, then I'll leave you to it, but not before making my point and giving out the information that people should consider when looking at these boards. 

[Mamonos]

This board looks astonishing to be honest

 

Gigabyte B550 Vision D