"Future proofness" of AM4 chipsets?

I’ve read at various places AMD stated they will support the AM4 socket at least until 2020.
I wonder if it is worth to get a X470 based board instead of a B350 now - even though I have no use for the extra features of the X470 over the B350 - just to be able to update the CPU in ~2 years.
Is there any quote on the chipset support for the CPUs to come?
Will Zen 3 or what ever is the last architecture for the AM4 socket will be supported by current A320, B350 and X[3|4]70 chipsets?
Given the manufacturer will update the bios and the board supports the power requirements of the CPU to come of course.

I think I have heard Lisa Su saying that AM4 is “our platform at least until 2020”.
I don’t think anyone outside of AMD knows if Zen1 chipsets are even gonna work at all for Zen3.

Look at what CPU and RAM you want to run and what kind of VRM design you need for that.
Also look at what company you trust to deliver good UEFI updates.
B350/X370/X470 doesn’t mean that much.

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Well ryzen plus is an example. Heres a better question. Do you want to buy a new processorband motherboard alternating 6 months?

I would imagine that AMD has some kind of contracts with the MB manufacturers that they have to at least support the new CPUs on the older boards/chipsets when they require it, even if there are no new features to come for the old boards.

realistically you don’t update the cpu, you update stuff like drives and other pcie connected things, so imo thats where the future compatibility matters

Now x470 is out, i would not buy any other Ryzen chipset.

Why?

XFR2 support is only in X470. Which means better performance, and really in terms of total BOM cost for a new system, the additional cost of an x470 board vs. B350 or X370 is what… 10%? Less? Unless you’re building a very low cost system based on say, an AM4 APU or R3… AND maybe re-using a bunch of components from a previous build, the total cost for the build won’t be massively different.

Plus the new StoreMI feature could save you money on getting a smaller SSD and pairing it with a hard drive for seamless bulk storage.

AMD have said “Socket AM4” is to be supported for 5 years, but that doesn’t mean that all socket AM4 CPUs will necessarily work in all boards. You’re still going to be at the mercy of board vendors regarding BIOS updates. And X470 is likely to get vendor BIOS support for an additional year as it is a year newer at this point.

But thats my 2c. I think cheaping out on a board at this juncture is false economy.

If you take am3 & am3+ into consideration, you wont have to worry about any future proofness when compared to it’s intel counterpart, which had a fun time making people upgrade over and over, what every 6 months?

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See, i hate intel as much as the next guy, but most people simply don’t upgrade hardware every 6 months, so a chipset/socket/etc. change every 6 months doesn’t matter (well, not to me, and i don’t think for many).

Unless you’re a bleeding edge hardware nerd or tech reviewer and actually buy new CPUs every year (and in that case i’d question your sanity as the gains from 1 step just simply haven’t been there for the past decade).

Most people upgrade every 3, 5, 7 or whatever years and at that point whether the socket is compatible or not you typically want a new board anyway for things like

  • new PCIe version
  • new DDR memory version
  • new WIFI standard
  • new USB standard
  • new bluetooth standard

etc.

So, whether intel have gone through 1 new socket version or 10 new sockets in 3 years, doesn’t really matter for most.

Change that to 1-2 years and you’ll suddenly have a lot more people as most follow the intel cpu generation release cycles and don’t want to be left to far behind in performance

Well, this is l1t forums and there are a lot of other tech forums and a whole lot more tech enthusiasts, we’re not talking bout third world countries here, which 5-7 years sounds more descriptive of

Otherwise agree :slight_smile:

Either way, generally by the time you want a new CPU there are other new bits on the board you want too - socket compatibility or not.

Can’t count the number of people i see who say they’re still rocking a 2600k, 4790k or whatever.

Those CPUs are much older than 1-2 years at this point :slight_smile:

Myself? I’m running a Xeon E3-1231v3 (basically an I7-4770 without a GPU in it - but cheaper, which is why i bought it). It runs whatever i need it to run, the only real reason i’m looking to upgrade right now is for > 32 GB of RAM (and more PCIe lanes) so looking at HEDT.

I’d consider myself a tech enthusiast, and upgrading CPUs every 1-2 years is just not worth it IMHO… bang for buck you get far more out of the new motherboard features. M.2, USB3.1, PCIe 3, and DDR4 have done more for real world performance than the CPU speed bumps. And those need a new board :slight_smile:

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Well with an possible cpu upgrade in the future in mind.
And with the given facts that pretty much all B350 boards are kinda garbage.
I would say that its worth it go with a X470 board right from the get go.

Not true.
The only thing 400 series exclusive right now is StoreMI and precision boost overdrive. The latter can actually be patched to 300 series, vendor support required ofc.

More like 100%? The Gigabyte X470 boards are 240 €+ here while the X370 are 130-140 €.

Yeah, that’s board cost.

Now, add up the cost of all your components for the entire build and see the (overall) difference. Sure, might be 100 euro, but likely on a 800-1000 euro build (or more). If you’re spending say 1000 euro, you may as well spend 1100 for a more capable system with a more future proof board. In my opinion.

That’s what “total BOM” cost is (bill of materials).

every review of ryzen 2000 that i have seen says that x470 is required for XFR2 and precision boost 2 to work properly.

Eh rest of the components is the same on both platforms? Don’t see how that makes a difference.

Also I actually do have 2 shopping carts with both configurations that I’m watching, the result isn’t surprising actually.

Even Wendell mentioned it works. XFR is a CPU internal thing.

Sorry see updated post above for what i mean.

Depending on which particular board you compair in this case.
Because there definitelly is a massive quality difference between certain X370 Gigabyte models.
The Gigabyte X370 Gaming 5 and Gaming K7 are the decent ones.
On Which the Gaming K5 and lower arent really all that great.
Or atleast quality wise totally not compairable, and definitelly not with the X470 Gaming 7. that is.

Should have mentioned those are the ones I’m referring to.

650€ in my case, so it makes quite a difference.

Don’t recall that. What about precision boost 2 (which may be what i am thinking of).

X470 boards also support higher frequency memory which makes a huge difference. And more USB, often included wifi, etc., etc.

edit:
on a 600 euro budget, yeah it’s more significant. Depends what your future plans are, and how much USB you need i guess. Definitely confirm precision boost 2 support and whether or not you want higher frequency memory tho.

Yeah there will be a sale on X370 boards right now.
Because they are on the way out.
But the X470 lineup did see some interesting changes on vrm designs.
But depending on which route you wanne go with your setup.
Buying a X370 board right wouldnt be a bad idea.
And a decent semi to highend X370 board is totally fine for Zen+
But i would definitelly not pickup a B350 board anymore.
Especially not if you have upgrade plans in mind in the future.
B350 boards are okayish for Ryzen5 4 core cpu´s, and some of the higherend B350 boards are still okayish for Ryzen5 6 core sku´s.
But with an Ryzen7 i can only recommend to get a decent X370 or X470 board really.

Because the vrm designs on the B350 boards are just really poor.
And a 2700X really pulls some juice, 125A to 130A ish on a 4.3GHz OC is reasonable estimation.
I wouldnt be comfortable pulling that from any B350 board vrm.

Theoretically possible on 300 boards, but requires verification and uefi from board vendor.

According to their default specs yes, but it remains to be seen if 2000 CPUs on a 300 board might do the same because it’s mostly dependant on the IMC, not so much the board.
Also above 3200 you get into diminishing returns territory which the 1000 CPUs showed already.

That is true, though not on the Gaming 5 which I was following, been like that since a few months after launch.
Also side note, I don’t like the X400 esthetic on Gigabyte :frowning: and the features that were on the gaming 5 are now only on the 7 -_- but I digress.

Yeah, surprised half of them didn’t blow up on R7 1000 OC already :confused: