Be ready to budget more than expected if you’re planning a Zen 5 build.
The new motherboards will bring updated features like mandatory USB4 support to maximize performance with the Zen 5 architecture.
Leading the charge is the flagship AMD X870E chipset, succeeding the current X670E from the Ryzen 7000 generation.
A key upgrade with X870E is mandatory 40Gbps USB4 connectivity, according toMoore’s Law is Dead.
Requiring discrete USB4 adds cost for motherboard makers, which reduces the chances of affordable X870E models.
This raises the question of why AMD doesn’t integrate a USB4 controller into their I/O die.
The answer is likely cost and time savings.
While this limits vendor flexibility, it provides a reliable baseline experience for the new platform.
The I/O die gains some updates to the memory controller for faster DDR5 support.
AMD now recommends DDR5-6400 as the new performance sweet spot, a bump up from 6000.
Both Ryzen 9000 and the X870E chipset willlaunch together later this year.
Most AM5 boards feature BIOS flashback for easy upgrading, too.
MLID adds that they’d be surprised if the microarchitecture is ready before this summer.
