With the announcement of AMD's Ryzen 5000 desktop CPU series, we noticed a lot of churr well-nigh B450 and B550 motherboards. It seems many prospective buyers aren't clear on the differences between these chipsets and equally a result we've seen many current B450 owners concerned about what they should practise in regards to whether or not they need to upgrade.

In this article we'll explain how these chipsets differ and talk near why y'all may or may not need to upgrade for supporting a Zen three processor.

You may recall AMD originally announced they'd be axing support for Zen 3 on all 300 and 400 serial motherboards. Nevertheless, due to button dorsum from the community and publications like ours where nosotros strongly suggested AMD to reconsider, they chop-chop walked dorsum the conclusion and announced that the 400 series boards (B450 and X470) would receive back up for Zen 3 processors, now known equally the Ryzen 5000 series.

That means processor back up on B450 motherboards includes Ryzen 1000, 2000, 3000 and now the upcoming 5000 series, though a single BIOS revision is unlikely to back up them all. Compare that to the B550 chipset which only officially supports the Ryzen 3000 and the upcoming 5000 series, though please annotation the Ryzen 3000 series APUs such as the 3200G and 3400G aren't supported on B550 boards, APU back up is limited to Renoir APUs, that's the Ryzen 4000 series... which nosotros should add, aren't supported on B450 boards as far as nosotros're enlightened.

The key advantages of the AMD B550 chipset is PCI Express 4.0, but this is a little confusing as this feature isn't really enabled by the chipset. Technically speaking, there's no reason why B450 boards tin can't offer the aforementioned level of PCIe 4.0 support as B550 boards, as that support comes directly from the Ryzen 3000 processors, they're merely using the 20 PCIe 4.0 lanes from the CPU. In fact, we've seen BIOS revisions from the likes of Gigabyte which enabled PCIe four.0 operation on B450 boards, merely that was after removed due to pressure from AMD. Nosotros won't get into that here, but the point is PCIe 4.0 support on B550 boards comes from the CPU, non the chipset itself.

All AMD B550 motherboards just support PCIe 4.0 for the chief PCIe x16 slot for graphics cards, equally well equally PCIe 4.0 for the master K.2 slot for loftier speed storage. Equally it stands, neither feature is terribly advantageous to almost consumers as PCIe 4.0 has however to offer whatever kind of functioning advantage for graphics cards. Even the RTX 3090 only gains about iii% more performance on average at low resolutions.

When it comes to PCIe 4.0 storage, the gains look good on paper and are certainly good for raw file transfers, merely when talking about general PC usage and gaming, the divergence between a good NVMe SSD running in PCIe 4.0 and 3.0 way is well-nigh naught. That'south not to say PCIe four.0 won't be important to have in the future, only it'south a technology that's better suited to high-end systems using an X570 motherboard or HEDT systems using expensive Threadripper CPUs.

Now, the side by side almost important upgrade on the B550 chipset has to practise with the PCI Express lanes made bachelor via the chipset itself. Every bit noted earlier, PCIe 4.0 support is provided past the CPU, but the chipset nevertheless has its own PCIe lanes, viii in the case of B450 and x on B550. Both apply a PCIe 3.0 x4 link to the CPU, simply the lanes offered by the chipset are dissimilar. Whereas the B450 chipset offers viii PCIe 2.0 lanes, the B550 chipset offers 10 PCIe 3.0 lanes.

This increased bandwidth ways faster devices tin connect to the chipset, though information technology's hard to say how useful that is for about of yous. The more premium AMD B550 motherboards offering features such equally Wi-Fi 6 and 2.v Gbit LAN, simply unless you've invested in the latest wireless routers and network switches, neither of these features are going to exist particularly useful every bit you'll be express by your networking hardware. In addition to improved networking, the increased bandwidth also means USB 3.ii gen2 ports come up standard, though this is a feature you lot can find on select B450 motherboards every bit well.

Finally, the B550 chipset also brings support for dual GPUs, but honestly that's probably the most pointless feature it offers over B450 as no one uses SLI or Crossfire anymore, no less on a budget motherboard. Some B450 boards can back up dual GPUs, though the second card will exist severely handicapped with PCIe 2.0 x4 bandwidth.

The main takeaway hither is that AMD B550 motherboards offer meliorate PCI Express support from both the CPU and chipset, but how relevant that is for y'all is going to be questionable. If yous only have a Gigabit switch and don't desire to spend big bucks on 2.five Gbit networking or better, so paying actress for a board with 2.5 Gbit LAN might be a waste product of money, and of course, the aforementioned is truthful for Wi-Fi 6 back up.

Right at present PCIe 4.0 doesn't seem to exist a huge deal, at that place is no hardware configuration for a desktop PC that can really take advantage of it, and by the time it does offset to show a worthwhile reward nosotros'll exist seeing it with hardware that costs a serious premium, so nothing y'all're going to stick on a B550 lath anyway. So what all this means is, just because B550 motherboards are newer and offer some fancy sounding features like PCI Express four.0, it doesn't automatically hateful B450 owners need to upgrade or even that someone looking to buy an affordable AM4 motherboard necessarily needs to buy a B550 board.

Right at present you can buy the MSI B450 Tomahawk Max for $110, whereas an equivalent B550 board like the MSI B550-A Pro costs $140. While $30 isn't a huge premium and we'd typically recommend the B550 model, for those looking to save as much money as possible, the B450 selection is likely going to be better value. In this example, with the B550 board you're getting a slightly better VRM, two.5 Gbit LAN and PCIe iv.0, though depending on what you're doing with the arrangement, there's a good chance you'll take advantage of none of these features.

In short, those looking to upgrade their current Ryzen 2000 or 3000 CPU with a shiny new Ryzen 5000 model, who already own a decent B450 motherboard, we run into no reason why you'd demand or desire to upgrade to a B550 board.

Again, if you have something like the MSI B450 Tomahawk Max, there's little to be gained by upgrading to a B550 board. Really, yous'd demand to exist spending upwards of $160 for a worthwhile upgrade, and at that betoken you're halfway to buying a Ryzen 5 5600X.

Our communication is this: if you lot accept a B450 motherboard and plan on upgrading to Ryzen 5000, go on the board and wait until January 2022 for the Zen 3 BIOS and upgrade then.

Speaking of Zen 3 back up, we've confirmed with AMD that there will be no performance deviation betwixt B450 and B550 motherboards when running a Ryzen 5000 CPU. They have this working in their labs already, and then AMD B450 support is already a thing, the delay afterwards release will exist simply to allow board partners time to become their B550 and X570 boards up to speed and atomic number 26 out any bugs that might surface one time the masses commencement upgrading to the new processors.

AMD has likewise confirmed to us that VRM load is practically identical between similar spec Ryzen 3000 and Ryzen 5000 processors. In other words, wait the Ryzen 9 3900X and 5900X to place an about identical load on the motherboard's VRM.

VRM thermal performance, while useful information that tin assistance you purchase a ameliorate quality motherboard, it's not the be-all and cease-all of motherboard functioning. How you configure the estimator and what you lot plan on doing with it will determine just how much attending you need to pay to VRM performance. For example, if you program on running a 12 or xvi-cadre Ryzen processor with the intention of executing core heavy workloads for extended periods of fourth dimension, and then VRM thermal performance is something y'all'll desire to accept annotation of, especially if you alive in a warmer climate.

Still, if you but programme on running a half dozen or even an eight-core Ryzen processor with no intention of upgrading presently, then VRM quality is less of an outcome. Likewise, if you mostly play games, VRM quality is less of an issue as you won't exist taxing all cores at 100% for extended periods of fourth dimension.

We hope this article has helped clear up any questions current AMD B450 owners have near upgrading to a new Ryzen 5000 series processor, as well every bit for those currently tossing up between a B450 or B550 motherboard.

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