Review MSI MAG B850 Tomahawk MAX Wifi Motherboard Review: a little extra on a budget

I do agree that budget usually is something in the 100 range but to fair compared to all the boards in this price range, this is definitely a pretty good board for what it offers. Its a normal ATX board and thats what makes it budget. Its standard. Its wild to me that boards are now offering more nvmes but are taking sata connectors away from the board. You have to go to higher tier 500+ boards in order to get more sata connectors which is wild to me.
 
What's to distinguish this from the X870 "Gaming" MB from MSI, also at $229.99 (retail) ? It has all the same features but with at least one 40 Gbs USB port. The only drawback that my cursory comparison reveals is a 60 VRM. Should I expect a similar reduction in retail vs MSRP ?
 
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I guess being $50 less than the X870 technically makes it a budget board, but after looking at the specs and performance, it’s clear that most users would do really well with this board. Sure, budget builds aren’t typically looking for dual PCIe 5.0 NVMe slots, but having them means this board will stay relevant for a long time without the need for upgrades.

It’s also right in line with the price of other B850 offerings, making it a solid choice overall.
 
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AMD B chipsets have nearly the same specs than AMD X chipsets. The difference is that X chipsets have more PCI-E lines which is generally not useful as we rarely put several graphic cards on a motherboard.
If a motherboard with B or A chipset have the specs your looking for then you don't need to pay extra for a X chipset, it will not make the CPU faster.
 
AMD B chipsets have nearly the same specs than AMD X chipsets. The difference is that X chipsets have more PCI-E lines which is generally not useful as we rarely put several graphic cards on a motherboard.
If a motherboard with B or A chipset have the specs your looking for then you don't need to pay extra for a X chipset, it will not make the CPU faster.
X will likely have USB4 and additional PCIE 5.0x4 NVME slots. If you don't have plans to have multiple pricey 5th gen drives and very fast external connections there just isn't any reason to buy more than B. If you actually are budgeting for a PC build you would never consider an X board.
 
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AMD B chipsets have nearly the same specs than AMD X chipsets. The difference is that X chipsets have more PCI-E lines which is generally not useful as we rarely put several graphic cards on a motherboard.
If a motherboard with B or A chipset have the specs your looking for then you don't need to pay extra for a X chipset, it will not make the CPU faster.
Most X series boards also do not have x8+x8 slots from CPU OR PCI-E switches, so putting 2 graphics cards is a bad idea, even though you can technically do it.
The x4 GPU will have to go through the chipset, with all the contention.
 
What's to distinguish this from the X870 "Gaming" MB from MSI, also at $229.99 (retail) ? It has all the same features but with at least one 40 Gbs USB port. The only drawback that my cursory comparison reveals is a 60 VRM. Should I expect a similar reduction in retail vs MSRP ?
Vs 870 MB
+Type C USB 4/Display port on rear panel
-- single m2 CPU slot
-- ALC 897 codec.