News MSI X870, X870E motherboards have an extra 8-pin PCIe power connector for next-gen GPUs — unofficially aimed at GeForce RTX 50 series

[Admin]

MSI has upgraded its latest AM5 motherboards with a unique feature: a supplementary 8-pin PCIe power connector for powering the next-gen GPUs.

MSI X870, X870E motherboards have an extra 8-pin PCIe power connector for next-gen GPUs — unofficially aimed at GeForce RTX 50 series : Read more

 

[Amdlova]

225w is the max power draw of my system with screen and sound
At this Rate it's better to those motherboards and graphics make some Tea or coffee with this heat!

 

[wakuwaku]

Given that Asus has implemented the supplementary 8-pin PCIe connector on its own competing X870 and X870E motherboards, motherboard vendors likely already know the power necessities of next-generation graphics cards.

This statement is 99% false. I only attribute 1% to the fact that yes Asus did put a 8-pin PCIE power connector on ONE of their X870/X870E boards that has been announced so far, the ROG Crosshair X870E. But that is the only correct thing in this statement. The 8-pin PCIE power connector implemented on that board is for powering the 60W USB Power Delivery feature of one of the front panel USB-C ports, NOT for extra power for the PCIE slot.

You do not need to take my word for it. I cite my sources, unlike writers for tom's hardware who seem to hallucinate just as well as real AIs do. Scroll down until you see the USB ports section and click on the arrow:

ROG CROSSHAIR X870E HERO | Gaming motherboards｜ROG - Republic of Gamers｜ROG Global

The ROG Strix X870E-E Gaming WiFi elevates builds with 18 power stages, DDR5 slots and extensive PCIe 5.0 connectivity. It features five M.2 SSD slots with heat

rog.asus.com

This is not the first time Asus implemented this. A relative of mine has a Proart X670E, whom I helped build the PC for, that has the exact same feature. There might be other boards, possibly from other vendors, that have it too. I didn't look up all of them.

Also dear readers, here:

ASUS X870E/X870/B850/B840 ― the best motherboards featuring AMD Ryzen™ 9000 series processors for incredible gaming, professional-grade productivity, and magical AI experiences.

ASUS AMD X870E & X870 motherboards are designed to get the most out of AMD Ryzen™ 9000 series X3D processors and are ready for Advanced AI PCs. Featuring exclusive AI technologies, PCIe® 5.0, DDR5 support with NitroPath DRAM and AEMP technologies, USB4® 40 Gbps Type-C support, WiFi 7 and EZ PC...

www.asus.com

Do you see any of the boards having a 8-pin PCIE besides the ROG Crosshair? No need to look at tech specs, just look at the image of the motherboards.

 

[Pierce2623]

Well….running 200w GPUs with no 8 pin would be the first interesting motherboard development in at least a decade.

 

[Amdlova]

Well….running 200w GPUs with no 8 pin would be the first interesting motherboard development in at least a decade.

changing a pci-x 16x slot IS way harder than changing the 4090 melting connector

 

[thestryker]

As far as I'm aware the PCIe spec is still 75W maximum from the slot (I may be wrong I haven't checked in a while). What adding PCIe power connectors to the motherboard is generally used for is making sure secondary PCIe slots can still deliver all 75W. Given that the context was AI the implication is that one would have multiple video cards that need 75W from the slot.

 

[Hotrod2go]

Reminds me of an MSI Z590 board that has a 6 pin power connector at the bottom of it for the power hungry rocket lake cpus! System would not boot without it plugged in, even without a dGPU.

 

[DavidLejdar]

The 8-pin PCIE power connector implemented on that board is for powering the 60W USB Power Delivery feature of one of the front panel USB-C ports, NOT for extra power for the PCIE slot.

Are you sure about that?

Yeah, it says that it needs the 8-pin connector for the USB-C 60W quick charge on front panel. But that's for one of the ports only, and it is for 33W extra only. And for these extra 33W, a 8-pin connector is quite overkill, isn't it?

On the other hand, ASUS may be preparing for more power supply for USB-C ports in general (starting with the mentioned MB). But like that, it seems a bit silly. I mean, USB-C PD 3.1 can do up to 240W transfer. So, when one needs quick charging, even a direct connection between front panel and PSU (as already exists in my case, in regard to fans via fan hub), for a dedicated charging port - such would take of a lot of the PSU capacity, with that capacity being somewhat limited for a lot of users.

And meanwhile, e.g. myself, I can also use the power socket tower here, which comes including USB-C ports. Also, here in Berlin, we can do up to 3,680W (230 Volt x 16 Ampere) on one wall socket, whereas in some country, it isn't even half of that, setting a hard limit on how much a single PSU can run, even if everyone would be willing to upgrade the PSU to be able to also run a coffee machine via PC front panel, and whatnot.

So, I'd argue, that it would make more sense, when the extra power to MB is also be about other stuff. Such as perhaps about GPU in particular, and that perhaps mostly as mentioned for high-end or multiple GPUs - but it would also make builds more viable, which don't require extra width for a GPU-PSU connection. And additional stuff. E.g. the three M.2 slots, for up to NVMe 5.0 SSDs, they apparently can require up to 30W - which needs to come from the MB, plus two additional M.2 (up to NVMe 4.0), with further around 10W (at peak).

And then there is also a question about cooling. Like, the 8-pin connector may indeed be mostly about next-gen GPUs, but not so much in regard to the power supply of the GPU, as it may be about power supply for the PC case cooling.

 

[Pierce2623]

changing a pci-x 16x slot IS way harder than changing the 4090 melting connector

A 200w GPU isnt melting anything. Even the 4080 doesn’t melt connectors. That’s just a problem with stupid levels of power draw.

 

[Amdlova]

The rx480 and rx 470 scandal over pci-x drawing more than 75w. It's not only about power but noise EMI and other things can hurt other components in process.
I don't belive PCI-SIG will change something 75w is enough for many applications. Maybe when change the voltage for 24 volts wee see more power on pcie.

 

[jlake3]

As far as I'm aware the PCIe spec is still 75W maximum from the slot (I may be wrong I haven't checked in a while). What adding PCIe power connectors to the motherboard is generally used for is making sure secondary PCIe slots can still deliver all 75W. Given that the context was AI the implication is that one would have multiple video cards that need 75W from the slot.

Per Wikipedia at least, the maximum of 75W from the slot has not yet changed.

Also, I've personally seen boards as far back as Haswell with supplemental power connectors for running a large number of PCIe devices. Some old SLI/Crossfire boards had a 4-pin Molex near the graphics slots, then later mining boards had PCIe 6/8-pin sockets. It's not the first time a motherboard manufacturer has done this.

 

[Notton]

It seems like a good idea at first, but on second thought, the connector pins in PCIe slots is not very thick. Like thinner than the idiotic 16-pin nvidia connector.

I liked Asus' implementation better, where they added a thiccccc dedicated connector to the front.

 

[blazorthon]

Per Wikipedia at least, the maximum of 75W from the slot has not yet changed.

Also, I've personally seen boards as far back as Haswell with supplemental power connectors for running a large number of PCIe devices. Some old SLI/Crossfire boards had a 4-pin Molex near the graphics slots, then later mining boards had PCIe 6/8-pin sockets. It's not the first time a motherboard manufacturer has done this.

Yep, this isn't a new concept. There's an AMD ECS A890GXM-A V2.0 AM3 motherboard I've had since 2011 with a 4-pin molex next to the PCIe slots. I'm willing to bet it's far from the first. A 4-pin molex could supply enough 12V and 5V power for a single PCIe x16 slot, assuming the cable wasn't overloaded with too many other things. Before PCIe power connectors were the standard for video cards, some video cards also had 4-pin molex connectors.