News Why AMD’s Ryzen 7000 and Motherboards Cost So Damn Much

[dalauder]

The problem with your analogy is I can sit in a 300 dollar lawn chair for the rest of my life, but I can only use my CPU/Hardware for as long as it is useful and that varies from person to person, however, 10+ years is usually longer than hardware remains useful.

Lawn chairs don't last a lifetime. They last more like 5 years, depending on the weather.

 

[rholmes3]

TL;DR

 

[helper800]

Lawn chairs don't last a lifetime. They last more like 5 years, depending on the weather.

Depends on the lawn chair, and especially if you find one for 300 dollars. I bet a 300 dollar lawn chair would last generations.

 

[dalauder]

My Core i7 2700K would like to have a word with you

Regards xD

Well Sandy Bridge was a special architecture. It's like a GeForce 8800 from back in the day--legend.

 

[dalauder]

Isn't AM4 the only socket that is true for (so far anyway)? AFAIK AMD has only guaranteed AM5 support through 2025 (although they left the door open for longer support IIRC), and Zen 5 is supposedly only coming out in 2024. 5 years/4 generations seems far from certain for AM5 (except maybe if you count refreshes/V-cache SKUs as new generations).

No, AMD used AM2 for about 6 years and AM3 for 9 years.

 

[dalauder]

It's not only that they cost so much, it's the fact they're heavily segmented (no PCIe 5.0 slots except on X670E boards, for example), and the number of PCIe lanes is extremely limited and most every board, even X670E boards, are hardwired to drop to x8/x8 electrical if a second PCIe card is present (only a couple do x16/x4).

I'll say it again, AMD is a lightyear past screwed, and their posted client revenue crater shows how much they are suffering, but instead of using that as a wakeup call and instead of biting the bullet, axing prices to be competitive with Intel, they're continuing to ignore it.

Sounds like they rushed out the 7000 series before Christmas and should've waited until it was ready.

 

[dalauder]

Some folks have used $25 air coolers on a cheap B660 board + CL16 DDR4, with a 13600K and the combo works fine, albeit a bit hot (96C @ 5.1GHz in Cinebench R23) w/o undervolting. Much of the "you need superexpensive cooling" comes from partisan fans badmouthing.

View: https://youtu.be/Qklb9pm4hdk

I've seen a lot of Reddit posts about thermal throttling on custom builds for people who are trying to figure out why their benchmark results are terrible. I think it depends a lot on what chip and case you have. But if what you say is true, I'd like to see a comparison of how both do on $60 air cooling or the same $100 water cooler. What I've seen so far is only comparisons with incredible CPU cooling.

 

[dalauder]

You are correct that anything no matter the age can be useful at something. How useful it is at what it is doing is also important to look at. In my example I used a lawn chair to represent something that will always be just as good and efficient as the day it was purchased for the purposes of sitting. Technology does not work in this manner. The 13900K of today will be laughable in 10+ years for most things just as the 2700k is today. My cellphone has a more powerful CPU (single and multi) than a 2700k to put things in perspective.

What CPU does your cell phone have? The 2700K is pretty fast.

 

[dalauder]

B650E also provides PCIe 5.0 slot(s).

The limitation of only 16 general purpose PCIe lanes from the CPU has been standard for all non-HEDT products from both AMD and Intel for years (including Raptor Lake). Why is it suddenly an issue now for AM5/Ryzen 7K?

Edit: AM5/Ryzen 7K actually has more general purpose lanes from the CPU than past generations (and latest from Intel): 20 lanes (plus 4 for NVMe, and another 4 to connect to the chipset). Sounds like it's up to the mobo manufacturer to decide how/if to use those 4 extra lanes though.

AMD ALWAYS has better slot/connectivity options than Intel. Intel's offerings are pretty much unusable for anyone who needs to connect additional drives through expansion PCIe cards.

 

[TJ Hooker]

No, AMD used AM2 for about 6 years and AM3 for 9 years.

Just because they used the same physical socket for a length of time doesn't mean any given mobo using that socket supported every CPU that uses that socket (much like Intel LGA 1151). Admittedly I wasn't paying attention to the PC hardware scene back then, but from what I can tell from a bit of searching:

• AM2 was released in 2006 (not 2002 as you said earlier) , the last gen of CPUs supported by AM2/AM2+ boards (Phenom II X6/Thuban) came out in 2010. So ~4 years.
• AM3 came out in 2009, and the latest gen it officially supported came out in 2010 (Phenom II X6/Thuban). Some AM3 boards supported some AM3+ CPUs (i.e. Bulldozer followed by Piledriver/Vishera ), but it was up to the manufacturer and not supported by AMD (may depend on the specific chipset too). So ~1 year of support, or ~3 if you count inconsistent, unofficial support.
• AM3+ came out in 2011 and the last gen it supported came out in 2012 (Piledriver/Vishera) (2013 if you count the FX-9xxx series, but frankly I think it's more generous to AMD to not consider those). The fact that they didn't come out with a successor socket until 2017 doesn't mean you can say they supported AM3+ until 2016, when they simply didn't release any new CPU generations for the last ~4 years of its life. So only 1-2 years of support.

Saying that AM2 and AM3 were supported for 6 and 9 years, respectively, is way off.

 

[-Fran-]

Just because they used the same physical socket for a length of time doesn't mean any given mobo using that socket supported every CPU that uses that socket (much like Intel LGA 1151). Admittedly I wasn't paying attention to the PC hardware scene back then, but from what I can tell from a bit of searching:

• AM2 was released in 2006 (not 2002 as you said earlier) , the last gen of CPUs supported by AM2/AM2+ boards came out in 2010. So ~4 years.
• AM3 came out in 2009, and the latest gen it officially supported came out in 2010. Some AM3 boards supported AM3+ CPUs (i.e. Bulldozer), but it was up to the manufacturer and not supported by AMD (may depend on the specific chipset too). So ~1 year of support, or ~3 if you count inconsistent, unofficial support.
• AM3+ came out in 2011 and the last gen it supported came out in 2012 (2013 if you count the FX-9xxx series, but frankly I think it's more generous to AMD to not consider those). The fact that they didn't come out with a successor socket until 2017 doesn't mean you can say they supported AM3+ until 2016, when they simply didn't release any new CPU generations for the last ~4 years of its life. So only 1-2 years of support.

Saying that AM2 and AM3 were supported for 6 and 9 years, respectively, is way off.

AM2 was a rebrand of S939, which was precedded of S754. If memory serves right, AM2 was still 939 pins and AM3 moved to 940/1.

EDIT: No I remembered incorrectly. AM2 is in fact 940 pins and S939 is the direct predecessor. AM3 and onwards was 941+ and shenanigans.

Regards.

 

[TJ Hooker]

AMD ALWAYS has better slot/connectivity options than Intel. Intel's offerings are pretty much unusable for anyone who needs to connect additional drives through expansion PCIe cards.

Eh, I don't see why that would be the case (for generations prior to Ryzen 7K). All AM4 CPUs had 16 general purpose lanes, the same as Intel CPUs. AM4 CPUs (most, maybe all?) did have an extra 4 lanes, but I think they could only be used for M.2 slots. And for either AMD or Intel you can just use a PCIe slot that runs off the chipset. Running a x4 slot from the chipset rather than the CPU (the latter being only possible with Ryzen 7K, unless you sacrifice the main x16 connection) hardly seems "unusable".

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I think the 1150 socket was two different sockets between 4th & 5th Gen with identical names. Still, excellent list. Thanks.

Maybe, that was too damn long ago, I'd have to do research to validate it.
It wouldn't surprise me given that it's Intel though.

That makes sense that Mobo manufacturers actually prefer Intel's system. Users don't. It was pretty cool using AM2 from 2002 to 2009 (AM2+), AM3 from 2008 to 2016, and AM4 from 2016 to 2022.

AMD is more practical about how long a socket should last.

 

[Bamda]

None of this is surprising. In time all of this will work itself out.

 

[dalauder]

...
X feature isn't "better" when you have no plans to use it for the life of the product. In fact, it is definitely worse because you are paying for something you will not use. That is a fact.

Being a value builder means weighing the pros and cons of features vs cost. It applies to most everyone, to varying degrees, or else we'd all buy the most expensive parts. I know very well what I/O capabilities were cut from the Z boards to B boards, and for me, B boards are "better" because I won't use them, or at least won't miss them.

You need to understand what "better" means. It does not equate to "more features." The term itself denotes subjectivity, because what's "better" for you is not universal.
...

Can't argue with you about a universal "better". I do feel like Ryzen is clearly better for power users that have multiple hard drives/SSDs due to the exposed PCI-e lanes though. I used to like to run an AMD card + cheapo NVidia for PhysX, but I think PhysX is dead.

 

[-Fran-]

Can't argue with you about a universal "better". I do feel like Ryzen is clearly better for power users that have multiple hard drives/SSDs due to the exposed PCI-e lanes though. I used to like to run an AMD card + cheapo NVidia for PhysX, but I think PhysX is dead.

This is a tad annoying (not to you directly), so let me make a simple parallel: you have 2 cars, which are identical in absolutely everything, except one offers heated seats and the other doesn't. If you don't care about heated seats, you'll say both cars are objectively the same in features and/or have feature-parity? Going a step a tad further, if the one with heated seats costs just a little bit more and you still don't care about the heated seats, is it objectively equal, but more expensive "just because"? Would you still say having "heated seats" makes the car worse or better generally speaking ?

No need to give me an answer TBH. Just think about it and give yourself an answer.

Regards.

 

[helper800]

What CPU does your cell phone have? The 2700K is pretty fast.

qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1

 

[dalauder]

OK let's wade into this "should they or shouldn't they" beeswax.

...AMD has positioned its CPUs to be at least the equivalent of Intel's. Thus the rough pricing parity. It has worked long and hard toward this goal, and there is a psychological importance to this. By lowering the price, AMD would signal that its products are inferior to the competition's...

So, yeah, maybe a holidays promo, say, $50 drop, or maybe some sort of bundling deal. But officially cutting the price is never in the picture.

You're totally right. I don't think AMD had many choices on the price and it might not matter. What does matter is repeated articles like this that bring unnecessary bad publicity. Tom's is creating the belief that AMD is inferior. In reality, they're pretty much equal and what choice someone makes should be about what's on sale and what's in stock.

 

[dalauder]

This is a tad annoying (not to you directly), so let me make a simple parallel: you have 2 cars, which are identical in absolutely everything, except one offers heated seats and the other doesn't. If you don't care about heated seats, you'll say both cars are objectively the same in features and/or have feature-parity? Going a step a tad further, if the one with heated seats costs just a little bit more and you still don't care about the heated seats, is it objectively equal, but more expensive "just because"? Would you still say having "heated seats" makes the car worse or better generally speaking ?

No need to give me an answer TBH. Just think about it and give yourself an answer.

Regards.

But people like heated seats. It's more like those features that you can find out about in your car manual, but never bother to make sense of. For most people, they'll never notice. Now if you bought the car BECAUSE it offered the features, then it's better for you. But for everyone else, it's like that feature isn't even there.

 

[dalauder]

qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 1

That's a nice chip, but it is worse than the i7-2700K
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Processors-Benchmark-List.2436.0.html

 

[dalauder]

Depends on the lawn chair, and especially if you find one for 300 dollars. I bet a 300 dollar lawn chair would last generations.

Price has less to do with quality than it used to.

 

[helper800]

That's a nice chip, but it is worse than the i7-2700K
https://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Processors-Benchmark-List.2436.0.html

Check geekbench, its faster in single and multi.
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/14929685
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/18411481 2700k at 5ghz
Did you even look at that link you posted, on that list the 2700k wasn't even given scores for any of the benchmarks...

 

[helper800]

Price has less to do with quality than it used to.

A 300 dollar lawn chair would be quality even if you upcharge 250 dollar on the BOM.

 

[dalauder]

Just because they used the same physical socket for a length of time doesn't mean any given mobo using that socket supported every CPU that uses that socket (much like Intel LGA 1151). Admittedly I wasn't paying attention to the PC hardware scene back then, but from what I can tell from a bit of searching...

Saying that AM2 and AM3 were supported for 6 and 9 years, respectively, is way off.

It's not as simple as that. Some of the chips worked on multiple sockets as they had identical pin outs and several game with DDR2 and DDR3 compatibility, as well as CPUs released for each. I think a bunch of AM2 chips worked as 939 drop-in replacements, but also worked in AM2+ boards. Then the AM3 chips worked on AM2+ boards through AM3+. And AM3+ ran until Ryzen in 2016 and they were still releasing AM3+ chips at that point. So after you consider the overlaps, there were MANY upgrade paths for most users for around 5 years.

It's a bit of a mess, but you could always just google what CPUs your motherboard supported and drop in a replacement that was like 3 years newer.

EDIT: AM3+ didn't last as long as I thought it did. So the Athlon II upgrade path ended with the Phenom II x6's in like 2011.

 

[dalauder]

Check geekbench, its faster in single and multi.
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/14929685
https://browser.geekbench.com/v5/cpu/18411481 2700k at 5ghz

Notebookcheck is better than Geekbench, IMO. But the point stands that the i7-2700K was awesome and your phone is awesome, I think.