A number of low-cost motherboards for the Ryzen 3000 CPU family have not yet been released. Currently, there is only one chipset available for the AM4 sockets, namely the X570. The good news is that the “mid-range” AMD B550 chipsets will be released very soon.
AMD B550, motherboards will be introduced on June 16
AMD will soon introduce its new motherboards based on the B550 chipset for both high and low budget users, which will definitely encourage them to upgrade older PCs considering the value and performance promise offered by the Ryzen 3000 platform. Earlier this year it was reported that AMD will begin mass production of its B550 and A520 chips in the first quarter of 2020.
The X570 chipset implemented new features into the platform, including support for PCIe Gen 4.0 and a huge list of I/O capabilities. There was some fine-tuning on the BIOS side for each X570 motherboard, providing slightly better support for Ryzen 3000 CPUs and high-speed memory DIMMs, but it was not a major change like the X470 for the X370.
It is expected that B550 motherboards will continue to support better I/O and will be less expensive than the existing X570 options. According to sources, AMD plans to launch its B550 motherboards on May 21, but a retail launch is not expected until June 16, almost a month after the announcement.
We saw a B550 motherboard from a Chinese vendor that offers a good selection of ports and slots for expansion. The motherboards with B550 chipset would cost between 80 and 150 dollars. AMD X470 motherboards still have good support for Ryzen 3000 CPUs and start at around $120-130 if you can still find them in the sales channel. Motherboards based on the B450 chipset are quite cheap for about $60-$80.
The B550 and A520 chips would fit well with the upcoming Ryzen 3 third-generation quad-core CPUs, which are in the same price category and would be a budget-friendly PC. We will keep you informed.