The AMD B550 Motherboard Overview: ASUS, GIGABYTE, MSI, ASRock, and Others
by Dr. Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on June 16, 2020 11:00 AM ESTGIGABYTE B550 Vision D
Aiming more towards content creators and resembling its Designaire models, the GIGABYTE B550 Vision D includes a mid-range set of features. Spearheading what the Vision D has to offer includes an Intel Titan Ridge Thunderbolt 3 interface which powers the two Type-C ports on the rear panel, with two M.2 slots, four SATA ports, a Realtek ALC1220 HD audio codec and two Intel-based Gigabit Ethernet ports.
Opting for a clean-cut aesthetic, the GIGABYTE B550 Vision D uses a black and white contrasting design with white heatsinks on an all-black PCB. Dominating the lower portion of the board are two full-length PCIe slots which operate at PCIe 4.0 x16 and x8/x8, while the third full-length slot is locked at PCIe 3.0 x4. For storage is two M.2 slots with individual heatsinks with the top slot operating at PCIe 4.0 x4, and the second slot at PCIe 3.0 x4, while for SATA devices, a total of four SATA ports are included. The B550 Vision D has impressive memory support with speeds up to DDR4-5400 supported out of the box, and a maximum capacity of up to 128 GB across four memory slots.
On what is a pretty stacked rear panel are two Thunderbolt/USB 3.2 G2 Type-C ports which include support for DisplayPort output due to the presence of an Intel Ridge Thunderbolt 3controller, with a further two USB 3.2 G2 Type-A, four USB 3.2 G1 Type-A and two USB 2.0 ports. For the leveraging of Ryzen APUs with integrated graphics, GIGABYTE has included a DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.1 pair of video outputs, while an Intel AX200 Wi-Fi 6 interface and a pair of Intel Gigabit Ethernet controllers make up the Vision D's networking capabilities. A Realtek ALC1220-VB HD audio codec drives the five 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output, while a PS/2 keyboard and mouse combo port allows users to use legacy peripherals.
The GIGABYTE B550 Vision D is an interesting board for a couple of reasons, some very positive and some a little confusing. Starting with what's good, it is advertised as featuring a robust 12+2 power delivery, with the inclusion of an Intel Titan Ridge controller for dual USB 3.2 G2 Type-C ports. It's also one of the best looking B550 models on the market and supports up to DDR4-5300 memory which is impressive. GIGABYTE's decision to opt for Gigabit LAN when cheaper boards include 2.5 GbE Ethernet is a tad confusing. It's also one of the only models, if not the only model to include Intel Gigabit as opposed to Realtek Gigabit Ethernet. The B550 Vision D also has a hefty price tag for a B550 model with an MSRP of $260, putting it as one of the most expensive B550 models on the market, but does benefit from Thunderbolt 3, and two full-length PCIe 4.0 slots which operate at x8/x8.
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Kougar - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
Most of these boards are a serious VRM upgrade over the B450 boards. If I was buying Ryzen right now I'd easily go B550 over X570.So, only the ASUS boards offer bios flashback? Seems like a cheaper, just as userful version of dual BIOS anyway.
Brane2 - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
Finally ONE mini-ITX board with 3-monitor output.Gigaplex - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
Colour me disappointed. I was hoping to do a mATX file server build using an APU. No support for existing APUs, no ETA on when consumers can buy the newer APUs, and most of these boards only have 4 SATA ports.I really don't want to have to buy a crappy NVIDIA 710 just to get it running.
mm0zct - Wednesday, June 17, 2020 - link
If you're booting Linux, you might be able to get away with either a good old fashioned serial cable (a lot of boards still have a serial port header) or a USB-HDMI/VGA dongle, since these are supported by the mainline kernel. The main issue might jus tbe getting the BIOS to boot your install media, but a serial port might work still here.You could also just borrow a graphics card from any other system you own to do the initial install, and then let it run headlessly once it's up and running.
Gigaplex - Wednesday, June 17, 2020 - link
I am booting Linux, and have tried completely headless in the past. It's not really worth the trouble (especially if I need to quickly diagnose issues), I'd rather just buy the crappy GPU.IBM760XL - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
I'm probably missing something, but what's the point of including HDMI/DP/DVI outputs if the boards don't support APUs? Aren't you going to need to use the output on your dGPU anyway?I appreciate the summaries on the last page, but wish it could be enhanced a bit. E.g. what's the cheapest board with 2.5G Ethernet? What are the cheapest boards in general? I probably wouldn't go with the cheapest one, but given the prices on a lot of these, it's likely I would choose one of the less expensive ones.
Gigaplex - Wednesday, June 17, 2020 - link
They will support the Zen 2 APUs, which aren't out yet.IBM760XL - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
So checking my local store's inventory, they have 25 B550 boards in stock, of all varieties, but are completely sold out of both B450 and X570 (there are a few cheap A320 boards available as well, and nine TRX40 boards that start at $450).Something tells me Ryzen 3000 chips have been selling quicker than the motherboard manufacturers can keep up, and maybe that's part of the reason B550 prices are starting out high. If they're selling out, it makes sense for them to start with a higher MSRP, which they can always lower if demand falls.
Unfortunately for AMD, if B450 doesn't come back in stock, that's going to hurt Ryzen 3000 sales. Intel mobo inventory is also a bit limited, but about half of the Intel models they offer are available, including some in that $75-$125 range, versus about 15% of the AMD models being in stock currently.
romrunning - Wednesday, June 17, 2020 - link
I think the delays are all shipping-related. It's affecting all computer parts, like power supplies, motherboards, and the like. I wish a bunch of the mfgs would just pool resources to buy dedicated air cargo flights; maybe pooling will mitigate some of the losses on the lower margin items.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, June 16, 2020 - link
"Most of these boards are a serious VRM upgrade over the B450 boards. If I was buying Ryzen right now I'd easily go B550 over X570."Why does that matter? Overclocking died with Zen, especially Zen 2.
As long as it doesn't throttle, you're good.