The AMD B550 Motherboard Overview: ASUS, GIGABYTE, MSI, ASRock, and Others
by Dr. Ian Cutress & Gavin Bonshor on June 16, 2020 11:00 AM ESTMSI MAG B550 Tomahawk
Perhaps one of MSI’s most important models on any B series chipset is its MAG Tomahawk series. Highly popular with consumers due to offering solid features at a very competitive price point, the MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk has some interesting features with dual M.2 slots, dual Ethernet including a 2.5 G and Gigabit pairing, with a Realtek ALC1200 HD audio codec.
Starting with the design, the B550 Tomahawk has a contrasting black and grey design, including the heatsinks, rear panel cover, and a patterned PCB. There is one element of RGB LED lighting which can be found underneath the chipset heatsink. It features two full-length PCIe slots with the top slot operating at PCIe 4.0 x16, and a second PCIe 3.0 x4 slot which derives from the chipset. For storage, the B550 Tomahawk includes two PCIe M.2 slots, with the top slot benefiting from PCIe 4.0 x4 support, and the second slot locked at a maximum of PCIe 3.0 x4. Both M.2 slots include separate M.2 Frozr heatsinks, while for SATA drives, MSI includes six SATA ports. A total of four memory slots are present with the capability to install up to 128 GB, with speeds of up to DDR4-5100 officially supported.
Like the majority of MSI’s B550 models, the B550 Tomahawk includes a single USB 3.2 G2 Type-C, and a single USB 3.2 G2 Type-C port, with two USB 3.2 G1 Type-A and two USB 2.0 ports also present. For networking, there are two RJ45 Ethernet ports, with one controlled by a Realtek RTL8125B 2.5 GbE controller, while the other port is controlled by a Realtek’s Gigabit RTL8111H. A Realtek ALC1200 HD audio codec powers the five 3.5 mm audio jacks and S/PDIF optical output, while the rear panel also includes video outputs for Ryzen APU’s which consists of an HDMI and DisplayPort pairing. Finishing off the rear panel is a small BIOS Flashback button and a PS/2 Keyboard and Mouse combo port.
The MSI MAG B550 Tomahawk is an interesting model as MSI seems to have shifted its marketing position going from a solid entry-level model to a more premium offering. For MSI’s MSRP of $180, MSI includes dual Ethernet which its only B550 model at present to feature this, as well as slotting in Realtek 2.5 G Ethernet controller for good measure. It has all the hallmarks of its X570 counterpart, aside from full native PCIe 4.0 support, no Wi-Fi, and fewer USB 3.2 G2 connectivity, but at just $20 cheaper. It’s hard to make a case to not opt for the fully-fledged MSI X570 Tomahawk over this model.
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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.