AMD to Support Zen 3 and Ryzen 4000 CPUs on B450 and X470 Motherboards
In a surprising twist, AMD has today announced that it intends to enable Ryzen 4000 and Zen 3 support on its older B450 and X470 Motherboards. This is going to be a 'promise now, figure out the details later' arrangement, but this should enable most (if not all) users running 400 series AMD motherboards to upgrade to the Zen 3 processors set to be unveiled later this year.
[...] AMD came under a lot of fire. The company had originally promised that it would support the AM4 platform from 2016 through 2020 (or 'through to' 2020). A lot of users had assumed that this meant any AM4 platform based motherboard would be able to accept any processor made from 2016 to 2020, including the new Zen 3 processors set to be unveiled later this year. The fact that there was a discrepancy between what the users expected and what AMD had been saying essentially became a miscommunication or a misunderstanding, but one that had a negative effect on a number of users who were expecting to upgrade the system.
Ultimately the reason for the lockout was down to the BIOS size. Each generation of processors require a portion of the BIOS space for compatibility code – normally if you can support one processor from a generation, then you can support them all. We are also in the era of graphical interface BIOSes, and as a result some of the BIOS code was reserved for fancy menus and the ability to adjust fan curves or update the BIOS in a more intuitive way. All of this takes up space, and some vendors ditched the fancy graphics in order to support more processors.
Most AMD motherboards are outfitted with 128 megabit (16 megabyte) BIOS chips. The reason why this is the case is due to a limitation on some of AMD's early AM4 processors – due to design, they can only ever address the first 16 megabytes of a BIOS chip. So even if a motherboard vendor had a larger BIOS chip, say MSI had a 32 megabyte chip, then it would actually operate like two partitioned BIOSes and it would get very complicated. There is no easy way to support every AM4 processor with a simple 16 megabyte BIOS.
Also at Guru3D and Tom's Hardware.
Previously: AMD's Zen 3 CPUs Will Not be Compatible with X470, B450, and Older Motherboards
Related Stories
AMD's Robert Hallock has confirmed that the upcoming AMD Ryzen 4000 Zen 3 processors will be compatible with Socket AM4 as long as the motherboard features an X570 or B550 chipset. Zen 3 will not support older chipsets owing to lower space on the EEPROM of these motherboards. Future prospects of Socket AM4 depend on the industry's I/O innovation.
[...] In a blog post, Hallock confirmed that current AMD X570 and B550 chipset motherboards will support Zen 3 processors after a BIOS update. However, Zen 3 processors will not be compatible with any chipset prior to X570 or B550. This means end of the road for all those who have X470, B450 and below chipset boards. Hallock says that this decision had to be taken as due to BIOS capacity limitations on older platforms.
We've seen AMD taking a similar stance with Zen 2 as well by removing drop-in support for motherboards that have just a 16 MB EEPROM. X570 motherboards have a 32 MB EEPROM thereby enabling larger a AGESA[*] codebase to be comfortably accommodated.
Wikipedia explains that AGESA:
AMD Generic Encapsulated Software Architecture (AGESA), is a procedure library developed by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), used to perform the Platform Initialization (PI) on mainboards using their AMD64 architecture. As part of the BIOS of such mainboards, AGESA is responsible for the initialization of the processor cores, memory, and the HyperTransport controller.
See also: AMD axes Zen 3 support on 400-series motherboards: Is AMD pulling an Intel?
AMD will use the AM4 socket through its 'Zen 3' CPUs, but it will drop older chipset support
B450 and X470 chipsets won't support AMD Ryzen 4000 processors
Hardware Unboxed: No AMD Zen 3 Support on 400 and 300 Series Motherboards
AMD Zen 3 Based Ryzen 4000 'Vermeer' Desktop CPUs Will Be Compatible With Existing AM4 (X570, X470, B550, B450) Motherboards, Confirmed By XMG (from April 16, fake news or specific to the motherboard manufacturer?)
AMD announced its first Zen 3 (Ryzen 5000 series) desktop CPUs on October 8.
Compared to Zen 2 (Ryzen 3000 series) CPUs, the Zen 3 microarchitecture has higher boost clocks and around 19% higher instructions per clock. A unified core complex die (CCD) allows 8 cores to access up to 32 MB of L3 cache, instead of two groups of 4 cores accessing 16 MB each, leading to lower latency and more cache available for any particular core. TDPs are the same as the previous generation, leading to a 24% increase in performance per Watt.
AMD estimates a 26% average increase in gaming performance at 1080p resolution, with the Zen 3 CPUs beating or tying Intel's best CPUs in most games.
Ryzen 9 5950X, 16 cores, 32 threads, boosts up to 4.9 GHz, 105W TDP, $800.
Ryzen 9 5900X, 12 cores, 24 threads, boosts up to 4.8 GHz, 105W TDP, $550.
Ryzen 7 5800X, 8 cores, 16 threads, boosts up to 4.7 GHz, 105W TDP, $450.
Ryzen 5 5600X, 6 cores, 12 threads, boosts up to 4.6 GHz, 65W TDP, $300.
You may have noticed that these prices are exactly $50 more than the launch prices for the Ryzen 3000 equivalents released in 2019. The 5600X is the only model that will ship with a bundled cooler.
The CPUs will all be available starting on November 5. AMD will stream an announcement for its RX 6000 series of high-end GPUs on October 28.
See also: AMD Zen 3 Announcement by Lisa Su: A Live Blog at Noon ET (16:00 UTC)
AMD Teases Radeon RX 6000 Card Performance Numbers: Aiming For 3080?
Previously: AMD's Zen 3 CPUs Will Not be Compatible with X470, B450, and Older Motherboards
AMD Reverses BIOS Decision, Intends to Support Zen 3 on B450 and X470 Motherboards
AMD Launching 3900XT, 3800XT, and 3600XT Zen 2 Refresh CPUs: Milking Matisse
AMD Zen 3, Ryzen 4000 Release Date, Specifications, Performance, All We Know
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:29PM (8 children)
The first IBM PCs to ship with hard drive had 10 Megabyte drives. DOS 2.0 didn't even support partitions over 16 megabytes.
Spoiled little shits.
Let me guess, that also control the rainbow patterns your fans light up in? That would explain it.
(Score: 2) by Booga1 on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:36PM (2 children)
That, and mouse control, fancy icons, charts, meters, and even whole interactive motherboard diagrams. [aphnetworks.com]
(Score: 4, Funny) by takyon on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:53PM (1 child)
64 MB oughta BIOS enough for anybody.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @12:11AM
No, but that pun is.
(Score: 2) by datapharmer on Wednesday May 20 2020, @01:26AM
Amen to that. Heck you can run an entire OS with GUI like menuetos with internet browser in a couple MB. Why not just load a usb driver and enough info to load the cpu specific info from a flash/thumb drive? Don’t worry about the cpu specific stuff in bios as long as it can boot far enough to load the custom instructions and microcode patches?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by toddestan on Wednesday May 20 2020, @03:01AM (3 children)
I was going to make fun of the size, but I checked and the image for the BIOS on my 2012 motherboard is 4 MB. Larger than I thought, especially considering it's a text-mode interface that's little changed from the PC's I had in the 90's. And it's an actual BIOS too, no UEFI support at all.
If we now have 32 MB BIOS images, that's 3 doublings in 8 years. Seems about right for tech things.
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Wednesday May 20 2020, @04:50AM (2 children)
Well, lets work that backwards:
2012 4MB (=32Mb)
2004 2MB (=16Mb)
1998 0.5MB (=4Mb)
1990 0.25MB (=2Mb)
1982 0.125MB (=1Mb=1000KB=8000Kb)
But, the first PC came out in 1982 (IBM 5150) had an 8KB(=64Kb) bios ROM: http://www.minuszerodegrees.net/5150/motherboard/5150_u33.htm [minuszerodegrees.net]
So, no. It's not "about right for tech". It's actually off by 32 years.
compiling...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @05:11AM (1 child)
You missed the factor 3 in his math.
divide 125KB by 4*3 12 an you get 10 KB not too far 8KB, isn't it?
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Wednesday May 20 2020, @07:26AM
Yeah sorry was thinking Moore's law since it's all about node density.
Depends where you start:
1982 8KB
1990 24KB
1998 72KB
2004 216KB
2012 648KB
2020 1944KB (~2MB)
2028 5832MB (~6MB)
So going by factor of 3 every 8 years we get to 4MB at around 2024 instead of 2012. So, 12years off the mark instead of 32years I guess?
compiling...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 19 2020, @11:30PM (2 children)
If you have the agesa modules for any AM4 chip since bristol ridge you can run them on any AM4 motherboard.
What you CAN'T do is is customize the bios images or the AGESA packages for it due to signing and bios locks, or swap out the bios chip (thanks soic-8 instead of socketed dip-8!) unless you're a pro at soldering and at least an apprentice in parts procurement.
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:12AM
you can get a clip-on doohickey to flash an soic-8 without desoldering it
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 21 2020, @07:11PM
so sick of closed source BIOS/UEFIs!
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday May 20 2020, @12:51AM
https://www.guru3d.com/news-story/amd-zen3-to-get-series-b450-and-x470-support-after-all,5.html [guru3d.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Wednesday May 20 2020, @01:10AM (2 children)
For years hard drive capacity grew at a snail's pace while everything else was at a rapid clip. 25-30 years ago I picked up a, I don't remember, a 500 meg hard drive for something like $200. It was a great deal and I figured that when I ran out of disk space I'd install it.
Fast forward 6 months, I ran out of disk space. Then I could buy a drive with twice the capacity for half the price. Due a shortage of disk bays or cables or who knows I ended up buying a new hard drive and my "bargain" never got out of it's package.
My ducks are not in a row. I don't know where some of them are, and I'm pretty sure one of them is a turkey.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by shrewdsheep on Wednesday May 20 2020, @11:14AM (1 child)
Too me, storage growth is the single most remarkable story of electrical engineering. The automatic doubling's we saw were never automatic. Important technical innovations were required to keep density growing (mostly the read heads). All problems were sorted out in a timely manner and people just took the growth for granted. Finally, the development ground to a halt in say around ~ 2010 and has only slowly picked up again recently. The mayor growth will now come from the non-movables and it seems that after the initial years we are on track to observe something similar for SSD & co.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Sunday May 24 2020, @03:55PM
It looks like I lost an HDD between opening your comment and responding to it.
The truth is that both HDDs and SSDs are reaching dead ends and need to be replaced. We need a better bulk storage than HDDs (no, not tape). Some kind of optical or holographic storage might qualify and reach hundreds of terabytes, but it should be rewritable. NAND needs to be replaced by a superior non-volatile storage technology. If it can also replace RAM and act as a universal memory, even better.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by zion-fueled on Wednesday May 20 2020, @02:06PM
Older boards already had support for various things hacked in. These days patching your bios is a must regardless.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Thursday May 21 2020, @10:16PM
MAKE BIOS BASIC AGAIN
Account abandoned.