AMD interestingly took a low-key approach to launching its value-centric A620 motherboards, hiding details of its A620 announcement late Friday night, but the company finally revealed full details about the new range. and the slide deck shared with us of the worthy motherboard. To keep the price down, the motherboard will not support the full range of Ryzen 7000 processors at full power levels. These boards do away with some features of the more expensive AM5 motherboards, such as overclocking and high-speed USB connectivity, in exchange for a lower price.
AMD’s Ryzen 7000 lineup currently tops the list of best CPUs for gaming, but the supporting AM5 motherboard platform and required DDR5 memory have earned it a reputation for being priced very high. We recently ran a promotion with up to $125 off chips, motherboards and memory purchases, which ended today.
This would lead to a timely release of AMD’s budget A620 platform with at least one motherboard priced at $85, although early signs point to some new boards priced above $100. Unfortunately, that means the entire A620 lineup is likely to be more expensive than expected.
There are no US prices for most A620 motherboards, but ASRock 1 for $85, 1 for $99 (opens in new tab), ASUS announced EU prices for three motherboards. Converted US dollar prices are $151, $161, and $183. This is more than what you would expect from a budget class board with a reduced feature set. It seems that there are only a few.
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AMD’s B-series motherboards are designed to support all Ryzen 7000 models at their full TDP range, so sometimes boards with low-end chips can seem ridiculously over-handled. This has also led to higher prices for B-series motherboards compared to Intel’s competing chipsets. That’s because Intel doesn’t require its B-series motherboards to support full peak power capping for its power-hungry high-end chips. This allows vendors to reduce power delivery (VRM, etc.) to lower prices.
A620 motherboards are designed to support chips with 65W TDP. That is, a model with a peak power consumption of 88W (PPT). A620 motherboards can be populated with higher TDP rated chips. If the BIOS supports it, it will boot, but the chip will not run at maximum peak power consumption (PPT). This means the top-of-the-line chips will lose some performance in thread-heavy applications due to VRM limitations, but AMD doesn’t expect the reduced power delivery to affect gaming too much.
So far this policy deviates from AMD’s standard AM5 policy, but it makes sense. High-end chips are not suitable for low-end motherboards in this class. The reduced power delivery will ultimately drive down the price of lower-end builds. Additionally, this is the same approach that Intel uses for its lower-end products.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | 65W TDP | 105W TDP | 120W TDP (X3D) | 170W TDP |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Socket Power (PPT) Watts | 88W | 142W | 162W | 230W |
| peak current (EDC) ampere | 150A | 170A | 180A | 225A |
| sustained current (TDC) ampere | 75A | 110A | 120A | 160A |
Overall, the new motherboards will be in the lower price range of their B-series counterparts, but as you can see in the full slide deck above, the board is a step back from the B650, so there are other sensible features There are trade-offs. 1 USB 20Gbps and 6 10Gbps ports to 2 USB 10Gbps and 2 5Gbps ports.
The A620 offers x16 PCIe 4.0 connectivity, but does not allow operation in 2×8 mode like the B650. A620 also supports direct connection to CPU x4 PCIe 4.0 for M.2 SSD port, but there is no PCIe 5.0 M.2 port option like B650. However, it’s a nice step up from the x16 PCIe 3.0 supported on the previous generation A520.
Of course, many bargain-based A620 boards only have one M.2 slot, but the A620 supports four SATA ports just like the B650. That’s two more SATA ports than the previous generation A520 chipset.
| Header Cell – Column 0 | A620 | A520 | B650 |
|---|---|---|---|
| CPU graphics support | 1×16 PCIe 4.0 | 1×16 PCIe 3.0 | 1×16 or 2×8 PCIe 4.0 |
| CPU storage support | 1×4 PCIe 4.0 | PCIe3.0 | 1×4 PCIe 4.0/5.0 |
| CPU chipset uplink | 1×4 PCIe 4.0 | 1×4 PCIe 3.0 | 1×4 PCIe 4.0 |
| Overclocking support | no | no | yes |
| Full TDP CPU support | 65W | Max 170W | Max 170W |
As before, the A620 chipset does not support manual overclocking, so automatic clocking via voltage or frequency changes, or Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) is unrestricted. Unlicensed BCLK overclocking has been possible on at least one A520 board, but so far no one knows if it’s possible on the A620. A620 motherboards support memory overclocking with EXPO profiles up to DDR5-6000, but it’s unclear if manual memory tuning is allowed.
from what we have collectedThese motherboards use the Prominitory 21 (PROM21) chipset, the same silicon used in AMD’s X670 and B650 motherboards. The AM5 platform will leverage a new chiplet-based approach to the chipset, sometimes using two of his PROM21 chips in the high-end chipset while the A620 will only include one. Surprisingly, AMD didn’t develop low-end chipset silicon for these low-cost boards, but reusing them can reduce design costs. In addition, cost benefits can be achieved through mass production. There are hints of the later PROM22 chip, but it has the same functionality as the PROM21.
Motherboards come from all the usual suspects including ASRock, ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI and Biostar, but US pricing has yet to be announced for all of the A620 boards. Follow up.
