All technology has a disruptive point where there is no turning back and, above all, which ends up being quickly forgotten by the news of the PC sector. In the case of AMD, those of Lisa Su are so clear that they allowed Intel to roam free in an era when only the blue giant can assume leadership: with DDR5 memory. AMD will therefore take a step forward and forget the past: its Ryzen 7000 will only support DDR5.
You don’t have to be very smart to understand that a disaster like the one Intel is going through with its Core 12 regarding the implementation of DDR5 can only be assumed by a company like that of Pat Gelsinger. Unfortunately, AMD cannot assume the leadership of such a leap at the present time and this represents an opportunity which is now confirmed. Why limit your processors in user options?
Ryzen 7000 only with DDR5: prepare the pocket
Prices continue to skyrocket for new DDR5 memory. There is a shortage of PMIC chips and this drives the price up too much, but not the NAND Flash which drops slightly to balance stock and supply and demand. The problem is that this fact of high prices has no end date, but the presentation of the Ryzen 7000 is approaching and if there is no change, AMD can get into a d angerous game with Intel.
Alder Lake and Raptor Lake they are a commitment from Intel to reach all market segments by offering chipsets that support DDR4 or DDR5, while their processors support both, giving the user the option to purchase the board which suits his pocket depending on the memory to be purchased. . But AMD won’t play this game and will upgrade to DDR5 and PCIe 5.0 without going back.
That is, the X670 and B650 chipsets will not have support for DDR4 and there is speculation behind the scenes that it is directly “the fault” of the Ryzen 7000 processors for do not include support in your BMI.
Chiplet-based chipset, betting on the future?
It’s not that we’re going back to the days of northbridge and southbridge, at least not technically as such, but the truth is that there are more than rumors that the X670 as a chipset will be at least a set of two tokens. In fact, there is a lot of controversy over this since there is talk that some models will come with two chips instead of one.
We don’t know if this leaked information refers to the fact that X670 is it a dual chipset or are there two versions of it according to its characteristics, or just the first one is dual and B650 it is the monolithic chip that has been manufactured so far.
In any case, and if AMD is smart, it will wait for the DDR5 price drop to launch its processors, which is expected for the second half of the year as manufacturers try to balance supply and demand with the PMICs and VRMs that these new RAMs include because if AMD has effectively eliminated DDR4 support in its I/O die, then we’re faced with a platform that won’t come cheap at first and is also a game changer disruptive to the premium segment. Will AMD succeed with this new market approach?