In this review, we took one of the advanced motherboards of the B650E chipset for AMD’s new processor generation for a spin.
AMD’s AM5 socket has officially begun its shelf life, which is expected to continue for at least three years from now, during which time the existing motherboards will receive support for future processors that AMD will launch.
Now, there are four processors that are officially supported in the AM5 socket and in the near future we are expected to hear about new processors. The bracket is led by the 16-core Ryzen 9 7950X and the 12-core Ryzen 9 7900X. There is an 8-core processor called the Ryzen 7 7700X and a 6-core processor called the Ryzen 7 7600X.
The AM5 bracket actually includes four chipsets. These are two chipsets that each come in two configurations. As of now, they all allow overclocking for processors, and AMD has yet to launch a budget chipset for the entry-level office and home market. We hope that such an A620 will be released soon, along with processors cheaper than the 7600X.
This is how AMD currently segments the different degrees of connectivity between the chipsets. X670 and X670E are the most advanced followed by B650E and B650. In practice, according to the decision of the various motherboard manufacturers, you can find an overlap for example between advanced B650E boards and cheaper X670 boards. Four different degrees of connectivity give motherboard manufacturers a lot of freedom to create their product lines.
Among its motherboard brands, ROG is the most prominent and most associated with ASUS. The STRIX B650E-F GAMING WIFI is one of the more advanced motherboards it offers based on the B650E chipset. This is not a rank for the crazy to talk about, but with a price tag of 300 dollars it is screwed in the middle of the list of motherboards today for the AM5 mount. There is one more senior model in the series, it is the B650E-E GAMING WIFI.
The purpose of this motherboard is to provide mostly everyone who wants all the functions common today in motherboards without touching too much on overclocking using physical tools on the board.
This motherboard comes in the old ATX standard and will therefore fit most gaming cases today. The design includes mostly black on black with some pink stripes cutting off the various heatsinks. There are RGB lights on the plastic on the heatsinks for the voltage stabilizers for the processor, on the left.
This motherboard, like all AM5 boards, comes with DDR5 memory support only, and here four slots allow a memory volume of up to 128GB. This volume is expected to change in the future with the availability of more compact memory sticks and will increase to 256GB.
In a non-ironic way, we think that one of the biggest improvements for the user in the latest generation of motherboards is this button, which is wired to the top PCI-Express interface to the video card and allows the catch hook to be pulled into the bracket. Pressing the button will release the video card when removed.
On the heatsink for the chipset we found this piece of text. We can’t help but wonder how many potential motherboard users are even going to read this, and what conclusions will they draw from it? “Innovative user controls deliver true game-ruling innovation”…
This motherboard includes three M.2 interfaces for SSD drives. The top interface supports the new 5.0 standard, and the middle and bottom support the 4.0 standard which is still considered advanced. There is an asterisk here though – when using the lower interface, the large PCI-Express interface below it will not provide traffic and will therefore be disabled. The PCI-Express X1 interfaces support the 4.0 standard. This motherboard comes with dedicated removable heatsinks for all of its M.2 interfaces.
The main PCI-Express X16 interface for the video card supports the 5.0 standard but also of course all previous standards in full. This interface has a spring release mechanism that pulls back, and not one that has a handle on a hinge as we know on many motherboards in the past. We give ASUS credit for that, it’s more durable.
The sound card built into this motherboard uses a Realtek ALC4080 controller which is considered among the best, but the display on the board itself is just as important. Here ASUS uses Nichicon capacitors and a Savitech SV3H712 amplifier for high resistance headphones. It’s not the quality you’ll find in an external sound card, but it’s nice to know that an emphasis will be made.
AMD’s new AM5 bracket gets a refresh in terms of rear ports found on motherboards. There are ten standard USB Type-A ports here split between the old USB 2.0, USB 5Gbps for faster storage devices, and 10Gbps (in red) for devices like the latest external SSD drives.
A pair of Type-C interfaces will allow additional connectivity at speeds of 10Gbps and 20Gbps. Here, unfortunately, we do not find the USB 4 standard that allows 40Gbps connectivity. It is still a bit new and a bit more expensive to implement. A pair of display interfaces will be used for built-in graphics cores in Ryzen processors but are expected to remain empty for this motherboard’s target audience, which uses video cards.
The network input connects to an Intel I225-V model controller at a speed of 2.5Gbps. There is also a connection to the antenna that comes in the package. This motherboard comes with a wireless network card that supports the Bluetooth 5.2 standard and WiFi 6E at a maximum speed of 2.4Gbps. It is advanced and fast enough for most users today.
Among the other interfaces you can also find a bios reset button, if overclocking has become a bit problematic for a normal system boot. One USB port surrounded by a rectangle is also used for “cold” burning of a BIOS file from a disk on key even if there is no processor in the bracket, which will facilitate the update for future processors mainly.
One thing that is evident in the last generation of motherboards is that the amount of common SATA interfaces starts to decrease on average. We are moving from a situation where all motherboards have six, to a situation where there are four. This transition takes place simultaneously with the growth of the storage market in the M.2 interface.
As befits any random AM5 motherboard that costs over $200, the B650E-F GAMING WIFI also gets a proper power supply system for the processor mount, even though AMD processors are considered relatively efficient and limited in cooling to really go wild.
The processing cores receive 12 stabilization stages, where the voltage stabilizers are SiC659 model produced by Vishay. This is a stabilizer model configured to work with a maximum current of 80A. Our only problem with it is that Vishay is in no hurry to publish full data of the component, so we can only rely on very rough calculations as to its effectiveness.
If we look at the data of a similar component such as SiC830, it is a product that is over 90 percent efficient in voltage conversion even at a current of 40A. If we throw such a figure on this system, then a voltage conversion with a current of 200A for the whole array will yield a heat production of about 12W or about a single watt per phase. To clear the head, you need a water cooling system in the assembly for 7950X to continuously draw 200A. In 170A mode which is a standard stress mode with air or water cooling for such a processor, the heat emission for the system is expected to be in the region of 10W or a little less than a watt for each stabilizer.
It’s not just good – it’s very good. This system is not expected to limit any processor in overclocking for the generations of processors that are expected to come out for the AM5 socket. We wouldn’t call it too over-engineered, it feels just in the right area.
The heatsink for the stabilizers is respectable enough. It is made of a single piece of aluminum with several fans. There are no cooling pipes and special refinements here, but there is really no need for those either.
We know the system is doing its job because we tested it hard and found that the delta over ambient temperature was only 25 degrees Celsius at the hottest point in the stabilizers. This motherboard will have no problem at all getting by in any standard gaming case with minimal airflow, it will survive any overclocking you throw at the CPU.
According to a summary – it is impossible not to refer to the value and condition of the AM5 mount as of the time of writing these lines. We like products like the ASUS B650E-F GAMING. It’s a fairly balanced motherboard, one that doesn’t have an LCD display for troubleshooting or full of buttons on the motherboard, but it’s also not designed for extreme overclocking, even though a large part of its hardware will definitely support it.
Compared to the AM4 mount, the price tiers seem to have gone up for everyone when talking about market shares. Suddenly, what belonged to the price category of the 220-230 dollar area is in the 300 dollar area and this is exactly the case with the B650E-F GAMING. This is not a problem that is specific to ASUS but to the entire motherboard market. Therefore, we have to be fair here and say that compared to the market, this is not the least profitable product you can purchase for $300, far from it.
If the array of interfaces and the overclocking capabilities of the B650E-F GAMING are something that speaks to you, there is no reason that such a motherboard will not become the center of the computer for the next generations of AMD as well, since processors that will be launched next year and the year after that will naturally support it after a BIOS update .
The market share and target audience for this motherboard will probably be those who choose processors such as Ryzen 7 7700X or Ryzen 9 7900X. We feel that the purpose of the Ryzen 5 7600X is mainly to be used by those with a lower budget, and there also a significantly cheaper motherboard can be a good choice.
Bottom line – this is a good product, a little expensive, but one for which we have no special complaints. We would love to see a two-digit LCD monitor for debugging and error display purposes, and perhaps also a power button on the motherboard itself. Also, three M.2 interfaces is far from the most we’ve seen on a $300 motherboard, even the Z690 boards offered four in a significantly cheaper price category.
Everything Else? Not bad. The board is generous in USB interfaces, including six controlled fan connectors, aesthetically not too flashy and will fit computer systems in many configurations. The board will be a proper basis for receiving a current Ryzen processor and probably also for Ryzen processors of the next two generations. ASUS is good at frequent bios updates for these things.