PCIe 4.0 for all: Asus announces its B550 motherboard line-up

Motherboards with the AMD B550 chipset are finally making an appearance. They are compatible with Ryzen 3000 (and 4000, in theory at least) desktop APUs, and provide up to 20 PCIe 4.0 lanes each, yet are aimed at the budget end of the market.

They include Asus' latest slew of boards, which may allow a new PC to get a lot out of a decent candidate processor while costing as little as US$135 (correct at time of writing).

Asus B550 motherboards also allow for as many as 4 USB 3.2 Gen 2 ports that are associated with the processor in question. The OEM also asserts that their voltage regulator modules (VRMs) are equal to the demands of modern-day gaming: these new components feature up to 14+2 power stages with "proprietary ProCool solid-core power connectors" in some cases.

Similarly, the Taiwanese company claims that heatsink counts have also risen across nearly the whole of this new line-up. The boards are also equipped with up-to-date features such as Wi-Fi 6, BIOS FlashBack (an update method that only requires a USB drive and power), pre-installed I/O shields and RGB with Aura Sync.

These new B550 boards come in a range of SKUs from 3 of Asus' best-known brands, and are nearly all priced already. Specifically, they consist of the:

• ROG Strix B550-E Gaming; $279.99
• ROG Strix B550-F Gaming (Wi-Fi); $209.99
• ROG Strix B550-F Gaming; $189.99
• ROG Strix B550-I Gaming; $229.99
• TUF Gaming B550-Plus; $169.99
• TUF Gaming B550M-Plus (Wi-Fi); $179.99
• TUF Gaming B550M-Plus; $159.99
• Prime B550-Plus; $149.99
• Prime B550M-A (Wi-Fi); $149.99
• Prime B550M-A; $134.99
• Prime B550M-K; price TBD

They are all available from June 16, 2020 from retailers such as Newegg.