ASUS X570 Motherboard Prices Leak, and They’re Expensive

Tsing

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The increased pricing of X570 motherboards isn’t exactly a secret. MSI CEO Charles Chiang commented on this recently, pointing out that AMD was repositioning itself as a premium brand.

He never specified how much MSI’s boards would cost, but TechPowerUp has managed to get the alleged prices for ASUS’s models:

Prime X570-P: $159.99
TUF Gaming X570-Plus: $169.99 (Wi-FI Variant $184.99)
Prime X570-Pro: $249.99
ROG Strix X570-F Gaming: $299.99
ROG Strix X570-E Gaming: $329.99
ROG Crosshair VIII Hero: $359.99 (Wi-Fi Variant $379.99)
ROG Crosshair VIII Formula: $699.99

Basically, enthusiasts better prepare their wallets. That’s especially true for those upgrading to the Ryzen 3950X; they’ll likely need a top-of-the-line board to maximize the 16-core part’s potential.

A significant portion of the increased expense could be chalked up to new technologies such as PCIe 4.0, as well as the requirement for increased cooling.

For one, the AMD X570 chipset is a big and hot (~15W TDP) piece of silicon AMD designed in-house, with a large PCI-Express gen 4.0 switching fabric, and more downstream connectivity than the ASMedia-sourced X470 "Promontory." This chipset needs a much more capable cooling solution than what the X470 needed, including in many cases, an active fan-heatsink. AMD has also dialed up the electrical and physical requirements, with a stronger CPU VRM specification, possibly more than four PCB layers for improved memory wiring, and external PCI-Express gen 4.0 re-driver and lane segmentation components that could be expensive on account of being new.
 
According to the slide deck for the platform, there is a ton of switching capability to increase the flexibility of the platform. Basically, manufacturers can choose from a variety of options to customize the feature set. Its quite a bit different than the out going X470. Plus, as I understand it, PCIe 4.0 requires additional trace paths which further increase PCB complexity.

The post above mentions increases in CPU VRM being more robust but that's probably true of the memory as well. The RAM VRM's are probably more stout to support DDR4 5000MHz speeds through overclocking. As I've said in the past, AMD needed to be on point with its platform to compete against Intel and its done very well with its X370 and newer chipsets. It seems they are continuing the momentum with X570. The only downside is that the price is going up and effectively, on the high end there is zero cost savings vs. Intel in the mainstream segment. In HEDT, there was no cost savings on the motherboards, but there is a huge savings on the CPU side. That may change with whatever successor there is to X399 and the third generation of Threadripper CPU's.
 
Honestly, other than the VIII Formula I don't think those are all that bad.
 
I haven't been following the us/ China tariff situation, but wonder if these prices reflect that scenario. Or if prices could potentially go up higher.
 
SeymourGore said:
I haven't been following the us/ China tariff situation, but wonder if these prices reflect that scenario. Or if prices could potentially go up higher.
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That could have something to do with it. However, given what we know about the technical changes, these are far more expensive to produce than the X470 motherboards were.
 
SeymourGore said:
I haven't been following the us/ China tariff situation, but wonder if these prices reflect that scenario. Or if prices could potentially go up higher.
Click to expand...


I seem to remember a good portion of companies moving their smaller plants over into Taiwan
 
I'm a fan of the TUF/Sabertooth line from Asus, and that's not bad at all.

$700 for a consumer MoBo is asinine, imo.
 
That $700 version better cook me dinner and come covered in gold so I can at least sell it for something after it's outdated in a few years.
 
DejaWiz said:
I'm a fan of the TUF/Sabertooth line from Asus, and that's not bad at all.

$700 for a consumer MoBo is asinine, imo.
Click to expand...

Keep in mind that the TUF/Sabertooth series is a shell of what it was. At one time, they stood as equal but different to the ROG line. Now, they are budget gaming boards. It was also formerly a brand that represented durability and a different type of enthusiast who cared more for stability and longevity than anything. Now, they are a budget gaming oriented brand.

I made the mistake of recommending the line sight unseen to my girlfriend's dad and what he came back with was embarrassing. Notice that its been years since we got one at HardOCP. ASUS repositioned the brand and said nothing to reviewers. They dropped off the radar. They quit asking if we wanted them for review. They just seemed to disappear one generation.

Oh, gone are the olive drab "military" themed and more subtle aesthetics. Now, they have a yellow and black construction tape theme. This is the model I installed: https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/TUF-Z370-PLUS-GAMING/ It was awful in terms of quality. I'll be all over these if the X570's go back to being well built, but what I saw the last time was sad.
 
It is a shame what happened to the line. My Sabertooth 990FX was a pinnacle of durability, even came with a bunch of certificates for MIL spec stuff.
Seems now it's just a Prime board with a different color theme
 
I will be hard pressed to need to go to x570. Hoping I can get by with my 450 board for a bit.
 
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