I have a deep fear about how messy AMD's Ryzen 7000 CPUs will be with too much thermal paste
AMD has got a big end of year ahead of it. Its third take on its RDNA architecture is due before the end of the year and we're expecting Zen 4 to launch at around the same time. To whet your appetite a little bit for that new CPU architecture, the AMD Ryzen Twitter account has posted a photo of its new AM5 socket along with a few bullet points about what's on offer. Nothing exactly new here, but it's a lovely image.
Meet the new AM5 platform:• LGA socket• Native support for up to 170W• DDR5 and PCIe 5.0 support• Compatible with Socket AM4 cooler pic.twitter.com/OqTFyw1kUiJuly 19, 2022
We know for instance that it's an LGA socket design similar, which should be familiar to anyone that has built an Intel system since it moved over to LGA 775. That means there are no pins on the chip itself, but rather contact pads, with the pins being in the motherboard socket.
It doesn't say so in the tweet, but we've know it's a 1718 pin LGA design, which means there are 1718 of the little suckers to bend, break, or otherwise destroy if you're not careful when handling your motherboard. Here's hoping motherboards ship with a socket protector like Intel's motherboards do.
Part of the reason for the increasing pin count is down to adding support for the latest technologies, such as DDR5 and PCIe 5.0—for reference, the current AM4 socket has 1,331 pin slots. Somewhat contentiously, AMD has said that it will be supporting DDR5 exclusively, and unlike Intel's Alder Lake chips, won't be offering support for both DDR5 and DDR4.
The issue with AMD's decision to only support the latest memory standard is cost—DDR5 is simply more expensive than DDR4, and while DDR5 pricing is starting to drop, you're still paying a premium. By way of example,
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