Introduction

MSI MPG B650 Carbon WIFI review

MSI has released a motherboard in the B650 series that is reasonably priced. The Ryzen 7000 ready MPG B650 Carbon WIFI series offers quad M2 slots (PCIe Gen4/Gen5), a 2.5 GigE connector, WIFI6E, and a powerful VRM design.  For most gamers, AMD's B650 motherboard is the best choice. With its reduced price, upgrading to AMD's latest generation of processors should be much simpler. But the CPUs and DDR5 memory will still cost a pretty penny. 

The B650 board is equipped with an LGA 1718 socket and can support the entire line of Ryzern 7000 Desktop CPUs. Of course, the new AM5 socket will be applied to B650 and B650E motherboards. The more affordable motherboards for AMD's Ryzen 7000 processors will be available on the B650 and B650E platforms. The X670/X670E platforms will be more costly overall. The B650/B650E should be the more practical choice down the road. While the bells and whistles of these cheaper solutions may be limited, they should still provide many of the premium capabilities that AM5 offers. DDR5 memory and PCI Express 5.0 connectivity are among the new features. There is a clear distinction between the X670 and X670E, with the latter guaranteeing PCIe 5.0 for both graphics card slots and the NVMe slot. The actual method of differentiating B650 and B650E from the X670 is not that hard; X670 and X670E consist of two physical chips, while those of the B650 family consist of only one. As a result, onboard I/O on B650-class motherboards will be cut in half. The MSI MPG B650 Carbon WIFI features a dual 8-pin connector for powering the CPU socket and is powered by a 16+2+1 phase digital power supply solution. The motherboard features dark heatsinks above the power supply, providing adequate cooling for the electrical components beneath. Regarding procedure memory, the board features four DDR5 DIMM slots that support EXPO overclocking. MSI equips the B650 with 2x PCIe x16 4.0 and 1x PCIe 3.0 x1 slots.  

There are four 2280 M.2 slots, which all have a thermal heat sink finished in the same brushed dark colour as the rest of the motherboard. One of them is PCIe Gen 5.0 compatible.  The PCH heatsink is coated in a dark palette and embossed with the product features. Additionally, the board features six SATA III ports. The rear panel connectors include a wide variety of USB 3.2 Gen 2 slots including 20 Gbps, HDMI, Display-Port, a dual 2.5G Ethernet port based on Realtek's 8125, and a seven-channel audio jack array. We'll load this B650 motherboard up with a Ryzen 7 7700X processor and see how well she handles it. Let's have a peek.