Wednesday, September 7th 2022
MSI Reveals its Official Pricing for its X670 Motherboards and They're Not Affordable
MSI has put up the pricing of its upcoming X670E and X670 motherboards on its website and it's already causing a stir online, as MSI seems to have priced itself out of the market. Starting at the bottom of the product stack, where the Pro X670-P WiFi sits at US$289.99, which should be compared to the X570-A Pro (without WiFi) which retails for around $110. Admittedly we don't know the exact pricing of MSI's competitors at this point in time, but this seems like a very steep price for a lower-end board in the category. However, things don't improve, as the MPG X670E Carbon WiFi comes in at US$479.99, or about $200 more than its X570S counterpart is currently selling for. This is also at least $70 more than what we expect Gigabyte's X670E Aorus Master to sell at.
Next step up is the MEG X670E ACE which comes in at a steep $699.99, which is at least $100 more than what Gigabyte's X670E Aorus Xtreme is expected to sell for and around twice the current retail price of the MEG X570 ACE Gaming. Finally, MSI is asking for a whopping US$1,299.99 for the MEG X670E Godlike, a price we can't see many being willing to pay for what appears to be a fairly unexciting flagship board, at least compared to what we've seen from ASUS. It's obviously far from the first $1,000 plus board, but despite a fairly feature packed bundle, this board is simply bad value for money no matter how you look at it. Hopefully MSI will adjust their pricing based on the comments that are already posted around the internet, but we're going to have to wait until the official retail date to see if these boards will come down in price or not.
Source:
MSI
Next step up is the MEG X670E ACE which comes in at a steep $699.99, which is at least $100 more than what Gigabyte's X670E Aorus Xtreme is expected to sell for and around twice the current retail price of the MEG X570 ACE Gaming. Finally, MSI is asking for a whopping US$1,299.99 for the MEG X670E Godlike, a price we can't see many being willing to pay for what appears to be a fairly unexciting flagship board, at least compared to what we've seen from ASUS. It's obviously far from the first $1,000 plus board, but despite a fairly feature packed bundle, this board is simply bad value for money no matter how you look at it. Hopefully MSI will adjust their pricing based on the comments that are already posted around the internet, but we're going to have to wait until the official retail date to see if these boards will come down in price or not.
73 Comments on MSI Reveals its Official Pricing for its X670 Motherboards and They're Not Affordable
It also prices people out of the market. In order to exact every ounce of profit these companies are turning PC gaming into a blood sport between customers and their wallets. I want PC gaming to grow but this kind of price is just off-putting to so many people. Even if people would only consider entry level products it's this kind of thing they see and figure that PC gaming is only for the rich. It's this sentiment that had PC gamers only getting ports back in the Xbox 360 era, do people really want to go back to that? Ease of access and affordability are what made modern PC gaming, these prices are just out of hand and stand to potentially ruin that.
So the question becomes, why would the motherboard manufacturers enjoy that increased price or even demand it in the first place when they did nothing to deserve?
MSI is immediately removed from my list of manufacturers worth considering this winter. I liked my MSI mbs :( sad to see them go this route.
Hard to make any conclusions till all the boards are revealed and have actual buy it now buttons next to them.
Of course I'll revisit all of the players later but as is, MSI has gone full on stupid for some reason. One can only assume to drop pricing after the immediate launch to give that msrp vs look at the deal your gettin feel.
So we have 2 options here:
1. Other manufacturer(s) reveal much cheaper comparative boards
2. Other manufacturer(s) reveal pretty much the same price comparative boards
We all would much rather like number 1 and would punish MSI for doing so as an added bonus. The thing is though, MSI is not some stupid immature and inexperienced company, oh no. They are very good at what they do and know their shlt. Given that, I sadly think that we are more likely to see the option 2 playing out in reality. That's so sad.
14 80 amp power stages for the cpu
4x M.2 slots 3x at 4.0 1x at 5.0
8 layer pcb vs 6 on a lot of high end X570 boards
This pretty much looks like a 250+ X570 board
For people who don't want to pay for all that there will be B650 board's.
Now if other manufacturers come out with X670 boards with identical features for 50-100 usd less then sure msi is smoking some good $h!+.
If your not trying to absolutely max the platform and aren't into overclocking then you'll buy/target a B series board which should run on a single 8 pin with no issues.
A manufacturer building a motherboard for Intel today, knows that after Rocket Lake they don't have to support any new series of CPUs. With AMD I bet many manufacturers where not happy seeing AMD making the favor to AM4 owners to announce support for even the 5000 series on old motherboards with 300 series chipsets. Manufacturers, when they where putting a price tag on 300 series motherboards, probably they where not expecting to keep making firmwares for those motherboards in 2022. If they knew it, those motherboards could have been more expensive.
Motherboard manufacturers have to keep selling new motherboards every year to support themselves. With someone buying an AM5 today and not having to buy again a new motherboard for the next 5-6 years, motherboard makers will make it sure to get higher profit margin from that buyer in that period of 5-6 years. So, (as an example with random numbers) if they have to sell two motherboards, one Intel and one AMD that each costs them to make $100, they will sell the Intel motherboard for $150, expecting the buyer to swap motherboard at least once in those 5-6 years and the AMD motherboard $200, expecting that the buyer will probably not swap motherboard for the same period of 5-6 years. Doing that, they can expect a profit of $100 from both buyers in the period of those 5-6 years.
If this is the case, we can expect AM5 motherboard pricing to keep declining year after year, the closer we get to AM5's end of line. But the first batch will be ultra expensive.
Well, it's not that intel can't do the same with Biostar, ASRock, ASUS, etc. but will it be worth it? More so, AMD now are big and strong; they have claws and will to fight. Will mobo OEM risk it going to bed with intel?