If you want 3 m.2 slots 100% go for the x670e board.
By default on most B__0 boards installing a second m.2 SSD uses all remaining pcie lanes, and possibly even disables some features like sata ports. So installing a 3rd means downgrading your GPU from x16 to x8. X670/e gives you 8 more pcie lanes to fill with all the SSDs you want.
https://www.amd.com/en/products/processors/chipsets/am5.html#specs
Supposedly there’s no limitations on the b650 for pcie lanes but I did note that on other boards which is why I ruled other ones out. But yeah seems safer to go with x670e and then there’s a 4th m2 if I really need it.
Isn't it mostly do you need PCIE 5.0 / NVME 5.0 support:
AMD bringing out surprise 56/700X3D/5600XT recently does give them more brownie pts for extended support for the old AM4 platforms.
Maybe someday there will be a 96/7/800XT3D or something fancy for AM5?
🤔insert moniker naming scheme here.
I'm happy on my B650 board with NVME 4.0 drive and my 7900XTX is still only PCIE 4.0 so eh.
I don't have experience with those particular boards, so I don't know if there's any weird things to expect, but from when I bought my parts a couple years ago, general advice is that the *70 boards are really only worth the extra cost if you plan to do OC'ing on the CPU.
As a side note, a brand new chip might not have BIOS support out of the box until the vendors catch up. Just beware and plan for that possibility.
Thankfully both boards support bios flashback so as long as OP prepares a USB drive ahead of time, they can update bios without a CPU.
Also agreed on the X*70s. Besides the OCing stuff you'll see more pcie lanes but it doesn't sound like that's much of a concern for OP. Personally, with the small price difference and similar capabilities, I'd go with the one I thought looked better lol. The average user probably won't notice any difference between the two.
Yeah I’m all good for doing bios updates and as you say both boards have rear bios ports.
I think for $40 I may as well go with the x670e to get a pcie 5.0 nvme slot and better vrm. I’ve heard rumours that the x3d may be overclockable but doubt I’ll bother.