ASRock B650I Lightning WiFi

Specifications

Socket

AM5

Wi-Fi chipset

MediaTek MT7922

Form factor

mini-itx

DIMM slots

2 slots

M.2 slots

2 slots

M.2 lengths

2280

Memory

DDR5

What a buyer needs to know

$169.99 — the budget pick and a fine one. Same MediaTek MT7922 (`mt7921e`) as the B850I, verified by a real Linux hardware probe. Its 96GB memory cap is meaningless on a console. 🛑 DO NOT 'UPGRADE' TO AN X870 ITX BOARD. Both X870 mini-ITX boards on the market (ASUS ROG Strix X870-I, $389.99; MSI MPG X870I EDGE TI EVO, $339.99) ship the MediaTek MT7927, which has NO LINUX DRIVER IN ANY KERNEL UP TO 7.0 — not flaky, ABSENT (confirmed by linux-hardware.org probes, one of them taken on Bazzite: driver `-`, failed). On a machine whose whole job is to sit under a TV far from the router, that is a $390 paperweight. THE MITIGATION, WHICH YOU SHOULD BE TOLD AND NOT SURPRISED BY: wifi on every board here is a SOCKETED M.2 KEY-E 2230 MODULE, not soldered. A ~$20 MT7922 card converts any bad-wifi board into a good one. So MT7927 is 'broken until you swap a $20 card' — budget it and an extra step, or just buy a B850.

Where to buy