TeutonJon78 wrote:
That's kind of why I asked. The uncompressed flash sizes are the full chip size. So it should literally be writing every bit anyway, so I don't see how one method would be different than the others. Maybe the flashback method clears out some UEFI variable or something, but loading the optimized defaults should essentially do the same thing.
Exactly. If it's doing a bit-for-bit flash of the chip, then presumably there must be something else happening to preserve some of the settings. Maybe it only flashes part of the chip? Maybe it saves some settings somewhere else and restores some of them afterwards? Given the level of competence Asus have been displaying, nothing would surprise me. Could be happening by design, could be entirely accidental!
TeutonJon78 wrote:
And it's not like they advertise that on all the various motherboard models either. And in fact all it says on the listings is you need to rename the file if you are using flashback, not that you need to use flashback. It's probably the same as people who thought you need to factory reset a phone 3 times when you install a 3rd party ROM for some reason -- like it would actually clear anything different.
Yeah I do feel sorry for all the less techy people who just expect their expensive motherboard to actually work in a sensible and predictable fashion, who for some reason don't immediately think of going to the Asus forums to see if there's some obscure nonsensical workaround known only to enthusiasts. It really is a bit of a piss-take - if the other flashing methods don't work as intended and they can't be arsed to fix them, the least they could do is disable them and say explicitly "always use flashback". But of course Asus just want to sell you hardware and couldn't care less what happens after you've bought it...
