New BIOS: Z690 BIOS 3501

[1100R]

"The update introduces the Intel Baseline Profile option, allowing users to revert to Intel factory default settings for basic functionality, lower power limits, and improving stability in certain games"

I haven't installed it yet, I think it's aimed at 14000K cpus

[simon_leuener]

I already did this on every BIOS update since 3101....
Fact is, that most likely the the Voltage changes (and other minor things) in order to make the "new" paying customers  for the 6400 - 8400 Mhz RAMs happy, ruins the stability for the "old" 6000 - 6400 Mhz RAMs accordingly.
I saw many complains on Reddit and other Tech forums about the very bad situation on every new ASUS BIOS
since 2802.

[Enet]

Before a few months ago, if I were writing on Reddit then I would have had similar complaints. But in the end, my issues were mostly caused by what I mentioned before. I think in my case the ram stability went down a little since earlier Bios but not enough to cause a major issue. I don't think this is about making higher speed ram customers happy which financially wouldn't make sense. But I suppose, if there has been a drop in stability, however minor, then it probably affects your high speed ram more than it affects my 5600 ram.

[MightEMatt]

As with Simon, I've also tried this on every bios since 3101. No overclocking, I make very few changes apart from enabling XMP so I've never loaded settings in from a previous BIOS. I always load defaults and reboot before making my changes again so it shouldn't have anything to do with corrupted settings between versions.

3101+ are just scuffed for me. If I didn't have 2802 as reference I would probably RMA my cpu or ram, but everything is perfectly stable when returning to pre-3101 versions. I can only hope somebody on the team is aware of this and fixes it in the future, but I'm not holding my breath.

[Silent_Scone]

Hi,

XMP is overclocking, though. Which is why it holds no assurances. Changes to CPU ucode and ME firmware can also impact overclocking. If not willing to tune manually, stick to a UEFI that works out of the box. Some more info can be found here

Be sure to try XMP II as this contains the default DIMM timings and can sometimes net better stability, but your mileage may vary as this is not the profile used to validate the board by either ASUS or the memory vendor.

[MightEMatt]

Yeah I figured somebody would nitpick that. I meant no manual overclocking, no tweaks to the CPU which might affect IMC stability.

My point is that something has changed that COULD be fixed in 3101+, since it works in 2802. It very well could be ME 2307 since that is when the problem first arose. Using your own language, recent BIOS versions result in worse overclocking performance, this should be a problem for everybody. We should all want better performance and more stability across the board.

Also claiming that it holds "no assurances" is a bit of a stretch. Assuming you have the resources to prove which component is the culprit you can usually claim warranty on failure to run XMP. I've successfully RMAd motherboards, CPUs and RAM because of their instability with XMP. All 3 components advertise it as a supported feature that is intended to work seamlessly.

Again, 3101+ has made previously stable systems unstable. I would like this fixed, that's all I'm saying.

[Enet]

I wouldn't say that recent BIOS versions result in worse overclocking performance. Assuming 3401 and 3501 are identical then that has not been the case for me. Different mobos, different RAM and different Windows setups in combination all make a difference. But I know that doesn't help in your case.

[MightEMatt]

Update, 3603 appears to have fixed my instability issues. I can run XMPI and XMPII now. I can no longer run XMP Tweaked, but it only errors at 2 or 3 per test pass, instead of the hundreds of errors per second I was getting on all profiles on 3101-3501 for the duration of the test.

So for anybody who had memory problems on 3101-3501 give 3603 a try, hopefully I'm not alone.

[raddragon]

Same here. Took 100 tries to install Windows. Sync your cores to 55 and you'll have stability

[JohnAb]

That sounds frustrating. I was just thinking, perhaps rather than try making adjustments, would it be easier to go back to the last BIOS that was working OK for you (3401 I think)? Hopefully the next BIOS release might prove to be better. 

I've never understood why some combinations are problematic, it's all down to the CPU IMC I guess, but DDR5 is getting mature now and I would have thought that BIOS versions should be more robust by now. One way to look at things, I suppose, is that claimed RAM speeds are optimistic, so if everybody was happy to dial down their RAM speeds that might help. However, buying 6600 sticks and running them at, say, 6400 doesn't tend to make happy customers. 

I'll bet that DDR5 has cost a lot of money in returned motherboards, RAM modules and CPUs. My RAM is only rated at 5200 and it's always been stable on XMP with every BIOS, but then again it's probably below the speed at which problems tend to show themselves because most IMCs can cope OK at that speed.

[simon_leuener]

Hi John
Thank u for the input. Well I also had problems with the last 2 BIOS in the beginning (maybe u remember I posted in the threads here back then. 
XMPII and set my 6000Mhz RAM to 5800Mhz helped. But not this time.
It seems, like ASUS only focus on Z790 and 13th and 14th Gen Intel anymore.
Very bad support really.