z690 Apex with Samsung DDR5 Memory Issues?

[Murlo26]

Hi,

I have a new build put together and the memory is giving me all sorts of issues. I have seen a few people saying that the Apex board might have some dim slot issues but not sure if that is actually an issue. I snagged up a 6000mhz CL36 G Skill kit and tried pairing with my apex board and 12900k. Everything is on a custom water loop with fairly solid temps. I am on the latest bios. I recognize the Samsung flavor of sticks are not officially supported by the Apex board yet, but am curious as to why (per the QVL). The hero board has mine listed already but the apex list seems light. I tried the XMP profile and have had very little luck. I have been able to get it to boot into windows but typically crashes on any heavy workload and sometimes even just being in windows things lock up.

I am just curious if this is something I need a bios update for and just have to wait or I should look at going after different memory. Part of why I got the apex was to finally play around with memory overclocking but not even being able to run xmp kind of sucks. Just surprised that the apex board has so little support for memory so far.

Any thoughts?

I appreciate any help and sorry if this is covered elsewhere.

PC Components:

12900k (stock for now until I get memory sorted)
z690 Apex
G Skill F5-6000U3636E16GX2-TZ5K (32gb)
EVGA 3090 Kingpin Hydrocopper
EVGA 1300W G2 PSU
Corsair 5000d
2x360mm radiators
Windows 11

Edit: I have also tried the built in profiles on the apex, like all of them and none of those seem to work even speeds down to like 5200mhz, wouldn't boot into windows on those. I also tried the XMP and bumped voltage up...no luck really.

[Tactical_Donut]

Agreed, XMP is technically overclocking but should be set, forgot and stable if running the intended out of box timings and rated speeds. Period. Prior to Z690, and over many prior builds I have never had to tweak included XMP profiles for even base level stability like I have this time. XMP is well understood (and until now) I have found it to be well implemented across multiple generations with zero prior problems.

[Deke06]

Hi there.

I don't have the Apex, but I have been running this kit on my Z690-I with success. It was a bit problematic at first and required some tweaking. Rock solid stable now. It did require significant voltage increase to run XMP I along with a few other tweaks. I'll list them here and maybe it can help with your situation.

VDD 1.375
VDDQ 1.375
IVR Transmitter VDDQ Voltage 1.375
Memory controller voltage 1.25

CPU System Agent Voltage: Offset mode (this was actually the final tweak I made that got the kit stable
- CPU System Agent Voltage Offset: Auto

Additionally, and because I'm paranoid, I dialed in the BCLK manually to 100, disabled Asus multicore enhancement, set the BXLK:DRAM manually to 100:100, the Memory Controller: DRAM frequency to gear 2 (1:2), and manually set the DRAM frequency to 6000.

Finally, in BIOS Advanced\ Platform Misc Configuration I disabled PCI Express Native Power Management, since leaving it enabled causes a ton of WHEA errors.

Every CPU, RAM and board combo is different, and DDR5 seems to have re-emphasized this fact. Hope this info helps and best of luck. It's a great kit once you get it stable.

[Murlo26]

Deke06 wrote:
Hi there.

I don't have the Apex, but I have been running this kit on my Z690-I with success. It was a bit problematic at first and required some tweaking. Rock solid stable now. It did require significant voltage increase to run XMP I along with a few other tweaks. I'll list them here and maybe it can help with your situation.

VDD 1.375
VDDQ 1.375
IVR Transmitter VDDQ Voltage 1.375
Memory controller voltage 1.25

CPU System Agent Voltage: Offset mode (this was actually the final tweak I made that got the kit stable
- CPU System Agent Voltage Offset: Auto

Additionally, and because I'm paranoid, I dialed in the BCLK manually to 100, disabled Asus multicore enhancement, set the BXLK:DRAM manually to 100:100, the Memory Controller: DRAM frequency to gear 2 (1:2), and manually set the DRAM frequency to 6000.

Finally, in BIOS Advanced\ Platform Misc Configuration I disabled PCI Express Native Power Management, since leaving it enabled causes a ton of WHEA errors.

Every CPU, RAM and board combo is different, and DDR5 seems to have re-emphasized this fact. Hope this info helps and best of luck. It's a great kit once you get it stable.

Thank you for the reply. I might try this out and see if it helps or works. Thanks again.

[Deke06]

My pleasure. Incidentally, this kit isn't on the QVL for my board either. It was just the first kit I could actually get my hands on.

[Murlo26]

Deke06 wrote:
My pleasure. Incidentally, this kit isn't on the QVL for my board either. It was just the first kit I could actually get my hands on.

Same, first kit I was able to get when DDR5 was a lot harder to come by. Also I wanted something at least at 5600 as anything slower seemed like it wasn't really better than ddr4.

Ironically, I got it in a bundle with a z690 hero but I didn't want to risk the reversed polarity cap issue so returned just the mobo to newegg unopened and grabbed the apex. Feeling like I should've just rocked the hero but I am hoping it's just that they haven't finished testing samsung kits yet.

[wing_man]

These settings work for my board and ram

Z690 Apex Made 11/21
UEFI 1505 or 1304
Samsung 2x16 6000 CL36 36 36 76 2T
VDD 1.40V
VDDQ 1.40V
VDDQTX Auto
MCVDD 1.19V
VCCSA 0.95V

[wing_man]

wing_man wrote:
These settings work for my board and ram

Z690 Apex Made 11/21
UEFI 1505 or 1304
Samsung 2x16 6000 CL36 36 36 76 2T
VDD 1.40V
VDDQ 1.40V
VDDQTX Auto
MCVDD 1.19V
VCCSA 0.95V

XMP 2
Windows 11

Totally stable

[Jlozde]

I just wanted to post an update. Couple of pages ago I wrote that I can not boot on xmp profile with my Gskill 6000 rams which is in the QVL list. Thanks to Asus Turkey they could not find a working motherboard for me. I have tried 4 different Apex mobo thanks to retailer not Asus Turkey.

Finally, I decided to buy a MSI Unify-x, boom no issue with xmp anymore even I can boot 6800mhz @1.38v. It is not yet stable needs some fine tuning. But there are my results at 6000mhz and 6400mhz.

Same CPU, RAM ....

This issue crystal clear to me.

[CNesbit]

Hi,

I have an APEX board 90MB18IO-M0AAY0. I have this because I had the Hero board with the reversed capacitor and sent it back. I really don't feel like ripping my board out again. Is there a "known good" DDR5 2x16 or 2x32 which will work on this version? I have a 2x16 Gskill 5600 set now but I can't run XMP only default timings.

Thanks!

[rjbarker]

You guys are putting far too much energy into Apex QVL......has nothing to do with the Memory kits not being listed.

The Apex Board is superior to other Baords....XMP reuires to be tweaked a bit....tons of threads.

Saw one thread wehre someone with an APEX was retruning both kits of 5600 C36 Dominators as "XMP isnt working"....I have exact same kit....booted into XMP fine, but not fully stable, a few minor tweaks and it OC's fine and have it running at 6000 C36.....

Suggest going here to Shaminos OC'ing Thread and have a quick read thru Part 2 "Memory".....in that time that you post stuff about QVL stuff you could have a qiuick read and follow some of the suggestions.....get her up n running....its where I began...

https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?126439-ROG-Z690-Overclocking-Guide

Remember XMP = OC
I have had other Memory going back to DDR3 that required tweaking after loading the XMP Profile....
My last GSkill DDR4 4000 Royals required a bit if tweaking on my Maximus XI - Extreme Board as well.....