Vicious BSOD loop issue. Formula VIII + i7 7700K + Samsumg 950 Pro + 3101 Bios

[Trigger5521]

Hi guys looking for some more ideas to try I'm getting really really frustrated.

Background story. So I built my system back in Oct 2016 with i6700K, Samsung 950 Pro NVMe (win 10 installed to it), 16GB g.Skill 3400 RAM(in the QVL list), evga 1080GTX FTW. (can't remember the bios version so I'll assume whatever it shipped with).
System ran fine for a month or 2 until I decided to get a new Razer Keyboard and Mouse. Plugged them in and system BSOD, could not get out of the BSOD loop, managed to restore a backup from a WD My Cloud boot into safe mode and unistalled previous razer drivers.

Ok so things going along fine after that nightmare incident. Made sure I was backing up regularly, learned you have to have the backup in the root of another attached drive and folder must be named "WindowsImageBackup" for System Image restore to find it. You simply cannot connect to the WDMyCloud NAS with the Windows system Image software.
Anyways I got the system running at stock quite nicely for a while, say 3-4 weeks. Then I decided to see what kind of OC headroom my chip had. Easily achieved 4.7 3466 stable @ 1.31v. Ran a bunch of the ROG stress test, bench marks etc. Temps were never going over 80(custom waterloop). Ran like this for at least a month until this past Monday. I should add flashed the BIOS to 3101 during this time.

So Monday the computer was asleep, woke it up and it froze, NO blue screen just frozen. Had to kill the PSU to attempt to reboot. MB lights up system fails to post CPU LED lit red, can't even post into BIOS. Went through the whole internet have you tried shebang, reset cmos, remove ram, remove gfx card, remove drives yada yada. Nothing changed result, no post CPU LED lit red. So I removed the cpu and brought it to Canada computers where they offered to put it into a known good MB...to my surprise same thing CPU LED lit red, CPU is dead. SOB WTF gezzz first time in my whole computer career I've had a cpu fail(going back the i286 days).

So not wanting to be without a computer for 2-3weeks while I go through and see if Intel will RMA it. I decided what the hell I'll grab a new Kaby Lake 7700K pop it in and I'll be back in business. I could not have been more wrong! Popped the new processor in, posted right away. Bios recognized the CPU allowed it to go with the defaults. System tries to boot and I get dreaded BSOD SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED with no file name . System self restarts and tries to fix itself which of course it doesn't. Tried to boot into safe mode same BSOD. I'm like really...wtf why can't you go into safe mode. Anyways none of the other options work, system restore fails, auto fix fails. I give up and resign myself to pulling a backup off my NAS and getting onto my SSD games drive. Using the Win 10 CD to boot I access system Image restore and load the backup onto the 950 Pro m.2 drive. Strangely after the initial restart windows is working on updates, lots of them too has to go through 3 rounds of updates before it finally reboots to my login screen. I think wow finally gezz that was painful but what the hell I'm back and G2G. NOPE WRONG, I get a BSOD SYSTEM_THREAD_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED in less than 1 min. First I'm think ok this one won't be so bad, I should at least be able to get into safe mode and uninstalled NVidia drivers and whatnot to see what's going on. NOPE! can't do anything stuck in endless BSOD loop. Only options are to restore from image again or install Win 10 clean. I have done both of these options multiple times now today is Thursday I must have spent 25 hours on this already. I did have the system stable for a few hours after installing windows 10 clean, so I started one by one building back up. Went to the latest NVidia drivers rebooted then went to ASUS Suite III and got the damn same BSOD. I thought BINGO, conflict with the Asus Suite III and Nvidia. So back to my last system image but this time before logging in and before it could BSOD on me, I held SHIFT + restart and booted into safe mode. Here I uninstalled Asus Suite II and Nvidia drivers. System worked ok for a few mins after a couple of reboots and then BSOD AGAIN. Same vicious BSOD that completely cripples you.
Sorry for the long jumbled rant. That's where I sit right now. Looking for ideas.

I'm thinking BIOS 3101(beta) and the new 7700K are not ready for prime time. Thinking of trying the unofficial 3201 but would like some thoughts on that. Was also thinking of rolling back to 2202 but I don't think the new processor is support by this BIOS...can anyone confirm.
Any other ideas guys? Thanks again for reading.

[tkeysiv]

I have the M8F with the 7700k as well - and I'm at 3101 beta. I think you have some other issue based on your problems before you switched to the 7700k. You can try the 2202 bios, it supports the 7700k.

[Trigger5521]

tkeysiv wrote:
I have the M8F with the 7700k as well - and I'm at 3101 beta. I think you have some other issue based on your problems before you switched to the 7700k. You can try the 2202 bios, it supports the 7700k.

Thx for confirming, I will try 2202 now. Was worried if I flashed it might not post.

[Trigger5521]

wow ez flash will not let me use 2202 or 1902. Says they are not valid bios. Only 3101 and 3201 it will accept. Wonder if they have to be named mf8 first? I left them as default full names as dl from asus support site.

Ram tested OK with mem test button. I'm really starting to think another piece of hardware is damaged after the 6700k took a $hit. Trying just one stick and restoring. It's so painful to try things because once I get a BSOD I'm totally blocked. Only 2 options clean install of windows 10 or restore my system image. Take so long!!!

[tkeysiv]

Trigger5521 wrote:
wow ez flash will not let me use 2202 or 1902. Says they are not valid bios. Only 3101 and 3201 it will accept. Wonder if they have to be named mf8 first? I left them as default full names as dl from asus support site.

Ram tested OK with mem test button. I'm really starting to think another piece of hardware is damaged after the 6700k took a $hit. Trying just one stick and restoring. It's so painful to try things because once I get a BSOD I'm totally blocked. Only 2 options clean install of windows 10 or restore my system image. Take so long!!!

Every bios you wish to update to has to be renamed to M8F.CAP and placed in the root of the usb stick. Put the stick in the bios flash port on the mb and press and hold the flash button until it starts flashing blue and wait for it to stop flashing. This is with the system turned off, btw.

So once you download the bios file, extract it from the zip, and rename it to M8F.CAP. Of course you can only have one file with this name in the root of the usb stick, so if you have multiple bios files you want to hold on to, I'd suggest you keep the zip files and just extract, rename, and overwrite that M8F.CAP file with whichever one you want to use next.

1902 and earlier isn't compatible with the 7700k, I don't believe.

[Trigger5521]

tkeysiv wrote:
Every bios you wish to update to has to be renamed to M8F.CAP and placed in the root of the usb stick. Put the stick in the bios flash port on the mb and press and hold the flash button until it starts flashing blue and wait for it to stop flashing. This is with the system turned off, btw.

So once you download the bios file, extract it from the zip, and rename it to M8F.CAP. Of course you can only have one file with this name in the root of the usb stick, so if you have multiple bios files you want to hold on to, I'd suggest you keep the zip files and just extract, rename, and overwrite that M8F.CAP file with whichever one you want to use next.

1902 and earlier isn't compatible with the 7700k, I don't believe.

Thanks for that, weird how the naming restriction only applies to older Bios's.

I'm still 3201 for now. I dropped down to 1 stick of ram and did a clean install of win 10 to see what drivers apps might be triggering the BSOD. To my surprise I was able to work with it for a good 4-5 hours. I basically got everything setup the way I like(using Macrium Reflect to image as a go along).
The only things I didn't put on were the absolute latest Nvidia drivers(using what win10 wants) and all the Asus ROG stuff. At this point I thought hum maybe ram was my issue all along.
Tired loading my old system Image that was made before 6700k died with just 1 stick of RAM. BSOD within 2 min on the desktop.

This is the second time changing any hardware on my system (keyboard and Mouse 1st) and now CPU has forced me to fresh install Windows. I don't get it, is it something with the stupid UEFI windows secure boot BS. Sure seems like it because restoring a image taken with any hardware differences causes my crazy BSOD.

Now I'm back to suspecting Asus Suite III and Nvidia conflict but I had tried restoring my last good backup before the 6700K died, restarting in safe mode right away before it could BSOD. Uninstalled Nvidia and Asus Suite III but it still BSOD when I got back on the desktop. It's maddening!