Not all AM4 mobos will support all AM4 CPUs

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

This sort of thing has been happening with AMD platforms pretty much since the beginning. Backwards compatibility was a possibility provided the board manufacturers support it. Go for the higher end boards and you'll be fine. Go for the bottom of the barrel offerings, you're most likely in trouble. 

[AkatsukiKun]

3 hours ago, Jurrunio said:

Cant AMD just support BIOS flashback (no CPU needed) with a new chipset? So people can just flash in the BIOS with the right support any time they want.

The problem with that is BIOS flashback in this case with Asus, Gigabyte with what they call either EZ Flash or USB BIOS Flashback is it's almost always limited to the top end board. Which is why they've started the Ryzen+ cpu support by sending in bristol ridge kits to upgrade the BIOS since many B350 as well as A320 boards don't have these (cpu-less bios flashing).

Which is why I didn't think about getting my Crosshair VI Hero board, it was shipping from New York/Jersey instead of say around Toronto/Richmond/Brampton where Amazon's fulfillment centres are because I assume Asus was updating the bios in their centres there which I assume they have.

Also yes, my Crosshair VI Hero has Bios flashback, which I went for instead of Gigabyte's Ultra Gaming/5 x470.

[flibberdipper]

Who knows, maybe it'll be like older AMx sockets that were halfway retarded (such as my AM2+ board "supporting" a Sempron 145 without recognizing it).

[asus killer]

Seems like a stupid issue. Create different bios for ryzen 1st gen and 2nd gen and users can download accordingly just the version they need.

 

It seems more like manufacturers creating an artificial problem to sell more boards.

[Jito463]

3 minutes ago, asus killer said:

It seems more like manufacturers creating an artificial problem to sell more boards.

Or more likely cheaping out to save a few pennies, then having it bite them in the rear.

[Misanthrope]

At first I thought this was a concern and long term it might be but Bristol Ridge? is anyone really going to lose sleep now that the 2200G are out and new lower tier cpus are forthcoming?

[Taf the Ghost]

32 minutes ago, AkatsukiKun said:

The problem with that is BIOS flashback in this case with Asus, Gigabyte with what they call either EZ Flash or USB BIOS Flashback is it's almost always limited to the top end board. Which is why they've started the Ryzen+ cpu support by sending in bristol ridge kits to upgrade the BIOS since many B350 as well as A320 boards don't have these (cpu-less bios flashing).

Which is why I didn't think about getting my Crosshair VI Hero board, it was shipping from New York/Jersey instead of say around Toronto/Richmond/Brampton where Amazon's fulfillment centres are because I assume Asus was updating the bios in their centres there which I assume they have.

Also yes, my Crosshair VI Hero has Bios flashback, which I went for instead of Gigabyte's Ultra Gaming/5 x470.

MSI, at their Computex booth, was talking about bringing USB Flashback to all of their boards. I kind of hope it becomes industry standard anyway.

[Taf the Ghost]

1 minute ago, Misanthrope said:

At first I thought this was a concern and long term it might be but Bristol Ridge? is anyone really going to lose sleep now that the 2200G are out and new lower tier cpus are forthcoming?

No. I expect it'll be dropped from microcode by most vendors in the next iteration anyway. (Odds are they've brought it up because it sits out there as a far bigger chunk of code for such a small number of CPUs.)

[Trixanity]

I think we'll see them drop Bristol down the road for new boards.

It seems the codebase for Bristol takes up a sizeable chunk because it's so different from Zen based products. They should be able to consolidate and share some of the code between the other Zen products to be able to support a very large product stack. I imagine it won't be as big a problem to support 4 or 5 generations of Zen as it would be 2 generations and Excavator.

 

That being said this is once again OEMs doing the bare minimum for AMD's platforms and AMD not putting their foot down. Ultimately it's a game of economics and not a technical issue so it's up to OEMs to spent the extra dough to make it work if they want to.

[Jito463]

4 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

That being said this is once again OEMs doing the bare minimum for AMD's platforms and AMD not putting their foot down.

To be fair, it's rather hard to "put your foot down" when you're as much of an underdog as AMD is.  Especially when they've lagged as far behind Intel as they had been before Ryzen.

[AlTech]

The motherboard guys had no faith in Ryzen and tried to save a few pennies.

 

What a load of shit. The motherboard guys could easily fix this but they don't want to. 

 

Next time I buy a new motherboard, I'll buy the board from the OEM that doesn't screw everyone over.

 

I didn't expect this level of pettiness from OEMs. It almost makes me wish AMD put their foot down and taught those OEMs a lesson.

[Dabombinable]

And yet my P5Q Deluxe manages to have its BIOS chip hold the necessary microcode for:

• All 90nm LGA775 CPU
• All 65nm LGA775 & LGA771 CPU
• All 45nm LGA775 & LGA771 CPU

[NumLock21]

7 hours ago, Jurrunio said:

Cant AMD just support BIOS flashback (no CPU needed) with a new chipset? So people can just flash in the BIOS with the right support any time they want.

Bios flashback has nothing to do with AMD, it's a feature by Asus and it's up to them to decide if they want to include it or not. The only boards that have it are their top tier Prime and ROG series. Rest of them including ROG Strix will not have this feature.

Here is their AM4 ROG and it has USB biosflash back button located in the back i/o

https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/ROG-CROSSHAIR-VII-HERO/

[DrMacintosh]

6 hours ago, Sierra Fox said:

heh heh

 

#FUCKYOUAMD

Uhh, did you read? This isn’t really an issue....

[mr moose]

This may or not may not be the issue biostar thinks it is, however if you bought an early AM4 mobo thinking you aren't going to miss out on features in future generations,  then you aren't paying attention to history.  No company has managed to maintain full compatibility across multiple generations of product without  limitations, I see no reason why AM4 will be different.

[Trixanity]

4 minutes ago, mr moose said:

This may or not may not be the issue biostar thinks it is, however if you bought an early AM4 mobo thinking you aren't going to miss out on features in future generations,  then you aren't paying attention to history.  No company has managed to maintain full compatibility across multiple generations of product without  limitations, I see no reason why AM4 will be different.

I think AMD has only promised that the processors will fit in the socket and that they'll make sure they'll work until further notice. They can't nor will they promise that newer chipsets will work 100% (100% meaning all features etc) on older processors and vice versa. They kinda also have an obligation to give board vendors the opportunity to sell new boards which feature exclusivity promotes despite it being detrimental to the consumer. 

 

This topic is a testimony to the fact that AMD isn't selling directly to consumers though. OEMs can block support for any feature they see fit. We're seeing it with this where not all microcode can fit on the memory chip. We also see it with ECC memory where every CPU supports it but few board vendors will enable it.

 

Bristol Ridge isn't a big loss though. I'd be more outraged if they cut off first gen Ryzen next year.

[Dabombinable]

1 hour ago, NumLock21 said:

Bios flashback has nothing to do with AMD, it's a feature by Asus and it's up to them to decide if they want to include it or not. The only boards that have it are their top tier Prime and ROG series. Rest of them including ROG Strix will not have this feature.

Here is their AM4 ROG and it has USB biosflash back button located in the back i/o

https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/ROG-CROSSHAIR-VII-HERO/

My Asus H87M Pro has their USB BIOS flashback, as does my Z97 Sabertooh MKII (which is actually as far from top tier feature wise as the H87 board). Decent midrange Asus boards also have it.

24 minutes ago, mr moose said:

This may or not may not be the issue biostar thinks it is, however if you bought an early AM4 mobo thinking you aren't going to miss out on features in future generations,  then you aren't paying attention to history.  No company has managed to maintain full compatibility across multiple generations of product without  limitations, I see no reason why AM4 will be different.

Asus managed, because of not having any of the UEFI UI bloat (and "backward support VRD10.X CPU"):

https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P5Q_Deluxe/HelpDesk_CPU/

Remember, that's official support for all 90, 65 and 45nm LGA775 CPU/

[Doobeedoo]

Still odd for such limitations at this day and age. Board manufacturers could really bolster this.

[Arika]

5 hours ago, Jito463 said:

Yes, because AMD is obviously to blame for the MoBo manufacturers screwing up. 

ThEY ArE

 

also see below

55 minutes ago, DrMacintosh said:

Uhh, did you read? This isn’t really an issue....

I'm Just firing in with how AMD fans would react had this been Intel since people like to jump up and down whenever something bad happens around Intel, regardless of whether or not it was their fault

[mr moose]

22 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

I think AMD has only promised that the processors will fit in the socket and that they'll make sure they'll work until further notice. They can't nor will they promise that newer chipsets will work 100% (100% meaning all features etc) on older processors and vice versa. They kinda also have an obligation to give board vendors the opportunity to sell new boards which feature exclusivity promotes despite it being detrimental to the consumer. 

 

This topic is a testimony to the fact that AMD isn't selling directly to consumers though. OEMs can block support for any feature they see fit. We're seeing it with this where not all microcode can fit on the memory chip. We also see it with ECC memory where every CPU supports it but few board vendors will enable it.

 

Bristol Ridge isn't a big loss though. I'd be more outraged if they cut off first gen Ryzen next year.

Absolutely.   I always refer back to the AM socket series and the loss of features as earlier boards agerd.  yes you could stick later CPU in an earlier board, but at the expense of DDR3, SMT etc.  I really don;t think AM4 will be any differeent, buying a nmobo today for a possible CPU in 4-5 years is taking an extreme gamble on features let alone the fact their might be cheaper options available then.

6 minutes ago, Sierra Fox said:

ThEY ArE

 

also see below

I'm Just firing in with how AMD fans would react had this been Intel since people like to jump up and down whenever something bad happens around Intel, regardless of whether or not it was their fault

 

How true, had this been about Intel there would have been 16 "fuck you Intel" posts already and the rest with self inflating comments like "we'll this is to be expected, it's Intel after all" .

 

 

[mr moose]

22 minutes ago, Dabombinable said:

 

Asus managed, because of not having any of the UEFI UI bloat (and "backward support VRD10.X CPU"):

https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/P5Q_Deluxe/HelpDesk_CPU/

Remember, that's official support for all 90, 65 and 45nm LGA775 CPU/

I don't think anyone is claiming this is an insurmountable problem (although I am sure some will insinuate it is), I think the problem might be restricted top manufacturers who use too small of a bios chip.

 

My comments are more general about the way technology advances and how you can't rely on full compatability over extended periods without losing some features. Unless you have a crystal ball of course .

 

[Jito463]

46 minutes ago, Sierra Fox said:

I'm Just firing in with how AMD fans would react had this been Intel since people like to jump up and down whenever something bad happens around Intel, regardless of whether or not it was their fault

In truth, I would be less lenient towards Intel in this regard if the roles were reversed, but not because of fanboyism.  It's because Intel has the clout to make the manufacturers adhere to their whims, and could force them to stick to a strict set of specifications.  AMD lacks that kind of clout, as I stated in a previous post.

4 hours ago, Jito463 said:

To be fair, it's rather hard to "put your foot down" when you're as much of an underdog as AMD is.  Especially when they've lagged as far behind Intel as they had been before Ryzen.

 

[Jurrunio]

5 hours ago, AkatsukiKun said:

The problem with that is BIOS flashback in this case with Asus, Gigabyte with what they call either EZ Flash or USB BIOS Flashback is it's almost always limited to the top end board. Which is why they've started the Ryzen+ cpu support by sending in bristol ridge kits to upgrade the BIOS since many B350 as well as A320 boards don't have these (cpu-less bios flashing).

Which is why I didn't think about getting my Crosshair VI Hero board, it was shipping from New York/Jersey instead of say around Toronto/Richmond/Brampton where Amazon's fulfillment centres are because I assume Asus was updating the bios in their centres there which I assume they have.

Also yes, my Crosshair VI Hero has Bios flashback, which I went for instead of Gigabyte's Ultra Gaming/5 x470.

I'm mentioning the name here to show what I hope AMD can make as a function of the chipset, say put a USB connector somewhere that's specific to updating the BIOS and all boards with the chipset will have it.

5 hours ago, asus killer said:

Seems like a stupid issue. Create different bios for ryzen 1st gen and 2nd gen and users can download accordingly just the version they need.

That's the problem, you have the right BIOS, but you cant flash it in...

2 hours ago, NumLock21 said:

Bios flashback has nothing to do with AMD, it's a feature by Asus and it's up to them to decide if they want to include it or not. The only boards that have it are their top tier Prime and ROG series. Rest of them including ROG Strix will not have this feature.

Here is their AM4 ROG and it has USB biosflash back button located in the back i/o

https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/ROG-CROSSHAIR-VII-HERO/

That's why I hope AMD will make it a feature of the chipset and not one added in by their board partners.

 

These wont affect me too much anyway (I cant afford even Ryzen), but being close enough to mainland China means I only need $10 to do anything that needs special tools, say flash a new BIOS without a CPU on boards that need one, even hardmodding Z170/270 boards and slap an 8700k on it later.

[mr moose]

3 minutes ago, Jurrunio said:

I'm mentioning the name here to show what I hope AMD can make as a function of the chipset, say put a USB connector somewhere that's specific to updating the BIOS and all boards with the chipset will have it.

That's the problem, you have the right BIOS, but you cant flash it in...

That's why I hope AMD will make it a feature of the chipset and not one added in by their board partners.

 

These wont affect me too much anyway (I cant afford even Ryzen), but being close enough to mainland China means I only need $10 to do anything that needs special tools, say flash a new BIOS without a CPU on boards that need one, even hardmodding Z170/270 boards and slap an 8700k on it later.

Board manufacturers can make that an option without AMD if they want.  Mind you why put in such a feature to fix and issue that could be fixed by simply using a bigger bios chip? 

[Emberstone]

What’s stopping mobo manufacturers from releasing two BIOS versions per release? One for one set of CPUs, and the other for the CPUs that wouldn’t fit on the first BIOS file.

 

They wouldn’t have to increase the size of the BIOS chip then. Just flash the BIOS you need.

 

They could put a very basic BIOS version on it out of the box that is limited in features in order to support all Zen CPUs, then you can flash the one you need after since you should update your BIOS when you build a new rig anyway.