Asus Memory QVL are wrong?

CatHerderCam · July 26, 2020

Ok, so a little back ground. I started building a new PC using parts that I already had except for the Mobo and case. I went with a Mini-DTX board from ASUS for the overclocking and USB C header. I used fairly standard 2x8gb ram and am having no issues. Now I am moving on form a PC where I had 128gb of ram, so have decided to try and max out the two DIMM slots on the board. Because I am going on the extreme side of what the board can hold, I decided to reference the QVL. But looking at the list, there are so many parts that will not fit. 4-8 stick kits. I push this off and move on, as I was looking for the DCRAM that the board supports. When I start looking into pricing for the parts supported in the DCRAM section, I come to discover that over half of the "aproved" parts have never been made, and the others by GSKILL show that they only work on 3 specific boards. Reaching out to support as I am not trusting the QVL, with all the errors that I can see with a causal glance, I wanted to get some confirmation. They kinda blew me off at first only answering that;

Quote

Asus has our own list and tested the memory (DCRAM) ourselves on the board and if it passes our qualify test, we will put it in the QVL. Gskill might not have tested the motherboard and not put it in their list. We will work with Gskill to add it in their list.

After reaching back out about the other errors, they asked me for a comprehensive list of the errors. I have annotated their PDF with the issues and have found there are just shy of 200 part numbers that do not physically fit in the board. I have included the annotated PDF as an attachment to this post.

For laughs I went an looked at other MIni-ITX boards that they have and they too have parts that do not fit them in their QVL. This seems wrong to me, as it seems like they are not actually testing these parts for comparability. I'm I over thinking this or is there negligence going on here?

ROG_CROSSHAIR_VIII_IMPACT_MEMORY_QVL.pdf

WereCat · July 26, 2020

13 minutes ago, CatHerderCam said:

Ok, so a little back ground. I started building a new PC using parts that I already had except for the Mobo and case. I went with a Mini-DTX board from ASUS for the overclocking and USB C header. I used fairly standard 2x8gb ram and am having no issues. Now I am moving on form a PC where I had 128gb of ram, so have decided to try and max out the two DIMM slots on the board. Because I am going on the extreme side of what the board can hold, I decided to reference the QVL. But looking at the list, there are so many parts that will not fit. 4-8 stick kits. I push this off and move on, as I was looking for the DCRAM that the board supports. When I start looking into pricing for the parts supported in the DCRAM section, I come to discover that over half of the "aproved" parts have never been made, and the others by GSKILL show that they only work on 3 specific boards. Reaching out to support as I am not trusting the QVL, with all the errors that I can see with a causal glance, I wanted to get some confirmation. They kinda blew me off at first only answering that

After reaching back out about the other errors, they asked me for a comprehensive list of the errors. I have annotated their PDF with the issues and have found there are just shy of 200 part numbers that do not physically fit in the board. I have included the annotated PDF as an attachment to this post.

For laughs I went an looked at other MIni-ITX boards that they have and they too have parts that do not fit them in their QVL. This seems wrong to me, as it seems like they are not actually testing these parts for comparability. I'm I over thinking this or is there negligence going on here?

ROG_CROSSHAIR_VIII_IMPACT_MEMORY_QVL.pdf 707.97 kB · 0 downloads

The one on the bottom you listed as "don't exist"

https://www.ark-pc.co.jp/i/11778552/ there is one of them for example, some are difficult to find though.

2 DIMM support for 1 DIMM SKUs can exist because you can get two SKUs of one DIMM and put in in the PC.

Anyways, their QVL is just informative, you don't have to stick by it.

On my X570 Hero VIII my DRAM was not even on the QVL. When using all 4 sticks my PC would randomly shut down (not restart, just shut down). With 2 sticks everything was completely fine. I found that just changing the Max DRAM Current Limit in BIOS from 100% to 120% completely solved this issue.

ASUS later added my DRAM to their QVL yet it still exhibits the same issues if I let the current limit at 100% for the DRAM even after updating BIOS. I have been using this since R9 3900X released and had no issue and I know my DRAM is perfectly stable, heck I even overclocked it a lot.

And this is true not just for ASUS, many other QVL lists are just a copy/paste since many motherboards are basicaly the same board with just few little things changed about it so they don't bother to retest everything again.

CatHerderCam · July 26, 2020

37 minutes ago, WereCat said:

2 DIMM support for 1 DIMM SKUs can exist because you can get two SKUs of one DIMM and put in in the PC.

I agree with you that normally you can do this without any issues. The problem that i have with this on this particular QVL is at the bottom of the list it says;

Quote

Please ensure all memory modules are from a single validated kit. Do not combine DIMMs from multiple kits—even if they are the same make and model. Mixing and matching DIMMs can result in failure to boot and compatibility cannot be guaranteed.

so the document contradicts itself. They can't have it both ways.

As far as the ZADAK ram goes, the never released the DCRAM in 2 stick configurations. So those part numbers still don't exist. There are a few Japanese site that have the part numbers listed as EOL but after talking to ZADAK, they confirmed that they were never actually made. And only the one timings was released in a 1x32gb config. This was well before the x570 impact was released.

Im not saying that you can't use things not on the QVL, but we should hold manufacturers to a higher standard if they say that the item is "guaranteed to work"

Edited July 26, 2020 by CatHerderCam
added info