ROG Z690 Extreme Glacial Question + Hi everyone!

[CoolaxGaming]

Hey friends!

Its been a while since I have been on this forum so please bear with me if I am unknowingly breaking some rules

I was able to get my hands on a Maximus Z690 Extreme Glacial after waiting for so long! I couldnt find one being sold straight from a large retailer (no 3rd party), till today! I was able to grab the last one (its oos now and before it was 2.6 3rdP) Amazon had available for 2k! I honestly thought id have to wait months more and I am so excited right now.

Before I get criticized for getting this overpriced mobo, I just want to defend myself by saying that I really really wanted the glacial motherboard because of just how good it looks. I honestly have not seen one designed like that, and back in september I really wanted to get the Z590 (Maximus XIII Extreme) extreme glacial but had to settle for the non glacial one and felt like I missed out on a better board since. But when Z690 came out I felt like I had the perfect excuse to finally upgrade to the glacial! Plus I think ill keep this build for a while so I wanted to make sure it was decked out in every area (Startup did really well this year so I felt like I deserved it!), speaking of which, I had no clue you could get 32GB sticks now. That is so awesome since working with high throughput apps in java + my habit of having a billion chrome tabs open can be a stressor on the memory sometimes. And since there is DDR5 now I realized I could finally go from 4x16GB to 4x32GB! Its crazy to think about how excited I was when I finally got a 128GB ssd for my OS and could never have imagined 128GB ram fitting in 4 sticks.

 

Anyways, sorry for the flexing/sharing, I have genuinely been geeking out all day and when I needed a question answered about the board I felt it would be awesome for a nostalgic login to the community that really got me invested in computer hardware. Honestly I would not have the oppurtunities I have today if not for what I learned from this community. I used to post here when I was 12 y/o 8 years ago trying to convince people that the AMD FX 8350 was the shit  (unfortunately, now I realize it was "shit" and not "the shit" LOL), and learning about random stuff by watching linus's videos religiously every day.

==== QUESTION(s) STARTS HERE IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO SKIP MY NOSTALGIA ===

Okay onto the problem! I have been hearing that Windows 11 requires TPM 2.0, and having read up on the tech I would love to go for a discrete module and had one picked out and everything and was about to order it. However I quickly checked the new mobo's manual and I do not think it has a place for a discrete TPM module, which I confirmed by looking here: https://www.asus.com/us/site/motherboards/Intel-Alder-Lake-Z690-H670-B660/websites/download/ASUS_Z690_Full_Specs.pdf. I wanted to know if this means (hopefully) the glacial has one built in? If thats not the case and its like a firmware one, should I just say stfu to my need for better looks and go with the Maximus Z690 Formula? I dont really overclock and from what I have checked it seems like the Formula might actually be better for me if the glacial lacks TPM as I am not into OC anymore.

 

Another question is,  I will have the P5800X 1.6TB which is PCIE and I dont think I will ever use M.2 slots (I dont play many games anymore ill only play like the campaign on the newest cod of bf and then uninstall it after. Thus my storage hovers around 600GB so I have enough headroom already).  Now the asus PCIE lane width is confusing thie shit out of me so if anyone can help me I would appriciate it, I have a 3080Ti and I will have the P5800X and thats it. Im not going to use any other m.2, dimm.2, sata, pcie slots at all. The P5800X is quite fast so I dont want it to be limited in this case, and I think with the Glacial I might have to run the 3080Ti on x8 pcie 5.0 and the drive on x8 pcie 5.0 (which is more than enough for the drive) BUT with the formula I think I can run the 3080TI on pcie 5.0 x16 and the drive on pcie 4.0 x16 (Not sure about this, I might be totally wrong I was super confused by this chipset)

 

Now I know the formula is 1.3k cheaper and since I wont OC theres 0 point for me to get the glacial (Plus I have an unopened EKWB for the CPU which will be going to waste with the glacia), but try to ignore the price difference. Just assume these two boards cost 800 each. For my specs, would you prefer the formula or the glacial? 
Quick note: I hate PC noise and sometimes some motherboard part gets hot and it makes me pissed which is why these two boards are the only ones I am considering. In addition, I have only used Asus boards in my builds, and ever since I got the rampage v extreme I have never gotten anything non rog for a motherboard, and I would like to stick with this as well!

 

 

What do you guys think? Thank you so much in advance, I love you all

Heres the full build btw, ill italicize the stuff I am keeping from my current build (Ill post pics when the mobo comes as thats what + the intel p5800x! is wt im waiting on)
- Intel i9 12900k
- ROG Maximus Z690 Glacial
- 2 packs of: DOMINATOR® PLATINUM RGB 64GB (2x32GB) DDR5 DRAM 5200MHz C40
- MSI 3080TI Vector Trio
- P5800X 1.6TB ssd
- phanteks enthoo primo all noctua fans

- be quiet! Dark Power Pro 12 1200W, BN646, 80 Plus Titanium
- 360 rad + 360 rad (FK I REALIZED I GOT A 360 ACCIDENTLY INSTEAD OF 480)
-  block/backplate for gpu
- https://www.ekwb.com/shop/ek-quantum-kinetic-tbe-300-d5-pwm-d-rgb-acetal
- https://www.ekwb.com/shop/ek-quantum-magnitude-d-rgb-115x-nickel-acetal idk if ill use this tho cuz glacial does not need one

EDIT: I have 3x 2560x1440 monitors 165hz and the pc is used mostly for java/c(++) tls-related development

[RONOTHAN##]

10 minutes ago, CoolaxGaming said:

I think with the Glacial I might have to run the 3080Ti on x8 pcie 5.0 and the drive on x8 pcie 5.0 (which is more than enough for the drive) BUT with the formula I think I can run the 3080TI on pcie 5.0 x16 and the drive on pcie 4.0 x16 (Not sure about this, I might be totally wrong I was super confused by this chipset)

Other way around. The Extreme is one of the boards that steals PCIe lanes away from the GPU in order to use PCIe Gen 5 M.2 slots and therefore doesn't support x8/x8. The formula does. On both boards though you can use x16 to the GPU and x4 Gen 4 for the SSD (the bottom slot on both boards is fully wired to the chipset).

 

15 minutes ago, CoolaxGaming said:

And since there is DDR5 now I realized I could finally go from 4x16GB to 4x32GB!

Avoid this at all costs. DDR5 and the Alder Lake memory controller are infamous for just killing memory speed when trying to run 4 DIMM configurations. Memory speed will default to 4000MHz, and any chance of running above 5200MHz is just gone (if you get a mediocre CPU 5200MHz might not even be possible with 4 DIMMs). Plus there's the issue that memory training and POST times just take forever when using 4 DIMMs. As far as I'm concerned, on everything but the workstation boards that need 128GB+ of RAM, the extra 2 DIMM slots just shouldn't exist. If you're gonna end up spending this much on a motherboard, you're probably better off going with the Apex instead, since the VRM is better (it will run ice cold, even without being water cooled, it's pretty much the best VRM on Z690 including the Extreme), it has much better memory support, and should have all the expansion options you want. If you're going for aesthetics though, fine, go for the Extreme. 

[CoolaxGaming]

59 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

Other way around. The Extreme is one of the boards that steals PCIe lanes away from the GPU in order to use PCIe Gen 5 M.2 slots and therefore doesn't support x8/x8. The formula does. On both boards though you can use x16 to the GPU and x4 Gen 4 for the SSD (the bottom slot on both boards is fully wired to the chipset).

 

Avoid this at all costs. DDR5 and the Alder Lake memory controller are infamous for just killing memory speed when trying to run 4 DIMM configurations. Memory speed will default to 4000MHz, and any chance of running above 5200MHz is just gone (if you get a mediocre CPU 5200MHz might not even be possible with 4 DIMMs). Plus there's the issue that memory training and POST times just take forever when using 4 DIMMs. As far as I'm concerned, on everything but the workstation boards that need 128GB+ of RAM, the extra 2 DIMM slots just shouldn't exist. If you're gonna end up spending this much on a motherboard, you're probably better off going with the Apex instead, since the VRM is better (it will run ice cold, even without being water cooled, it's pretty much the best VRM on Z690 including the Extreme), it has much better memory support, and should have all the expansion options you want. If you're going for aesthetics though, fine, go for the Extreme. 

Hey man thanks for the reply!

See I believe I have read something similar to what you just said regarding the pcie lanes but I couldnt remember which motherboard it was for. Could you clarify this for me so I can understand it a bit better? So the PCIEX16_1 would be connected to the CPU I know that at least. And here it says The PCIEX16_2 shares bandwidth with the M.2_1 (Top most m.2 slot), which is connected to the CPU as well. Plus the pcie slots are under the CPU section of the glacial manual. Since I wont be using any M.2 slots as the SSD is PCIE only, in this case would it not run on x8 x8 connected to the cpu? Based on the research ive done since, the intel 12900k has 20 lanes that can operate 1x16+1x4 or 2x8+1x4, since I wont be using any M.2 slots like I mentioned would the formula and glacial not come out to be the same if m.2 is disabled? This was the confusion I was having before actually.

 

 

 

And for the other part "The Extreme is one of the boards that steals PCIe lanes away from the GPU" is this something in addition to the configuration differences or is there something else thats different? Writing this out I think yours makes perfect sense if I would have a M.2+1xGPU as it would be 16 lanes + 4 lanes vs 8+8 with a pcie ssd instead of a m.2 one (which unfortunately is the case)

Regarding the 4x32GB DDR5 I had no clue about that thank you for letting me know. I havent opened the ram packages yet so Ill make sure to keep the packaging just in case the 128 solution does not work out, ill probably end up benchmarking it vs 2x32 DDR5 and 4x16 DDR4 (I use this right now). Would the post times be longer than 4x16GB ddr4? Also I have a 12900k that I havent opened yet but I might just bite the bullet and wait a bit as I see the 12900ks might be out soon!

 

AndI dont think the apex has a tpm2.0 either which is my primary concern tbh. I might still order it to see if the dimms would work better, ty for the suggestion
 

[RONOTHAN##]

1 hour ago, CoolaxGaming said:

And for the other part "The Extreme is one of the boards that steals PCIe lanes away from the GPU" is this something in addition to the configuration differences or is there something else thats different? Writing this out I think yours makes perfect sense if I would have a M.2+1xGPU as it would be 16 lanes + 4 lanes vs 8+8 with a pcie ssd instead of a m.2 one (which unfortunately is the case)

OK, so it was a bit since I read the Extreme's datasheet, so I did misremember a bit of it. It does support x8/x8 mode, but it also has it where if you populate a particular M.2 slot, your GPU is limited to 8x and the 2nd PCIe slot is disabled. For your use case with the SSD, the Formula would work out better since it does have a PCIe slot driven entirely off the chipset. 

1 hour ago, CoolaxGaming said:

Regarding the 4x32GB DDR5 I had no clue about that thank you for letting me know. I havent opened the ram packages yet so Ill make sure to keep the packaging just in case the 128 solution does not work out, ill probably end up benchmarking it vs 2x32 DDR5 and 4x16 DDR4 (I use this right now). Would the post times be longer than 4x16GB ddr4? Also I have a 12900k that I havent opened yet but I might just bite the bullet and wait a bit as I see the 12900ks might be out soon!

Unless you have a genuine need for the capacity, you'd be better off getting a faster kit of DDR5 than trying to run 128GB of slow DDR5 (5200MHz in most benchmarks isn't actually much faster than 3200MHz CL16 because of how loose the timings are on DDR5). You can return your kits and get a kit of DDR5 6200MHz for about the same price as the 128GB and end up with much better performance overall. 

 

And yes, it would take a while to POST. I know Jayz2Cents ended up doing a video with uncut post times, and it was over a minute to POST with DDR5 in 4 DIMM configurations. The memory controller on Alder Lake for DDR5 is definitely first gen, and these are first gen issues. 

 

1 hour ago, CoolaxGaming said:

AndI dont think the apex has a tpm2.0 either which is my primary concern tbh. I might still order it to see if the dimms would work better, ty for the suggestion

It does not. Granted, I don't really care about TPM, it's only just is to say if it recognizes a boot device and store encryption keys for Bitlocker. If you don't use Bitlocker like 95% of desktop users (since robbers aren't exactly gonna try to steal your 50LB water cooled gaming rig) then it actually doesn't make a difference whether it's enabled or disabled. If your system is in an area where it's likely to be tampered with like a Hospital, yeah use a TPM, but for a home desktop I'd prefer to have it off since it just gets in the way. 

 

The Apex is a more overclocking focused motherboard, but since it has 1DPC topology it will clock memory much higher more stably (6200MHz is about the upper limit of any of the 4 DIMM boards, yet people get pretty regularly 6600MHz+ on the 2DIMM boards fully stable). It's to the point that because of how important fast RAM is to performance nowadays, if I were building a DDR5 system the only boards I'd consider are the 2 DIMM boards like the Apex, Unify-X, Tachyon, Aqua OC, Z690 Dark, and a couple of the ITX boards (the ITX boards to a less extent since a POST code is basically necessary for DDR5).

[CoolaxGaming]

6 hours ago, RONOTHAN## said:

OK, so it was a bit since I read the Extreme's datasheet, so I did misremember a bit of it. It does support x8/x8 mode, but it also has it where if you populate a particular M.2 slot, your GPU is limited to 8x and the 2nd PCIe slot is disabled. For your use case with the SSD, the Formula would work out better since it does have a PCIe slot driven entirely off the chipset. 

Unless you have a genuine need for the capacity, you'd be better off getting a faster kit of DDR5 than trying to run 128GB of slow DDR5 (5200MHz in most benchmarks isn't actually much faster than 3200MHz CL16 because of how loose the timings are on DDR5). You can return your kits and get a kit of DDR5 6200MHz for about the same price as the 128GB and end up with much better performance overall. 

 

And yes, it would take a while to POST. I know Jayz2Cents ended up doing a video with uncut post times, and it was over a minute to POST with DDR5 in 4 DIMM configurations. The memory controller on Alder Lake for DDR5 is definitely first gen, and these are first gen issues. 

 

It does not. Granted, I don't really care about TPM, it's only just is to say if it recognizes a boot device and store encryption keys for Bitlocker. If you don't use Bitlocker like 95% of desktop users (since robbers aren't exactly gonna try to steal your 50LB water cooled gaming rig) then it actually doesn't make a difference whether it's enabled or disabled. If your system is in an area where it's likely to be tampered with like a Hospital, yeah use a TPM, but for a home desktop I'd prefer to have it off since it just gets in the way. 

 

The Apex is a more overclocking focused motherboard, but since it has 1DPC topology it will clock memory much higher more stably (6200MHz is about the upper limit of any of the 4 DIMM boards, yet people get pretty regularly 6600MHz+ on the 2DIMM boards fully stable). It's to the point that because of how important fast RAM is to performance nowadays, if I were building a DDR5 system the only boards I'd consider are the 2 DIMM boards like the Apex, Unify-X, Tachyon, Aqua OC, Z690 Dark, and a couple of the ITX boards (the ITX boards to a less extent since a POST code is basically necessary for DDR5).

Hey man, thanks a bunch for the extra info! Memory speed has never really been a big issue its more about capacity. I dont think I have ever gotten XMP to work properlytbh as I just checked and my system is running at 2800Mhz LOL.  Java/chromium can be a huge memory hog and today I was unfortunately maxing out my 64 gb. I think I might consider a workstation board instead honestly.

Regarding the TPM I do use bitlocker as I sometimes have to travel back and forth between 3 locations, before I used to just transfer the data I needed between machines the night I arrive, but it started to get more and more of a hassle so I just take my ssd back and forth (Right now I have a m.2 drive), its a bit of a headache to get everything setup as hardware varies, but its a lot easier than ususal. Besides bitlocker, I do want to look into using TPM w PKCS11 (as a store) for other cryptography stuff, this will probably be a more important use case.

However because of the amount of stuff I have been unaware of regarding the first gen problems, I will probably put a halt on this build till I know more. I am 80ish% sure ill get the formula once I check up on the pcie stuff more. isint it faster to have stuff connected to the cpu? I might look into gigabyte mobos tbh

[CoolaxGaming]

Adding on to that I just checked and it seems that the CPU connection is normally better I *think* having a x8 x8 shouldnt cause a bottleneck as gpu is x16 4.0 (which would be x8 5.0 or does it not convert like that? Sorry the last CPU I knew well was probably the 5960x , Currently I actually run at x8 4.0 because my z590 has the same issue).

[RONOTHAN##]

2 hours ago, CoolaxGaming said:

isint it faster to have stuff connected to the cpu?

it's slightly lower latency, yes, but practically speaking there's not really much of a difference.

 

2 hours ago, CoolaxGaming said:

which would be x8 5.0 or does it not convert like that?

Yes and no. Yes x8 PCIe Gen 5 does have the same bandwidth as x16 PCIe Gen 4, but because the GPU doesn't have PCIe Gen 5 support it would run at x8 PCIe Gen 4 since it's highest common speed between the slot and the card. x8 Gen 4 shouldn't be a bottleneck for most stuff, but it won't be the full bandwidth accessible to the card. 

 

2 hours ago, CoolaxGaming said:

Java/chromium can be a huge memory hog and today I was unfortunately maxing out my 64 gb. I think I might consider a workstation board instead honestly.

If you need 128GB of RAM now, you really should be getting a DDR4 system. Running 128GB of RAM on DDR5 is just a nightmare, RAM speeds are pretty slow (which are actually pretty important for performance), compatibility in general is hit or miss, and the memory controller can barely handle it. DDR4 on the other hand, while not as easy to work with as 32GB of RAM, is a lot more tolerable and not prone to so many weird issues. 128GB of DDR4 will currently outperform 128GB of DDR5. This will likely change once 64GB DIMMs get released (pretty sure one of the memory IC manufacturers has already announced the 32Gb memory ICs needed to make 64GB sticks), so if you want 128GB of RAM, wait for them to be released and run 2 sticks of those. 

[CoolaxGaming]

Interesting, thank you @RONOTHAN##I did not know the part about pcie scaling. Regarding the DIMM's tbh I might just stick with my 64GB DDR4 and just figure out how to do XMP. I dont think ill have to wait that long hopefully. Might just offload some test runs to cloud temporarily no point getting a headache over this stuff you are right.

Sad I have most of the parts already though LOL. oh well, the rest of the build will still work as I have that extra block, ima re-evaluate the cpu+mobo+ram upgrade in a couple months, and just keep the set as a funny reminder of when you shouldnt press the buy button hastily haha.

Argh, I wish U.2 could be used on the m.2 or dimm slots somehow so I wouldnt have to worry about the damn pcie slots.