Toughest cookie yet

[JakobR]

I'll try to keep this short but bear, I've been at this for months. First of, specs.

 

AMD Ryzen 9 7900X

Aorus X670E master (rev 1.0, BIOS F12a)

ASUS ROG Thor II 1000W

G.Skill 32GB (2x16GB) DDR5 6000MHz CL30 Trident (using EXPO)

Gigabyte GeForce RTX 4080 16GB EAGLE

 

I'll try to summarize the issue chronologically, I'll summarize system instabilities below theses steps.

1. Few months ago I noticed that the system (sometimes) behaved sluggish which was solved by a quick reboot.

2. System instabilities became more frequent so tried updating bios (currently running the latest)

  - Solved it for some time

3. System instabilities became a daily thing, so updated every hardware component except for mobo and CPU (both recently upgraded)

   - No noticable difference

4. These days I occassionally manage to boot into a stable issue, but whenever I reboot it's 99% guaranteed to be unstable again til I manage to get a successful boot.

 

System instabilities are:

- System boots slowly

- mobo logo appears after a delay

- windows loading screen looks like it's stuttering

- Once system is booted and I'm in windows it's stuttering continuously

- Wifi drivers seems to fail (code 10)

- With ethernet I get high latency and low down and up speed

 

The funny thing is, at the times when it boots normally (happens roughly 1 out of 30 times when I boot), these instabilities are nonexistent. Everything runs smooth as a butter until I reboot. Another noticable thing is that after a qflash (to whatever version) the systems tends to have one successful boot guaranteed until I reboot. Also, for some time it boot with stability if I had turned off my screens for a couple of hours, though that might be a bit of a coincidence.

 

Fixes I've tried (been at this for months, I'll probably miss a few).

- Installing new antivirus

- q-flashing to different bios (up and downgrading)

- changing hardware components (all but mobo and cpu)

- changing ram slots (tried booting without ram but it gets stuck in a boot loop)

- changing socket outlet

- uninstalling network drivers

- disabling/enabling cms

- running with and without expo (seems more stable with?)

- reseating every component including mobo card (twice)

- power cycling (cold)

- No peripherals

- Removing amd chipset drivers

- running sfc, dism

- changing sata cables

- Checked bent pins

 

 

Also worth mentioning, for some time I code the mobo q-code 92 consistently, however, that seems to be gone now. The issues are usually the ones i listed below instabilities but because their characteristics slightly change over time I found it hard to believe that this would be a hardware issue and leaning more towards software, correct me if I'm wrong.

 

As previously mentioned, been at this for months and I'd be eternally grateful to whomever that might find a fix.

 

 

[PDifolco]

I would have first swapped the board, then the RAM, then CPU, can't see how it can come from anything else...

 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Id just ditch the board outright

Somethings problably wrong with it

[JakobR]

12 minutes ago, PDifolco said:

I would have first swapped the board, then the RAM, then CPU, can't see how it can come from anything else...

 

RAM has been changed recently, so unless they are broken as well then I'd count them out of the equation for now. Also, CPUs tends to be like either they run or they don't? Because I theorize that if it was a CPU issue then I wouldn't be able to sometimes get into a stable system. Which leaves the mobo... but it's confusing as it seems like up or downgrading bios temporarily fixes the issue, it's almost as if reverts back to some former unstable state after a reboot, but how I wouldn't know.

 

Things I forgot to list earlier

- Tried reset cmos

- fresh installed windows 10 and later windows 11 (current version)

 

Another (probably coincidence) thing, have you ever heard of such a failure because of the case? Because the instability seems to be almost guaranteed when the case is closed, though I never heard of such a issue before.

[Dedayog]

7 minutes ago, JakobR said:

RAM has been changed recently, so unless they are broken as well then I'd count them out of the equation for now. Also, CPUs tends to be like either they run or they don't? Because I theorize that if it was a CPU issue then I wouldn't be able to sometimes get into a stable system. Which leaves the mobo... but it's confusing as it seems like up or downgrading bios temporarily fixes the issue, it's almost as if reverts back to some former unstable state after a reboot, but how I wouldn't know.

 

Things I forgot to list earlier

- Tried reset cmos

- fresh installed windows 10 and later windows 11 (current version)

 

Another (probably coincidence) thing, have you ever heard of such a failure because of the case? Because the instability seems to be almost guaranteed when the case is closed, though I never heard of such a issue before.

This would almost mean there is a short somewhere that the closed case produces or accentuates to a meaningful level.

 

 

[PDifolco]

6 minutes ago, JakobR said:

RAM has been changed recently, so unless they are broken as well then I'd count them out of the equation for now. Also, CPUs tends to be like either they run or they don't? Because I theorize that if it was a CPU issue then I wouldn't be able to sometimes get into a stable system. Which leaves the mobo... but it's confusing as it seems like up or downgrading bios temporarily fixes the issue, it's almost as if reverts back to some former unstable state after a reboot, but how I wouldn't know.

 

Things I forgot to list earlier

- Tried reset cmos

- fresh installed windows 10 and later windows 11 (current version)

 

Another (probably coincidence) thing, have you ever heard of such a failure because of the case? Because the instability seems to be almost guaranteed when the case is closed, though I never heard of such a issue before.

Mmm could be a short or static on the board with the case !?!

Check if there's any part of the board that's in contact with the case, or just try to run the system outside of the case.

Rly I'd have swapped out the board since long given that BIOS upgrade fixes the issues then it comes back it's defo a board issue anyway

 

 

[JakobR]

1 minute ago, Dedayog said:

This would almost mean there is a short somewhere that the closed case produces or accentuates to a meaningful level.

 

 

Any idea of how to debug this? Other than buying an entirely new case

[Whatisthis]

1 hour ago, JakobR said:

Any idea of how to debug this? Other than buying an entirely new case

First, try taking off all of the front panel connectors, extra usb ports, etc from the board. Try starting the system by shorting the power pins with a screw driver. If that fixes it, you have a bad connector somewhere. Start plugging things back in one by one until the problem reappears.

 

If that doesn’t work…

Take the board out of the case, install all components except case connectors, power on by shorting the power pins with a screwdriver.

 

If that doesn’t work, I would highly suspect the motherboard is bad.

[JakobR]

9 minutes ago, Whatisthis said:

First, try taking off all of the front panel connectors, extra usb ports, etc from the board. Try starting the system by shorting the power pins with a screw driver. If that fixes it, you have a bad connector somewhere. Start plugging things back in one by one until the problem reappears.

How do you short the power pins? is it similar to briding the cmos battery?

[Whatisthis]

21 minutes ago, JakobR said:

How do you short the power pins? is it similar to briding the cmos battery?

Yes, just touch the screwdriver to both power pins at the same time. That’s what the power switch does - just connects the two pins when you press it.

 

It doesn’t have to be a screwdriver either. A paperclip or anything else that conducts will work.

[JakobR]

1 hour ago, Whatisthis said:

Yes, just touch the screwdriver to both power pins at the same time. That’s what the power switch does - just connects the two pins when you press it.

 

It doesn’t have to be a screwdriver either. A paperclip or anything else that conducts will work.

Tried it but seems to make no difference. I'm gonna try to downgrade my bios far back and look for potential driver fixes because the issue feels far too random to be a hardware issue. If you can think if any other potential fixes then I'd appreciate them.

[JakobR]

Update

 

So I downgraded to F6 and then went back up to F11 as nothing had changed. Here's the interesting bit, when I went up to F11 2 of my SSDs disappeared from the BIOS, including the bootable one, during the period where they weren't recognized my system was fully responsive. As soon as they were recognized the system became sluggish and wouldn't run properly. (The SSDs are fine, new and tested)

Am I wrong to conclude that it is about the loading of windows that causes the issues? And if so, how would I proceed to debug drivers, registry etc.?

 

I'm really not a big expert on safe mode (which I pressume must be used) and how to manage drivers so any technical assistance would be highly appreciated.

[Whatisthis]

What drives do you have and what ports are they plugged into? 
 

Try unplugging all but your system drive and see if the issue goes away.

[JakobR]

8 minutes ago, Whatisthis said:

What drives do you have and what ports are they plugged into? 
 

Try unplugging all but your system drive and see if the issue goes away.

Samsung 870 EVO SATA SSD 1TB (2x, one is non evo)

Samsung 870 EVO SATA SSD 4TB

 

I added the SSD incrementally, reinstalled when I added the second one the second 1TB (to see if the issue would go away) and just recently added the 4TB. Before that I had other drives and with the same issue.

 

Right now I am booting into BIOS without any sluggishness whatsoever, but the only detected drive is the 4TB (not a bootable one, very new).

 

Back when I only had a system drive I had this issue.

 

 

Edit

Missed the ports, they are in

port 3 - 4TB

port 4 & 5 - 1TBs

 

Though I've changed ports and found no noticeable difference

[Whatisthis]

1 hour ago, JakobR said:

Samsung 870 EVO SATA SSD 1TB (2x, one is non evo)

Samsung 870 EVO SATA SSD 4TB

 

I added the SSD incrementally, reinstalled when I added the second one the second 1TB (to see if the issue would go away) and just recently added the 4TB. Before that I had other drives and with the same issue.

 

Right now I am booting into BIOS without any sluggishness whatsoever, but the only detected drive is the 4TB (not a bootable one, very new).

 

Back when I only had a system drive I had this issue.

 

 

Edit

Missed the ports, they are in

port 3 - 4TB

port 4 & 5 - 1TBs

 

Though I've changed ports and found no noticeable difference

OK, I’m out of ideas. Sometimes a failing drive will cause strange issues, but sounds like you have tried multiple and the issue has persisted across drives. And sometimes sata ports are bad, or are on a separate third party controller that doesn’t work right (not the case on your board). 
 

Im stumped.

 

[JakobR]

14 hours ago, Whatisthis said:

OK, I’m out of ideas. Sometimes a failing drive will cause strange issues, but sounds like you have tried multiple and the issue has persisted across drives. And sometimes sata ports are bad, or are on a separate third party controller that doesn’t work right (not the case on your board). 
 

Im stumped.

 

Talked with the store that I bought the components from and in short, I'll have them repair or replace it. I'll update this post if they let me know what the issue was in case other people ran into similar issues.