PRO Z690-A DDR4 and WIFI discussion thread.
BIOS: v11
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BIOS: v11
MSI PRO Z690-A DDR4/WIFI Owners Thread
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garikfox
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That is so strange. I've never heard of RAM slots going bad before. I would try to take everything apart, re-seat the CPU and clean the slots and the modules with isopropyl alcohol. Then I would do a BIOS flashback and hope it works again.
My Z690 also failed, it would refuse to turn on consistently at some point. I couldn't fix it and bought the Z790 as replacement. I recently tested the old board again and guess what, it works?
Anyway if that doesn't help I would try a replacement CPU first, since its easier to replace than the board.
My Z690 also failed, it would refuse to turn on consistently at some point. I couldn't fix it and bought the Z790 as replacement. I recently tested the old board again and guess what, it works?
Anyway if that doesn't help I would try a replacement CPU first, since its easier to replace than the board.
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Thing is, I've experienced strange occasional system stability issues since at least this summer, even at default or lower clocks, so it might be consistent with some sort of degradation occurring at the hardware level that eventually culminated in those two DIMM slots not working properly anymore. It could possibly be my fault since I've used LLC Mode 2 or Mode 1 for quite some time, but stress tests don't seem to be highlighting issues under load, so I don't know. I've never configured the memory controller voltage above 1.2V, and it's remained at that level all along.
I've also reseated the CPU, tightened and loosened the Contact Frame I have, even tried reinstalling the original ILM, but haven't reflashed an older BIOS yet (I've always used the latest one available).
I've also reseated the CPU, tightened and loosened the Contact Frame I have, even tried reinstalling the original ILM, but haven't reflashed an older BIOS yet (I've always used the latest one available).
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Apparently the culprit for all these issues were a pair of old Samsung 840 SSDs that I thought would have been fine to repurpose as temp/scratch drives—which I installed this summer, incidentally around when I began observing random issues. After removing them, now the system successfully boots up at XMP speeds with 4 DIMMs...
How exactly are SATA SSDs related with memory speeds it's unclear.
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That's so strange. Glad you found the root cause.
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Actually I was wrong. I think I might have found the actual culprit for at least part of the issues. It turns out that the DRAM training option "Slow Training", which MSI suggests can help the system boot "if the environment changes" causes bad memory training settings that persist until the CMOS is cleared. I had been using that, thinking it would help, but it actually made things worse. Leaving it to "Auto" after clearing the CMOS would allow the system to boot with memory at XMP speeds.
I still can't pinpoint exactly what other issue might there be, because I don't think that solved them all, although memory stress applications don't seem to find anything wrong with 4 modules at 3600 MT/s and SA voltage at 1.2V.
I still can't pinpoint exactly what other issue might there be, because I don't think that solved them all, although memory stress applications don't seem to find anything wrong with 4 modules at 3600 MT/s and SA voltage at 1.2V.
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And the SATA SSDs? Do they now behave well under heavy copy? Was that yet another symptom of memory related issues?
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I have removed those SATA SSDs from my system and I don't feel like reinstalling them again at the moment. It might possibly be that certain random problems, even during SATA transfers, are related to memory signal integrity issue, but I've seen them with the memory at 2133 MT/s too (failsafe setting), and with either 2 or 4 DIMM modules, so I'm not entirely sure.
In the meanwhile, I found that on my system certain memory training options cause issues when explicitly enabled, so they can be configured to "disabled". Probably "Slow Training" enabled them when set to "Auto".
- Early Write Time Centering 2D
- TxDq TCO Comp Training
- CMD CTL Drive Strength / Tx Equ
- Turn Around Timing Training
I tried enabling as many memory training options as possible that didn't cause the system to fail to boot up; hopefully that will help.
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39 Posts
Hi I ended up getting these for £120 work fine and managed to get them to 4000mhz cr1 18-20-20-20-38 without too much hassle other than dram voltage to 1.45v.
Got £75 for old ram so only a £45 upgrade.
Currently on rev F of the ddr4 mobo bios, should I be upgrading to latest version?
It's working with 14700k 5.5p 4.5e 4.5r currently and if the opinion if it ain't broke..
Cheers
Just joined the hottest club in the IT sphere, the 14900K series club 
I got it in Sweden for 450$ which was about 100$ lower than normal retail price so I couldn't turn that lottery ticket down seem I got pretty lucky, I can all core OC the P-core's to 6.4GHz but after that the volt becomes a bit too high for my taste especially while idle and since MSI board's isn't particularly exact in their reported voltage and lacks on-die sensors etc I don't want to push my luck with this board.
But I guess I just wanted to let you guys know that just swapping from a 12600K that I ran 24/7 all P-core 5.3GHz with 5GHz ring on the legendary 124U2 BIOS to the newest 7D25v1K because of the VR BIOS option so I wouldn't fry my brand new toy with voltage spikes I could run my **** E-die RAM at 3600MHz@1.55V instead of 3400@1.6V with ridiculously tight 2ndary timings for this RAM without the RTL moving/increasing at all which was a major problem with the 12600K.
Could also run 1.3V VDDQ (Auto, can maybe go even lower) and 1.2V SA.
The 12600K wouldn't even boot into Windows with anything below 1.5 VDDQ and 1.35V SA.
TLDR:
This board works pretty good even with a 14900K and if you've got good RAM and don't reach where you think you should it may be because of your CPU's IMC.
To make you all proud I can ez get 1300+ FPS in CS2, no need for AMD X3D for gaming
I got it in Sweden for 450$ which was about 100$ lower than normal retail price so I couldn't turn that lottery ticket down
seem I got pretty lucky, I can all core OC the P-core's to 6.4GHz but after that the volt becomes a bit too high for my taste especially while idle and since MSI board's isn't particularly exact in their reported voltage and lacks on-die sensors etc I don't want to push my luck with this board.But I guess I just wanted to let you guys know that just swapping from a 12600K that I ran 24/7 all P-core 5.3GHz with 5GHz ring on the legendary 124U2 BIOS to the newest 7D25v1K because of the VR BIOS option so I wouldn't fry my brand new toy with voltage spikes I could run my **** E-die RAM at 3600MHz@1.55V instead of 3400@1.6V with ridiculously tight 2ndary timings for this RAM without the RTL moving/increasing at all which was a major problem with the 12600K.
Could also run 1.3V VDDQ (Auto, can maybe go even lower) and 1.2V SA.
The 12600K wouldn't even boot into Windows with anything below 1.5 VDDQ and 1.35V SA.
TLDR:
This board works pretty good even with a 14900K and if you've got good RAM and don't reach where you think you should it may be because of your CPU's IMC.
To make you all proud I can ez get 1300+ FPS in CS2, no need for AMD X3D for gaming
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Congratulations thereJust joined the hottest club in the IT sphere, the 14900K series club
I got it in Sweden for 450$ which was about 100$ lower than normal retail price so I couldn't turn that lottery ticket down
But I guess I just wanted to let you guys know that just swapping from a 12600K that I ran 24/7 all P-core 5.3GHz with 5GHz ring on the legendary 124U2 BIOS to the newest 7D25v1K because of the VR BIOS option so I wouldn't fry my brand new toy with voltage spikes I could run my **** E-die RAM at 3600MHz@1.55V instead of 3400@1.6V with ridiculously tight 2ndary timings for this RAM without the RTL moving/increasing at all which was a major problem with the 12600K.
Could also run 1.3V VDDQ (Auto, can maybe go even lower) and 1.2V SA.
The 12600K wouldn't even boot into Windows with anything below 1.5 VDDQ and 1.35V SA.
TLDR:
This board works pretty good even with a 14900K and if you've got good RAM and don't reach where you think you should it may be because of your CPU's IMC.
To make you all proud I can ez get 1300+ FPS in CS2, no need for AMD X3D for gaming
May i ask what you're dailying the 14900K clockwise now, since 6.4 is suicide territory on ambient and i'd guess you'd daily around 5.8 to 5.9ish?
I've set it to 58X all core in BIOS with 200A and 1.45VR. What else, ehm, I'm using TVB but increased it to 75 degrees because I felt 70 is a bit too soft. Especially when I run LLC5 so the Voltage at 6.2GHz idle at 1.42v and when I play CS2 it around 1.35-1.37V with the new settings.Congratulations there
May i ask what you're dailying the 14900K clockwise now, since 6.4 is suicide territory on ambient and i'd guess you'd daily around 5.8 to 5.9ish?
Over the coming days/week I',mma tryin' to dial in the exact amount I need in A for the P-Cores to not get gimped but also run as cool and with as low V as possible. Imho idling at 1.42V is fine even if it would be a 7GHz but most of the time as I said I run 58X except for when I'm playing and tonight I played for almost 4hours straight and the V never went over 1.38V and only P-core 5 (which seem to be everyone's worst) reached 75 degrees for a short stint, rest of the cores where most of the time below 70 degrees.
I run a LF2 420 AIO atm but I'm not sure if it's just the AIO that's too weak or if I need better pasta/remount, I'm gonna get the Thermalright frame in about a week so I'm gonna redo everything then.
Man I wish I had som serious RAM and a custom loop - with just that I think I could actually take the world record on the CS2 bench map or at least get into top5.
atm I've stopped chasing 2ndary's because it's so hard to test if it's stable on Faceit because their AC CTD even though I can play hours on end on Valves servers and community servers but trust me, before 2025 is over it's not going to read 10 on all of those timings
why I'm running 3500MHz is just because I don't want to **** with my friends games by getting CTD's way to often. But the bench map had no problem running 3600MHz.
Steam Workshop::CS2 FPS BENCHMARK DUST2
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102 Posts
Sorry for late reply, I was re-reading thread. What do you mean by full circle: you quit CEP Enabled configs in favor of AC_LL with CEP Disabled undervolting now?
I'm still using AC Loadline equal to DC, CEP Enabled and V/F Point Offset method of undervolting now, without noticeable problems.
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38 Posts
Went to grab some drivers off the webpage and saw the L BIOS has been released. Has anyone tried it out yet?
BIOS 7D25v1L - 2025-04-24 - 9.77 MB
Description:
BIOS 7D25v1L - 2025-04-24 - 9.77 MB
Description:
- Fix the issue of DMI UUID loss after clearing CMOS.
- Security update.
- ME Firmware ver: ME_16.1.35.2557 (download)
- ME Firmware update SOP
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Haha fair! Neither did I, bit of a ghost release on MSI's part.
I just went to grab Realtek drivers as I corrupted the ones I had and saw it listed. Doubt there's anything significant changed.
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Well I decided to yeet it and updated to the L BIOS & it went smooth as butter.
Very first POST and both my 64gb (4 x 16gb mixed DIMM) RAM OC and my 12600k per-core OC settings stuck without issue. Verified in HWiNFO64 & CPU-Z.
Only thing which didn't seem to work was the ME Firmware update despite running it twice; first before the BIOS update as recommended, then again after. Not sure what's happened, also don't really care enough to investigate.
Haven't benchmarked & probably won't any time soon either, will compare next time I try for a Timespy highscore.
Very first POST and both my 64gb (4 x 16gb mixed DIMM) RAM OC and my 12600k per-core OC settings stuck without issue. Verified in HWiNFO64 & CPU-Z.
Only thing which didn't seem to work was the ME Firmware update despite running it twice; first before the BIOS update as recommended, then again after. Not sure what's happened, also don't really care enough to investigate.
Haven't benchmarked & probably won't any time soon either, will compare next time I try for a Timespy highscore.
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