tps3443

I’m kinda wanting to try a 4090FE now 😁 But yes I think if this 3090FE just had a fan pointed at the backside the vram would drop another 10-15C. The back plate was 120F before repad/repaste. It measured a whopping 148F on the backplate after rear full cover pad and new pads/paste installed 😳 you can’t touch it for a split second! It will melt flesh 🤣 It does not crash anymore at all! Even with auto fan and 113% power limit it just chugs. Very nice to see it working properly.

Someone sent me this 3090FE to fix for them. It kept crashing under loads due to heat. The card was built December 2020. So it’s right at 3 years old. Anyways, look at the difference in the temps on this RTX3090FE after re-pad/re-paste!!! Installed new 20W/mk thermal pads on the front side. And covered the entire back side with pieces of an old used Optimus 3MM Fujipoly pad that I had, until the back PCB was completely covered. The memory temp alone dropped 30C, max boost went up by +60Mhz. Both graphs are Witcher 3 DX12 at 4K. LEFT= Before RIGHT= After NEW pads installed!

Stock RTX4090 gets 57-60fps with Quality DLSS+FG on in the new ARK 1.5 Are we half way there to RTX5090 yet? 🙃 Also, check this out, I just tested a 3090FE for the first time ever. And this GPU can’t even run stock the GPU max temp with 100% fans is 55-57C. But It crashes in practically any game after just 15-20 minutes because the memory gets so HOTTTT 🥵 the back side will literally burn your flesh off after less than 1 second of touching it. It’s crazy! The memory is hitting 104C. I have a 114% power limit set, and that’s it. I am gonna have to tear the card apart and fix its horrible temps. I have a 100x100mm sheet of some 20w thermal pads ready for it.

Starfield has always ran amazing! This game is just absolutely butter since launch day. 4K@Ultra+DLSS Quality has always been around 77FPS average for me. Now, another title that does not run amazing is Ark Survival Ascended lol. 4K native resolution Epic graphics, FG & DLSS off averages like 19-25 fps (Using a 4090)

How’s that 4080 running?! Lol. I know GeForce now is really a cool idea, and great service. But how is the image quality can you tell it’s streamed? I know my Gamepass Cloud gaming looks like crap compared to real life. It’s like hazy and fuzzy looking and it almost looks like a YouTube video of gameplay compared to real gameplay. But GeForce now may be different. Never tried it.

Yes you’re right those 2x16’s work well on the Dark and that’s probably what you should leave in it, but nice 2x24’s can absolutely smash in an Apex. My timings are crap and loose. My memory is absolutely below average for water chilled ram. Even worse than your 8000 kit, but it’s all that I can get stable for 8600c38. If you go key in Sugi’s timings for 8600 just for benching purposes with 2x24GB it’s like 45NS with maybe 1.450VDD which is insane, I can run that for about all of about 3-6 minutes before a BSOD occurs haha. But he is using really good Hynix green sticks 2x24GB kinda like your green stick 2x16’s in that dark. If I was smart I would have bought some binned rams on HWbot when they pop up from time to time, and I’d be running a fully tuned 8600 profile.

This is a pretty speedy ram profile with some fairly loose timings. I have been having some strange things happen with ram OC lately since new bios and it was from pushing too much voltage to my IMC and IVR TX, since starting from scratch on bios 1501, I did NOT adjust CPU IMC voltage or IVR TX voltage at all. I left both on auto and miraculously DDR5 8600 C38 works very well. Latency on @Mr. Fox benching windows OS would probably be like 50NS. Ram voltages in bios are 1.640V VDD, and 1.590V VDDQ.

This is awesome.

Yeah that is pretty annoying. I’m just glad the gains are fairly minor. Not nearly as bad as me missing out on the Frame Gen feature that the RTX40’s have. This one feature alone would make it worth getting even just a RTX4070Ti. Lower power and high frames! Ark Ascended is really hard to run at 4K with no Frame Gen. @Mr. Fox Did you try those Team Groups in the Apex Z790 yet? My G.Skill 7200’s can run 8600C38 solid with 1.64V VDD, and 1.590V VDDQ. Latency is about 51ns. I have backed off the CPU IMC voltage, and backed off the IVR TX voltage to 1.400V or less range, and then I started juicing up the DDR5 VDD/VDDQ and I am seeing some really really good results now with bios 1501.

I’m going to order some next week. I did consider the G.Skill 8400 sticks. But they are too super crazy expensive, and I don’t trust the ram will be any better than what I have. I could get (2) of these kits for $390 and keep the best two sticks, return the others. And I can quickly exchange on Amazon if they all suck.

I would like to buy two of those kits and test each stick then run the best matched two sticks! Almost every memory kit sucks because we get 1 bad stick in the kit. One stick may hit like 8400Mhz, and another can do 8,900Mhz. Those are non gamer oriented. And pretty affordable at $194.99 which is a good buy for 48GB! The heat spreaders probably come off easier too. I am limited by my ram for the most part. But the link you just shared has me wanting to try those 100%. I bet they are really good. My current ram is at its limits. I would consider those Team Groups as like buying 3gbit green sticks, but we get a base XMp profile for free. I doubt they are binned at all. We gotta do that. They are also 7200C34 compared to my kit which is 7200C36. I bet 100% that you can find a golden match set from binning these. I’d like to find a set that can do the 8600C36@1.400VDD and 8800C38@1.470VDD. My rams are stretched pretty thin to 8600C40 lol.

It’s gonna work very good! I say go for it. They make tons of GPU blocks too and too many other things. Most CPU blocks all perform very similar to each other no matter how expensive one or cheap one may be. The only outlier here is when it comes to direct die.

I was able to get the 8600 stable by increasing IMC voltage from 1.450 to 1.475V. And I had to send 1.550V MEM VDD. Once I got this 8600 stable for 3 cycles 1usmus I turned off that Real-Time memory timings in the bios so my timings stay put. This motherboard does really great with this 8600 though so I’m happy with it. I will try to get 8800 stable next if possible. But it’s gonna be tough or impossible with my cpu and ram. DDR5 8800 stability testing and tuning is when random BSOD’s can occur on my Apex Z790 Vanilla. Similar to those random BSOD’s that my Apex Encore got at only DDR5 8400 lol. So I think it’s actual board lottery at play here. I indeed have a lower binned Apex Encore. I did get 8800 gaming stable on air cooled ram about 3 months ago using my Z790 Apex Vanilla. I keep losing these tedious ram profiles due to bios updates 🙃 Anyways, these voltages and timings are an endless combination. And they are all so different with what they need. My encore responded massively to increasing or lowering the SA voltage. But my white Apex is like totally dead with no feedback to that adjustment. Have you tried doing baby steps with that Strix? set your XMP 8000 in bios, before saving go ahead and adjust speed to 7200 speed, then F10 save, set ceiling voltages for IMC/IVR/VDD/VDDQ/SA and F10 save, then set some super loose timings (CL42-56-56-56-148) F10 Save, and go up in baby steps with frequency letting it fully train each time all the way to 8000 speed. I’m sure you tried everything by now though, and it’s just limited to that 7600, and hey 7600 ain’t too shabby. But the MSI is definitely more impressive here though. Some motherboards individually are just bad batches and provide little feedback or motivation when we are trying to tune them up. It would be COOL to see if exchanging it would result in a better quality Strix board.

Z790 Apex Vanilla bios 1501 is working SUPER GOOD!!! I just installed it tonight. I set DDR5 8400 right from a reset bios. Posted first try, then went right for DDR5 8600 and it just passed standard stability. This is DDR5 8600 XMP timings. And it passed right through. This is actually really impressive for my 7200 sticks. CPU IMC= 1.475V IVR TX 1.420V SA= 1.313V DDR5 VDD 1.500V DDR5 VDDQ 1.450V It only took me like three tries in and out of the bios and back to TM5. This is a great base line though! Now to tune it up from here. I just love this motherboard right here. 🥰🥰🥰🥰

Here’s the thing though, this only tells us so much. Of course this kind of board quality variation will exist even within the same board manufacturers. MSI vs MSI or ASUS vs ASUS. I had an old Z690 Unify-X that would run DDR5 8000c34 with 2x16GB T-Force ram. It was seriously impressive. Everyone wanted that board just because it was cheap, and it ran ram like a beast. (So long as your IMC was good, the board would provide the rest) and it absolutely did for its new owner. I do want to mention this, (I’m not competing with you here, but just an example) My white Z790 Apex would only do about 7600-7800 range when using 2x16GB A-Die too. With 2x24GB M-Die it will run 8400 XMP timings and 8600 XMP timings on my 7200 2x24 sticks with just 1.400V for 8400 and 1.450V for 8600. (This is crazy right) but it just absolutely freaking sucks with 2x16GB. I got like DDR5 7600-7800 stable tops on my Z790 Apex. So my Unify-X could actually out overclock my newer and better Z790 Apex using the same ram as on the MSI Z690 board lol. The MSI was not exactly better, but just very much different. That Asus Strix Z790I may excel with different ram just like both of my current Z790 Asus boards are, and just like the new Apex Encore does. We are popping together a bunch of random parts. And hoping for the best. In the (4) Z690/Z790 motherboards I have owned only (1) board that actually sucked at overclocking ram and it was the Z690 Apex which only ran DDR5 7000 reliably due to a weak Dimm slot. The rest of the boards are all about that “Ram compatibility” It’s funny because I remember with my white Apex. I was like, this thing absolutely freaking sucks... But turns out, it’s just a beast with 48GB kits. And it did not care much for 2x16 A-die at all. If a board is weak with one ram kit. Then try another on it. Unless it’s not a board worth pursuing this with. Then maybe just keep the MSI and that 2x16 kit. As far as I know all of the guys enjoying their new Apex Encore are running 2x16GB DDR5. But then again, everyone was pre-ordering the Apex Encore with the 2x24GB 8400 sticks which is just hilarious 😂 because well they just don’t work.

If you get a A770 you’ve gotta put a waterblock on it!

Both GPU’s are even at 99% And that’s 4090 VS. 7900XTX? Wow, literally.

Only thing good so far about the Apex Encore is the PCH temp ran substantially cooler than my Apex Z790. Not that it matters. But this is one noticeable difference. Below is both boards averages. And after already replacing their thermal pads. Z790 Apex 15w thermal pad 2.5MM thick AVG temp 55-57C. (Gelid ultimate thermal pad from Amazon) Z790 Apex Encore 12w thermal pad 2.0mm thick AVG temp 39-42C. (Cheap Off brand no name Chinese thermal pad from Amazon)

Oh yeah, I don’t do that, never lol. I have always been on the side of “If it runs games, it’s good enough” 🤣. But lately I just do 1usmus for 15 minutes. If it gets through that, it’s gonna run through literally anything and everything. Besides the Apex Encore lol. It’s definitely broke 😂. And that 15 minutes saves me lots of time instead of crashing in games and going through that trial and error I use to do. But some guys definitely go over board. As a matter of fact, I don’t even stability test my cpu at all lol. We all know if something is unstable right, of course we know! 🙂 If it runs Cinebench, and games it’s good! Especially modern games.

Im all for setting a ram OC and using it for gaming and benching and not actually stability testing it. I did it for years, but my Encore can’t do that 🤣. In my case the Encore was so unstable I had to resort to actually stability testing the ram and slowly working up. And physically knowing “ITS actually STABLE” however it was still unstable. I think mine is just broken. And yeah that that Wi-Fi magnet is such a piece of crap it won’t stay on my test bench either. I do kinda like the quick release though, but it looks like more cost cutting to me. I thought about swapping the wifi7 in to my white Apex. But that antenna magnet is really a deal breaker. Crazy how something so simple can effect an experience. @ryan Better just reinstall windows to ensure all the bloat is gone. Then once you get it exactly right, create a back up. I don’t have any Asus stuff installed, I just use my Asus boards with no armory crate. I did not kind the armory crate lite, but my OCD can’t handle anything like that installed. So I removed it lol. And I have already re-installed windows again anyways. This Apex Encore was breaking OSes left and right on me.

Yep I absolutely agree with that! Seeing that Sugi guy run DDR5 8800 stable, and post DDR5 9000, makes me think my white Apex is definitely a top bin it just does things very effortlessly. Because these boards were so uncommon and rare, also makes me think a different type of testing or standard they were held to. I think it’s funny that Asus tried to turn the Apex in to a mainstream product by mass producing them. Yet, this board gets literally “ram right over” by my old Apex lol. Anyways, I hope yours is good at least. Has it been okay?

Yep. You are not kidding. Sometimes we just gotta stop and think, “what in the heck am I doing!” Rinse repeat rinse repeat on this Encore wasting so much time. It swear it felt like this Encore was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. It kept tricking me over and over again each day. But, I’m done with all that, after I saw the first issue after flashing over to the new bios around 6 hours in. I was done. The white Apex is great. And I’m glad to be back using it. It’s just a solid product! I also swapped the PCH thermal pad for a 2.5MM thick and much higher quality option. The Z790 Apex has always worked with any kind of crazy memory profile. Whether it’s stable or no where near stable. I think I may have gotten a bad Apex Encore. Not a big deal. It happens. This would actually be the first time I have ever gotten a defective or unusable brand new motherboard.

I swapped back to my white Apex tonight. 🙂 she’s solid as a rock. The Encore Apex is a real trickster! It will make you think all is well. And then start causing random weird problems. After 10 days of testing with the pre-included 0220 bios, I decided last night I would flash to Encore Apex 0506 bios. I slowly stabilized DDR5 8000 to 8200 to 8400 testing in 1usmus. Then started using my system for just web browsing after a few hours this was when the weird stuff started happening. Random BSOD’s. And Instability. I re-installed windows again thinking I messed it up from using 0220. And, nope. By 1:30AM I was done with the Apex Encore all together. It felt awfully familiar to my old Z690 Apex with random unexplained instabilities when using DDR5 7200. If I run 1usmus for even just 15 minutes, that system should be good to go for practically any kind of usage especially gaming and light loads.

@Papusan Good news! I used the Apex Encore original 0220 bios for a while now to get a good feel for how it really is. And I struggled to stabilize fast speeds on my 2x24GB sticks. The bios just wasn’t great.. What can I say. Coming from an OG white Apex this Encore has felt weaker. Was it the board? Was it the bios? I did not give up early though, because I also had growing pains on my Z790 APEX white motherboard too. I gave the Encore a solid chance, and I’m glad I did. I just swapped over to the newest 0506 Asus Apex Encore bios tonight, I can say for sure “This bios” is absolutely better 100%. I keyed in 8400 XMP timings, 1.420 IVR TX, and 1.443V IMC, with just an auto SA voltage of only 1.250V and with an increased 131,071 tREFI and it still passed 1usmus 3 cycles the very first try! BAM! Let’s go Apex Encore 😎. Woot woot. (PS: This is using my OG 7200 sticks, I do not actually own the new 8400 sticks) But so far so good! I have slowly stepped up in ram clocks, DDR5 8600 up next. Maybe I won’t have to swap motherboards back after all. @Mr. Fox I’m swapping back to my OG Z790 Apex Vanilla tomorrow. I did get 8400 stable on this. But, it’s really some weird other things happening and making me want to switch back. 🙂 I tried. I do like the board. But, I need reliability.

Ohhhh! Okay okay. Mini ITX? No kidding 😎. This is pretty interesting. Now I’m dying to know if they’d make it through 1usmus. Better get a fan though. 😃