Mr. Fox

Seems a little bit inconsistent between runs for some reason. Not sure if the 3D-Vcache is helping the EPYC or what, but the clocks and power limits are the same as the 9950X, but it scores higher.

Nice. Thanks, bro. They finally gave it a new program icon so you can tell at a glance which Cinebench version the shortcut is for.

We already knew Winduhz 11 is lousy, but it is nice to see so many people figuring it out for themselves. Starting from conclusions (feel free to watch the whole thing)... I do not agree with his rationale for accepting Winduhz 11 at the end. Better to have no support from Micro$lop than tolerate a sucky OS.

Just fill the space around the die with low melt solder to protect the SMDs from liquid metal. 🤣

No thanks Brother @Papusan. I have no space in my life and no desire at all to waste money on mobile computing garbage. I hate turdbook filth more than I ever have. Just the thought of it makes me feel sick.

Interesting... Setting tRDPRE and tRWPRE from "Auto" (4) to 3 in the BIOS seemed to have made a minor improvement in performance and equalized my tPHYRDL. It certainly is stupid that motherboard OEMs are not using common nomenclature for all BIOS menu verbiage as we are on the verge of entering 2026. In their infinite wisdom A$$zeus has decided to refer to these settings as "Read Preamble P0" and "Write Preamble P0" for some idiotic reason. Why not just tRDPRE and tRWPRE? Keep it simple and speak the same language... dumb-dumbs.

That looks totally awesome, brother. I love it. To protect the GPU SMDs around the core you can use clear nail polish, the red Thermal Grizzly conformal coating (or other conformal coating) and the Thermal Grizzly GPU Guard gasket. I use clear nail polish covered by the GPU Guard, so double-protection. My recommendation would be doing that. You not only protect the SMD components, but everything else beyond them. The gasket also minimizes exposure to air, so the liquid metal should be less likely to oxidize. https://www.titanrig.com/thermal-grizzly-tg-gpu-guard-nvidia-gpu-set.html

If the Unify is a 2-DIMMer like the Unify-X of the past you probably should, even though it is an MSI. It probably won't match an Apex, but I think it would still be better than a 4-DIMM option. One of the best things (other than the BIOS) about the Apex is the DIMM.2 feature. I really like the convenience of being able to access all of the M.2 slots that I am willing to use without having to remove the GPU. (I will not use the M.2 slots that castrate the GPU bandwidth to X8 under any circumstances.) It is unfortunate that most motherboards made for Intel and AMD are still sucky 4-DIMM garbage. It should be an exception and 4-DIMM boards should be limited to a few isolated creator-focused options where maxing out RAM capacity is more important than performance. It's comical that some people still view that as a future "upgrade" path, but understandable to the extent that the average gamerboy is somewhat fightened about entering the BIOS to apply an XMP/EXPO profile. On another note... my God, how did so many people get so stupid so suddenly... rampant idiocy is the new normal where technology is concerned.

It will be interesting to hear what his conclusions are after 30 days. I can't say that I like either one now. I can identify things that I dislike about both brands, but I try not to dwell on those things because it can get pretty depressing when you begin compiling a list of the things that suck.

Merry Christmas, everyone. Blessings to all of you.

Yes, he is smart. But, thinking that raises questions about his ability to think clearly. Only a small number of people with misinformed bias think such things.

I do not think you can upload videos here, only embedded links.

Awesome. Glad you were able to snag one for a proper price. I think things are going to continue to circle the drain in the PC space for the next couple of years and anything that can be purchased now at proper pricing will likely hold its value longer than it normally would or should.

⁉️ limit for what?

Thank you. Just using a basic Barrowch memory cooling kit similar to this one from Titan Rig (slightly different appearance to the block on top). The memory kit is the same one I have had since May. G.SKILL F5-6000J2636H16GX2-TZ5NR was $189.99 when I bought it. Now I wish I had purchased a dozen at that price. Could easily sell for double what I had paid for them, maybe triple. Edit: here is the exact cooler kit on the Strix memory. I think it looks great, and it works great, but I do not recommend it because the spacing of the screw holes to attach the block to the RAM jackets are not spaced according to common standards. They do not line up with the spacing of any generic memory cooling parts I have purchased in the past, so this kit is sort of a proprietary piece of crap in that respect. I recommend sticking with the generic stuff like Bykski, Freezemod and the stuff that the eBay/Amazon counterfeiters sell. If you don't care about that then it is a great product. The reason I hate it is because I cannot simply move memory modules around between systems without disassembling everything and transferring the memory jackets to other sticks. That sucks. For a person with one PC that doesn't fiddle around with things it would be totally fine.

Hard to not get excited about things like this.

Hmm. Had the same issue on the Strix. The ASMx4242 firmware update did not seem to run. Then I remembered I had USB4 disabled in the BIOS on both of my systems. I toggled it back on and the firmware update for ASMx4242 completed on both... but with a bit of a scare... (see below). When I ran the ASMx4242 firmware update all of my USB and LAN stopped working on both systems. There was no visual indication on my screen that anything was taking place in the background. After what seemed like a long time the USB came back (maybe 20 seconds, but seemed like a long time waiting) and I was prompted to reboot. After rebooting and making it back to the desktop it seemed like a long wait for USB and LAN to power on again. This was exactly the same behavior on both systems. After the initialization the first time after rebooting the USB and LAN is working normally after multiple reboots. Apparently the flashing procedure does this since both systems behaved exactly the same when flashing the ASMx4242 firmware update. Did you experience the same with the ASMx4242 firmware update? I am glad I did not get impatient and power off in the middle of an invisible firmware update procedure. A$$zeus should have something in the Readme file about that. I could see some people flipping the power off before it finished. The PD update flashing provided a very visible indication it was working while it was happening.

Hmm. Interesting. There is a firmware update for both the Apex and the Strix. In fact, it appears to be the exact same firmware update for both systems... same SHA-256 hash even. The PD_UPDATE_TOOL_V0206.exe flash completed successfully on the Apex, but the second ASMx4242 firmware update doesn't seem to do anything. Running it gives a momentary cursor circle icon that goes away immediately. I rebooted and it still does not seem to run. I wonder if the Readme.txt file has erroneous information about installing both updates. I will see what it does on the Strix. I haven't had any major USB issues except for my USB mic would intermittently and randomly throw a device descriptor failure error message on the Strix, but never on the Apex. Maybe this will fix that.

@Rage Set it must be DIMM dying season. Check this out. Weird short circuit on this PC at the DIMM module.

A test BIOS (9923) dropped from ASUS for AM5 and it seems like an improvement. I cannot get 8400 fully stable, but I think that might be a CPU/IMC limitation. This is my weakest CPU. I may try my better 9950X or my 4585PX, but there is almost no measurable difference in performance between 8200 and 8400, so no biggie either way. These Kingbank XMP/EXPO 8400 sticks that @gupsterg turned me on to have been great. They were dirt cheap when I bought them on Amazon back in the "good old days" (not long ago) before the tech world went off the rails with the crazy AI nonsense. I've never seen so many stupid people that would otherwise be viewed as intelligent. Now I wish I hadn't sold that second 8400 kit. Kingbank no longer sells memory on Amazon, and even if they did the price would suck now. 😑

Yeah it is a real bummer. I am puzzled as well. Maybe they didn't make enough on motherboard sales for it to be sustainable. I loved their hardware and firmware. That will be a nice case upgrade for the wife. Antec makes good stuff, especially their cases. I enjoyed the Intel Unify X, but the firmware kept me from loving the X870E Carbon. It was not terrible by any means, it just never rose to the level of seeming awesome... good versus great.

That is the only solution that I would deem acceptable. Although disappointing, the fortunate thing for me is gaming is not important enough that making an exception and compromising my position on the subject isn't necessary. I won't lose any sleep over no longer playing new titles in game franchises I have enjoyed since the initial release. Seems like status quo that good things eventually turn to crap. Not a matter of if, but when. Easy come, easy go. Que sera sera. 🤣