Mr. Fox

Well, it sucks that the first one failed, and even more so that I was honest to Intel and they're not taking care of business. So, this time around I bought an Allstate warranty that includes accidental damage since Intel and AMD are determined to not stand behind the products they sell. The replacement 12900KS SP ratings are significantly better, so this might be the silver lining to the dark cloud.

I don't have any benchmark results yet because I have been too busy with other things and the replacement 12900KS is supposed to be delivered today. But, subjectively I love it. As expected, it is an amazing product as every Dark mobo has been compared to the alternatives. The MSI mobo or defective CPU also messed up the replacement memory kit, so I can't do much yet because of that. I am finalizing a product review on a kit of Corsair DDR5 Vengeance RGB but it is Samsung IC and sucks at overclocking. The PMIC is limited to 1.435V (locked in firmware). The replacement TeamGroup Delta that I got from the RMA of the first kit now has one module stuck permanently at 2.100V in both the MSI and EVGA mobo, so something was definitely going haywire with the Unify-X or the CPU. But, now with the messed up 12900KS it is impossible to know whether it was the chicken or the egg that came first. I think I am going to sell the Unify-X and stick with the Strix D4 simply because it has no issues and is fine for a work computer. The enthusiast part of me would prefer to keep the Unify-X rather than the Strix, but I don't want to have to deal with any more nonsense. I think I would be better off not assuming whether or the Unify-X has been the source of the issues rather than taking the risk and finding out the hard way. The better bin of the 12900K and the replacement 12900KS will go into the Dark mobo and the Strix will run the lesser of the two. Good to know on that RAM. I like that it is not RGB. Thanks for sharing the link.

Everything the big tech companies do is deliberately metered and rolled out incrementally as feature enhancements in stages to ensure they have milk left in their digital mammary glands so they can sell us something new later on. They enjoy playing poker with our money and keeping the jackpot and gambling wins for themselves. If they include everything in one release or hardware generation they also can't make as much money as they would holding back things for later, and they will run out of gimmicks that get people excited about wasting their money. They also won't have something in their bags of tricks and nifty gimmicks to deflect the tricks and marketing gimmicks of their similarly clever competitor(s) if they include too much in a single release. It was kind of humorous how Threadripper fans got butt-hurt about AMD breaking their promises on the HEDT socket cross-generation compatibility, while the consumer side of their fan base remains fixated on having a static CPU socket form factor that spans many years. What they often don't realize is that having the ability to install a newer CPUs doesn't necessarily give them everything the newer CPU brings to the table and they still have to buy a new motherboard built using a legacy socket if they want all of the features to work. Depending on what they are hoping to accomplish, the CPU upgrade may not actually be the upgrade they were hoping for. The effect isn't that different than buying a new motherboard with a different CPU socket. The inability to downgrade to an older CPU on a newer motherboard and chipset is probably the greater benefit that gets overlooked. I do really care a lot about PCIe lane count. Moving back to consumer CPUs after being on HEDT for a while was initially difficult. I had to lower my expectations on how much stuff I could have running on PCIe. I didn't have issues running a dual NVMe PCIe card dropping my GPU from 16x to 8x or 4x, etc. It was nice having more PCIe lanes available than what I needed to do whatever I wanted to do. Most consumers and gamers don't find this limitation to be relevant and the reduction in function doesn't affect them based on their use scenario.

It is very difficult to find anything nice to say about anything that has to do with electronics technology. The hardware and the software that runs on it mostly trash, and what little doesn't suck is priced for people that have frivolous spending habits, or more money than intelligence. I hope Intel, AMD and NVIDIA experience record-setting losses and have to sell their next gen garbage for less than they are currently dumping their excess last Gen GPU inventory. It would also be nice to see Apple go out of business and Micro$lop stop working on new versions of Windows and Office and offer nothing but basic function-essential bug fixes for the next 5 or 6 years. The world doesn't need a next gen of anything. What we need is for them to stop pushing overpriced, unreliable, buggy, trash and "digitally signed" PUPs and data-stealing malware gimmicks. They don't deserve anything nice or good, and we don't owe them anything more than a hard reset.

If 5950X and X570 were any good I would still be running that. The platform was buggy to the point of frustration and the CPU and memory overclocking capabilities were pathetic. There are not very many that can run 50x on all cores without sub-zero cooling. Nice Cinebench scores is what attracted me to it in the first place. Little did I know that it would ultimately turn out to be about the only thing that I thought it was actually good for... and even then, only when my mouse and keyboard worked. I'd rank it in my top 10 most regrettable purchases of all time.

This is an apples-to-oranges comparison. 5950X is 16 cores / 32 threads. 12900K/KF/KS are 8 cores/ 16 threads, plus 8 Atom cores for a total of 24 threads. The Intel CPU outperforms the 5950X by a huge margin on a per thread basis, but it is 8 threads fewer than the 5950X. It is erroneous to put them in the same class due to the difference in total usable threads. If you were to disable 4 cores and force the 5950X to run with a maximum of 24 threads it would get its ass kicked really bad by an overclock 12900K/KF/KS. The more appropriate comparison would by a Ryzen 3900X or 5900X, which are 12 core, 24 thread. The highest Cinebench scores on HWBOT for 5900X are lower than the 12900K* scores that I, @Papusan or @johnksss have posted. And, the Cinebench R23 record is with a 5900X running 6.0GHz on LN2. https://hwbot.org/submission/4673735_oclockdoc_cinebench___r23_multi_core_with_benchmate_ryzen_9_5900x_30202_cb https://hwbot.org/hardware/processors#key=ryzen_9_5900x

I am not sure what I want to do as far as which mobo to keep. I really like the Unify-X, but not knowing if it is what damaged the memory and CPU, or if it was the CPU that damaged the memory makes it seem like maybe it shouldn't be worth the risk. The latter seems far less likely to me. I almost feel like whatever it did to screw up the memory also damaged the CPU and it just took longer for the evidence to show on the CPU. The Strix isn't a bad mobo by any means, but not even close to the same caliber as the Unify-X. The Strix is nice and the Unify-X is excellent, but I'd rather have a nice mobo than another round of parts killing. Nothing is mission-critical on the work system in terms of risk for data loss. Everything I do, including the data part, is cloud-based. I could do everything with a Chromebook or tablet if I had to, even though I wouldn't really want to. No you do not need to totally remove all of the solder, just level it out where it makes contact. The copper the heat pipes is made of is very soft and flexible. It's easy to sand it down and make it sound so you do want to avoid doing that. I would use something like 400 or 600 grit paper to take down the solder quickly and then move to 800 or 1000 grit to smooth it up and just don't sand on the bare copper that much. The only reason you need to sand that surface is so that there's no clumps or chunks of old solder or paint to interfere with the resoldering.

I had to just bite the bullet and order another CPU. It should be here on Tuesday. The failing 12900KS seems to work right most of the time other than the dead memory channel. Very odd. No visibly burned pads or anything else. I am guessing something internal in the transistor circuitry. I was hoping it would work fine on the DDR4 Strix mobo and I would just live with knowing it did not work right for DDR5, but no such luck. What I mean by most of the time is that it will randomly throw a BSOD. It did that three times today within the span of 30 minutes around mid-morning, but worked correctly otherwise from 6:30 AM when I started work until I stopped working at 4:00 PM. When it does the BSOD the mobo lights act weird and it behaves like it is retraining the memory, so it might be interesting to see if it keeps working long enough for the new 12900KS to arrive on Tuesday. If not, I may have to use my laptop for work for a few days. Then I will have to decide whether to keep the Strix and sell the Unify-X or vice versa. Part of me wonders if the MSI board did something to the CPU like the Z490 Apex that killed my first 10900KF. I like the Unify-X way better than I do the Strix D4, but I wonder if it wouldn't be the safer choice to keep the Strix. The Unify-X has had occasional random weirdness all along, but it is an excellent motherboard when it is not doing something goofy. First the memory SPD corruption, now the CPU losing a memory channel. Hard to feel like continuing to use it is the smart thing to do at this point. And, it is my second Unify-X, so that makes it even harder to have confidence in it being a reliable product.

Maybe someday I will be blessed with a MC within 100 miles of where I live. I hope so. The closest ones are in Tustin, CA (yours) and Dallas. I have suggested they look at adding one in Phoenix. I really don't know why there is not one here already. It is a gigantic metropolis. It would be wildly successful here, and Arizona is very business-friendly with unusually low taxes compared to many of the cities that are almost hostile toward businesses and tax-Nazis where they have locations. I am still waiting for the guy from Intel to send me an official copy of the warranty that states the act of overclocking the processor or memory automatically voids the warranty for failures of any kind, whether caused by overclocking or not.

Yeah, I understand that. I like gaming and it was a major focus for me for many years (limited interest in FPS only) and it ultimately contributed to birthing my fetish for overclocking high performance PCs. But, gaming is no longer something I engage in frequently enough for it to be of major importance. Most of the games I would play if I had time for that have been verified to run well on Linux. A surprisingly high number of them too, and it is probably worth noting that I generally only play AAA titles. I haven't tried any of the indie stuff on Linux since I don't buy or play indie games. I would expect similar or better results on Linux for Indie titles. The last game I purchased from Micro$lop Store was Gears of War 4 and when I found myself being required to install a newer version of Windows in the middle of my single player campaign I vowed to not give those filthy dung-eating losers my money again. I don't intend to feed their pig. I am happy with the idea of it starving to death, and to that I would say "good riddance" LOL.

A lot better than this. https://www.3dmark.com/pr/1694278

The best way to tell is in a multi-boot environment. That is how I effectively rake the new crap OSes over the coals and tear them a new posterior orifice. The average Joe can only offer anecdotal opinions. I can directly compare the performance of Windows 7, Windows 10 LTSC 2019, Windows 10 LTSC 2021, Windows 11 all on the same system. It makes deficiencies and defects glaringly evident and leaves no place to hide. Where CPU and memory performance are concerned, you can easily measure the decline with each new release of Windows. I don't have Windows 7 on my laptop, but I do have LTSC 2019, LTSC 2021, Windows 11 and Liux. That is where I spotted the dramatic decline in CPU performance on the laptop. I suspect the weaker the hardware is, the more evident the decline will be in terms of what you can feel in the seat of your pants. You will feel the pain of a Windows 11 downgrade more on a quad-core i7 than you will on an octa-core i9 even if the percentage of performance loss is roughly the same.

Are there any pictures of the @Papusangaming desk to share yet?

Yeah, you are spot on about getting shanked. You cannot be honest and deal honorably with a party that is dishonest and has no honor. For the most part, the tech industry is dominated by companies and people of that low caliber of integrity. China being a key player in that industry probably has something to do with the problem as well. Hard to say what the motivation is. It could also be that they noticed that AMD uses overclocking as a lame excuse to void a CPU warranty and thought they may as well take the low road like AMD and save a few bucks by using the same excuse. One thing for certain is nothing seems to be made with the level of quality that used to be normal. It does not matter what it is, (tech, cars, homes, appliances... everything) quality continues to decline as prices increase. I may have to do a talking head feature video on my YouTube channel about this experience and share the email information with a broader audience. Maybe GamersNexus or WCCFTech will spot it and add some gasoline to the fire.

I have Windows 11 aesthetic atrocities mostly fixed using StartAllBack and OldNewExplorer. With a few minor exceptions it looks and feels like a properly mitigated version of Windows 10. The Start menu is on the left side where it belongs, the Taskbar functions correctly and the right-click context menu is no longer a terrible mess. What I can't fix so far is the horrible decline in performance with Windows 11. I don't understand what the Redmond Retards are doing, but every major release of Windows from 8.X forward causes a measurable decrease in CPU performance. Windows 11 is the slowest version yet. For example, the least taxing ThrottleStop benchmark takes more than 6 seconds longer to finish because of what these idiots have done to impair CPU performance. Memory latency also worsened, which is consistent with the degradation of performance with each new major Windows release. There is no reason I can identify that anyone should waste any time downgrading a system to Windows 11. While there is something to lose, there is nothing to gain. It's uglier, less efficient to navigate and slower. Nice job, Micro$lop.

Yes, I used to buy it. It was inexpensive. It was easy money for them because it was seldom needed as their processors were reliable and resilient. That reality was likely the reason it wasn't popular as most probably viewed it as being unnecessary. That is how insurance works. It is a waste of money until you need it, and then it becomes priceless. Needing it and not having it is tragic, especially when you're a wage-earner that isn't leeching an existence off of taxpayer sweat.

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In contrast to Arctic Cooling's handling of this, we see examples of the opposite. @johnkssshas always shared the belief that honesty is always the best policy. It seems that might not work for any of us going forward. We may have to stoop to their level to get the job done.

I totally agree. Probably another example of "monkey see, monkey do" nonsense. If AMD can give people unlocked processors built with the express intent of overclocking and say it is not covered under warranty, or that doing it arbitrarily voids the warranty, and get away with it, they probably figure they may as well do the same. It gives both companies a scapegoat for shirking responsibility. They can say the warranty is voided due to overclocking and then the owner of the product has to fight and make the case the overclocking didn't cause the failure. It is a very dishonest and deplorable way to run a business, but it is sadly becoming very common. It also creates an incentive for consumers to be dishonest in order to receive what they paid for and are entitled to by virtue of that payment. I could have lied to the rep from Intel and told him that I only used it with firmware defaults. Doing that probably would have even been in my financial best interest, but I still try to live by the principle that honesty is the best policy and telling lies will eventually catch up with you. It is sometimes easy to confuse slyness and deception with wisdom based on the outcome.

Turns out the CPU is the problem. Something must have crapped out internally on the 12900KS. The only thing I did not try before ordering the Z690 Dark was swapping the CPUs on the Strix and Unify-X. I installed the Dark and the problem was exactly the same. The secondary DIMM slot is messed up. I swapped CPUs and the problem followed the CPU to the Strix mobo. Only boots with the primary channel. If memory is populating a slot on the secondary channel it will not boot. I asked Intel for an RMA. The rep I chatted with said he would ask for permission to honor the RMA request and would have an answer for me on Monday. He claims overclocking the CPU or RAM voids the warrant based on Intel's latest policies. I guess that means the best plan going forward is to always pay extra for a 2- or 3-year Allstate or Square Trade warranty with accidental damage protection because now nobody, except EVGA (at least for the time being--who knows if that will last), is going to have your back when you do them the favor of choosing their brand when their product fails, including Intel. Sad that now Intel is playing the AMD card. It's so awesome how big tech companies almost never want to do the right thing by the people they love taking money from. It is like each brand has become a cartel. Allstate and Square Trade should start marketing their products as "Manufacturer Integrity Replacement Policy" or "Surrogate Warranty" plans.

Something to go along with that. EVGA does not offer a cross-ship RMA option on products purchased used or new if that item is not purchased directly from EVGA or one of their authorized sellers. The warranty transfers as you noted, but the only option is to send it in and wait. Congrats on the nice birthday gifts. That was a good gift. Please post some pictures once everything is set up.

While I know that much is subjective and varies by personal taste, I find the Windows 11 default GUI overall to be the most aesthetically repulsive and inefficient to navigate version of Windows to date. The Windows 8.X Start Screen was more unacceptable, but it was the only aesthetic atrocity compared to a list of unpleasant eye sores featured in the latest abortion.

I guess it depends on how you define do better. I think the obvious answer is "no" it can't. The exception would be which OS is better at misleading consumers that remain stupid enough to believe the fairytale that newer is always better. In that scenario, Windows 11 is a lot more effective. Most computer users don't know what they don't know, and their ignorance allows them to live a pathetic life in a state of misguided bliss. That is sad because it requires little time and effort to identify the ways that Windows 11 sucks. The enhancement of performance is one of the easiest myths to bust. It takes more that 6 seconds extra for Windows 11 to run the least taxing ThrottleStop benchmark than it does for Windows 10 LTSC 2019. Degradation of performance is sadly obvious and undeniable. In the examples below, the tests were run just a few minutes apart on a multi-boot system. @Papusan

The Eurocom Tornado F5 and other boutique-branded versions of the same product was definitely an interesting machine. It had several redeeming qualities and all of the elements that would be needed to constitute a paradigm of excellence. This is ironic because it was a "whitebook" product that was superior to the mainstream BGA equivalent piece of crap that received MSI branding. In spite of its admirable traits, it had some very damning artificial firmware-induced defects that largely spoiled it and prevented it from being viewed as excellent overall. Even so, ignoring the defects with origins rooted in engineering incompetence on MSI's part, the form factor made it impossible for me to love it. I have owned about five 15-inch laptops and about nine 17- and 18-inch laptops. In my experience, all of the laptops smaller than 17-inch were impossible to view as quintessentially excellent products. Using a 15-inch always left me with a sense of disappointment because it was simply too small and compromised to generate excitement, enthusiasm or a satisfying user experience.

Indeed. The best laptop money can buy is, at best, a lackluster equivalent of a mediocre desktop.

The sheeple always love the suckiest crap and hate on the better crap. If it is actually good or great they have a total come-undone. They have no ability to grasp the magnitude of their own tragic stupidity.