Mr. Fox

I am going to stick with the Carbon. It's solid. MSI always leaves a few things to be desired, but produce an overall decent product. I'd like to steer myself away from ASUS if that is possible. I've given them enough money alread. I've got the Taichi boxed up and ready to submit my RMA. Carbon is back in use.

One thing that I really like about it (not enough to forgive the issues) is the in-BIOS control of the lighting. I can make all of the RGB static white and save it in the BIOS. It should be mandatory that all motherboard firmware include that feature. The A-Tuning software also works well, and the per-CCD core ratio manual overclocking works correctly (broken in the MSI firmware). I am not going to try another one. The fact there is so little meaningful engagement in that ASRock X870 thread at oc.net suggests to me that nobody has a good one, or the people buying it are still content with point-and-click DDR5-6000. Neither of those are inspiring.

I have not. I will have to check it out. Edit: Wow. Shameful. Seems like shady and scummy is the new standard for all aspects of computer technology. Sad that NZXT is part of it. The trick of the day would be finding a brand that is good enough to not be shady and scummy. I don't think there is one.

Sounds like you're having as much fun as i have in the last 24 hours. I was planning to return the Carbon and replace it with the Taichi, but so far I am very unimpressed with the lack of memory stability with the Taichi. It has a lot going for it but that, in and of itself, is a deal-breaker. Not sure why, but it is not stable and has a lot worse latency in comparison. I wasted 16 hours yesterday trying to get it stable. Memory training takes 3 or 4 times longer than the Carbon and has 10ns more latency using the same memory timings. @cylix the no-lane sharing benefit of the Taichi means nothing. Here is the gotcha: If you use the second x16 slot for anything the GPU runs x8. Not being able to use my x4 PCIe add-card means I ended up losing NVMe storage capacity in spite of being able to use all M.2 slots without affecting the GPU. Using the PCIe slot on the Carbon does not cut the GPU bandwidth to x8. That allows me to install up to four NVMe in a x4 PCIe add-in card. So, the Taichi EATX motherboard essentially offers nothing in terms of expansion options than what you get with an ITX motherboard. Very disappointed with the poor overall functionality of this motherboard so far and will most likely return it and keep the Carbon. The opposite of what I expected. Edit: yeah, have tested every available BIOS and this thing is just pure trash. Not sure if it is the one I received or the product in general. Definitely going to RMA/refund on this and go back to the Carbon. It unequivocally sucks at memory overclocking like nothing I have ever seen. Rubbish.

I have not seen that. Maybe if you're wanting to target the wrong buyers. I've never expected to pay less or get less for a delidded CPU, but I don't care about what gamerboys want. Some of them also wig out about liquid metal making the etched letters on the IHS unreadable and similarly stupid noob notions.

Thank you. My current Ryzen 8000 memory profile is largely based on your work and I really appreciate it. On another note, the 14900KS that I purchased from @tps3443 is now bare die on a Thermal Grizzly Mycro Pro block. Just finished that a few minutes ago. And, the X870E Taichi just arrived right as I was finishing up that project.

The BIOS features do appear to be better and in this video it boots Intel XMP 8400 2x24GB G.SKILL with no issues. UNTIL he downgrades to a newer BIOS. (Newer is always better newer,) I'll leave it on 3.04 when I get it.

I think I am going to be done with my Ryzen memory tuning for a while. It's a bit more tedious than Intel memory tuning (which is tedious enough in its own rights, LOL). Anyone that wants to give these settings a go with their AM5 DDR5 setup, feel free... @jaybee83 @cylix @Raiderman. This was good enough that I wrote the settings to my memory module user profile space. The screenshots show BIOS pages where anything was changed from default. The water cooling is certainly working well. After lots of stress testing the RAM temps have maxed out like 38°C.

Pathetic, indeed. That is also a fitting description of the human beings that gave place to that and created the opportunity. We can attribute many of the things that are wrong with the world we live in to these stupid, sick, depraved losers that thrive on that kind of trash tech. Bottom-feeders like that are why we can't have nice things. Welcome to a world where hell-bound morons obsessed with the AI fairytale decide for everyone what matters most.

Happy Thanksgiving, friends. We all have much to be thankful for. I am thankful for all of you.

I went ahead and ordered a Taichi on NewEgg today. I have until January to return the Carbon. Taichi has two more SATA ports and I can use all of the M.2 slots without chopping the GPU back to x8, and the onboard clock generator that only the idiotic MSI Godlike offers. (The loss of storage options with the Carbon as a replacement to the Apex Encore was immediately painful.) The EATX size is not a big deal to me... not a problem. Added bonus (possibly) is that my TeamGroup Xtreem 48GB 8200 kit is on the Taichi QVL. It does not work correctly with the Carbon and neither does the G.SKILL 48GB kit. Only the older A-die 32GB memory seems to work correctly on the Carbon and the MSI QVL doesn't show anything else. I would have preferred the Taichi Lite for several reasons (including better aesthetics) but the lack of the GPU release made it unattractive. It's too hard to get to the release on the top x16 slot under a large GPU. I will make sure the Taichi is better before I return the Carbon.

200% that was a STEAL for that CPU new/sealed. I am super impressed with that motherboard and CPU. I removed the trashy stock G.SKILL heating blankets and have the memory on water now in the Carbon. Huge improvement (like 20-25°C) in memory temps under load. It's really too bad this is a 4-DIMM motherboard. I could have used the IceMan RAM blocks and the memory overclocking would also be better. Brother @Clamibot got those parts in his kit anyhow.❤️ This was hitting 55-60°C in TM5 before, usually erroring out due to overheating. No more. (lots of new bubbles in the loop now, LOL... will clear up in a day or so)

That sounds awesome, brother. I look forward to seeing how that turns out. Really interested in that. ❤️

That is a great deal. Congrats. These silver Byski RAM sinks and aluminum heatsink on top fit the Edge aesthetic nicely. It looks better than the black ones.

I reached out to @chew on oc.net (chewonthis) and he says it works, but it absolutely does not work or something I am setting due to lack of understanding of how AMD firmware works is making it not work. (I am thinking the BIOS is bugged.) I am still within my return Windows and seriously debating whether I should RMA this and get the Taichi instead. Overall I really like it, but I expected a little better in terms of BIOS tuning function. I could also be jumping from the frying pan to the fire and end up regretting the switch. I should probably poke around in the oc.net X870E Taichi forums first and see what, if anything, people are complaining about. I need to ping @Raiderman about something else (not computer related).

I don't know if it is me and my ignorance of AMD overclocking, or if it is something bugged with the firmware, but I cannot set CCD0 and CCD1 at different core ratios. If I do that they all run 43x max and ignore my settings. Seems like only PBO and All Core work, and PBO sucks as much as eTVB... rubbish. Sometimes I wish I had an SP rating, but other times I think my state of mind is better just exploring where the edge of functionality is for this CPU and not care about SP rating. I used to not care and not look, and we all got sucked into that flawed ASUS gimmick that creates a jaded view before any tuning starts rather than an informed understanding. Anyhoo... personal all-time best score for Cinebench R23. And, I still have thermal headroom if the silicon quality is able to handle more. https://hwbot.org/submission/5702114_

Interesting that the GPU utilization is higher on the 9950X in spite of the preset being the same. Not sure why the difference there. But, basically a toss-up and within a margin of error. I didn't do a second run (which is often higher) just grabbed the first for each system.

Next projects... Delid 14900KS and install bare die block Replace trash stock heatsinks on G.SKILL Neo 8000 RAM kit with water cooling

Success! https://imgur.com/a/HAftuqu Before Decapitation ^^^ IHS Removed ^^^ Liquid Metal Application ^^^ Micro Direct Die Block ^^^ CPU in socket (Kapton tape to prevent CPU from lifting out of socket with MDD block) ^^^ Installed... ^^^ Finished Product ^^^ Before Delid ^^^ After Delid ^^^ Before Delid ^^^ After Delid ^^^ AIDA64 5-Minute Stress Test (ambient 79°F / 26°C) - normalized at 72°C Edit: I just noticed that with the latest BIOS that Benchmate is not reading the core voltage correctly. The core voltage is fixed at 1.250V and other monitoring software confirms the same. Clearly not 2.00V+ vCore or CPU would be melting, LOL...

Cool (pun intended). Will probably use the HP IHS on my son's system with an AM5 CPU. I guess I won't bother comparing now. Just straight to direct die. No point in wasting my time thanks to Jufes. (That may sound sarcastic, but I don't mean for it to. I was not looking forward to the testing.) Delidding the 5950X did absolutely nothing with an IHS.

Running it as 720P low would basically make it mostly a CPU benchmark. That makes sense in a way and I see some of the YouTube dudes doing it, but what it doesn't do when one does that is actually capture how a CPU truly performs when being used "properly" (as in a real-world scenario) in a gaming setup. I think the conclusion could end up being misleading if the behavior doesn't always hold true to what the "real" experience is like. I am pretty sure the 14900KS is still going to beat the 9950X in that kind of test, especially with an all core fixed clock on the 9950X like I am running. It can't boost to 57x in light loads like it does stock. I have it fixed at 54x on all cores, both CCDs.

I think you might appreciate this...

Yes, Fire Strike chokes on too many threads. With i9 13900/14900/K/KF/KS your physics and combined scores go way up if you disable 3 of the baby cores. Same for 3DMark 11. They're both too old and don't know how to use them. (From a time when quad core hyperthreading was the norm.) Time Spy and Sky Diver will use them all and give you a score reflecting that a better CPU is installed. While it should not come as a surprise... we already knew this: the talking heads on YouTube that say 9950X is not a major improvement over 7950X are so full of crap their eyes are brown. They clearly don't know how to test CPU performance. (They're probably using games that don't care what CPU is installed and making numerous erroneous assumptions out of ignorance.) The 13th and 14th Gen i9 CPUs rip the head off of 7950X and poop down its neck, but the 9950X more or less levels the playing field against a 13900KS/14900KS. It's really unfortunate that AMD makes it standard practice to dump their trash bin chips on the second CCD. If both CCDs were as good as CCD1 this CPU would be so much better. I mean, it's a great CPU for sure, but why stab one of its nuts with an ice pick? That's just so stupid. They should put those crappy silicon samples in the inexpensive single CCD gamerwuss CPUs and save the cream of the crop chips for both CCDs on 9950X.