ASUS Z87 Motherboards - Overview, Guides and Official Support

[Ark :o]

I've read that a bug exists in the H87 chipset that allows you to overclock K-series CPU's, and that ASRock's H87 ITX board exploits this bug. Is this something the Asus H87 ITX board also exploits?

*edit* Actually, looking at the thread title, I realize this question is out of place, my apologies.

Thanks in advance.

 

[dbw09]

Trying to get the replicated. The first kit came up working for us, so I am not sure. Only common factor that sticks out is the 1866 factor for me so far...

Is there any news on the 1866 memory and XMP not working correctly with the 1007 UEFI on the Gryphon? Have you been able to replicate the issue yet? After reading more posts, it looks like I am not the only one having an issue

 

[theoryzero]

Can someone help an idiot? I was messing with the AI Suite 3 on my MVI Hero and picked one of the CPU presets (4.2 GHz). I'm having some stability issues in Windows 8 now (odd since temps are more than fine) and want to return to stock.

I set everything in the UEFI back to stock but AI Suite 3 stomps on it when I reboot and forces the overclock again. I can't find anything in AI Suite 3 to return to stock. Since I did the auto-preset I don't know what it changed and what the defaults are. Am I going to have to uninstall AI Suite 3, boot into UEFI to change the settings back, then go back to Windows 8 and reinstall AI Suite 3?

 

[MagicalHobo]

Hi Raja,

So I'm back again about the USB3 front panel issues with my Corsair Carbide 300R case... I received another new front panel from Corsair last night and plugged it in and still had the same issues! So I sent the new front panel home with a friend with an MSI motherboard, and while he has issues keeping his devices mounted while transferring large files, Windows 8 still recognized his device correctly which is further than I can get. So, I really have no clue what's going on as the external hard drive is recognized without issue (that second image may be of concern, everything else I've tried says that my drive is on a USB3 port) with the other USB3 cable I bought per jkramp's suggestion and while it is plugged into the USB3 ports in the back. It doesn't make much sense that the Corsair cable would have a compatibility issue with the motherboard as it's just a cable (to my understanding), and the header seems to transmit data just fine with the other cable. Any ideas? Think it might be my external just doesn't conform to standards? I unfortunately don't have an easy way to test it.

EDIT: So, as I didn't want to go through another RMA with Corsair, I decided to attempt to see if using the other USB 3.0 header cable with a pair of Monoprice USB 3.0 Male A to Female A cables routed through the assembly Corsair has for their header cable would work. Here was my process:

1. I plugged the other USB 3.0 cable in and plugged my external hard drive, a WD Elements 1TB, directly into it. Windows recognized it without issue!
2. I unmounted the drive, plugged in one Monoprice cable, and plugged the drive into the Monoprice cable. This resulted in similar behavior as the Corsair cable.
3. I swapped the Monoprice cables around and ran into the same issue again.
4. I stuck the first Monoprice cable into the back of the motherboard and then tried plugging in my external hard drive and the drive worked without issue!

My assumption is that there is a possible power loss with USB 3.0 cables of significant length, and while the ports on the motherboard (in the back) are able to provide enough power to compensate for the power loss, the ports connected via the header cannot unless the cable is a short one. I would wager a guess that if one were to run the drive at USB 2.0 speeds (like removing the driver), the drive would have enough power for that if plugged into the front panel I/O ports. So, my solution has ended up being that I'll just keep one of the Monoprice cables hooked up in the back in case I need to transfer files with my external (as crawling under my desk kind of sucks) and keep the front ports for USB 2.0 devices and less power intensive USB 3.0 devices (such as flash drives).

 

[unihappytime]

UEFI version is 801, I tried 1007, but the XMP setting fails, and anything from stock rate is very unstable, lots of BSoD.

I used Aida64 3.00.2500

This tune, the RAM was set to 1800MHz, so a noob question, how does DDR divider frequency affect the CUP core voltage?

AIDA64 shows throttling 2%, and heat got to 84c with above tune, as soon as stress test started, so I stopped it.

I have revert back to stock core multiplier 38x with XMP 1866MHz, and AIDA64 stress test for 6 hours, the voltage was at 1.279, everything was on AUTO part from selecting the XMP profile. Temp when under load was around 66c max.



This normal for just DDR oc?

Anyone with results?
Maybe my CPU is slightly defective or just a real bad quality one?

Just out of interest Raja, What's the% of CPU that ASUS have tested and found to have high voltage(above 1.200 at stock clock)?

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Hi Raja,

So I'm back again about the USB3 front panel issues with my Corsair Carbide 300R case... I received another new front panel from Corsair last night and plugged it in and still had the same issues! So I sent the new front panel home with a friend with an MSI motherboard, and while he has issues keeping his devices mounted while transferring large files, Windows 8 still recognized his device correctly which is further than I can get. So, I really have no clue what's going on as the external hard drive is recognized without issue (that second image may be of concern, everything else I've tried says that my drive is on a USB3 port) with the other USB3 cable I bought per jkramp's suggestion and while it is plugged into the USB3 ports in the back. It doesn't make much sense that the Corsair cable would have a compatibility issue with the motherboard as it's just a cable (to my understanding), and the header seems to transmit data just fine with the other cable. Any ideas? Think it might be my external just doesn't conform to standards? I unfortunately don't have an easy way to test it.

Sigaling is a lot more complex than it appears.Any crosstalk, noise, inductance, capacitance or impedance issues with that cable/interconnect could be enough to throw things off. Not sure what to suggest, you might have to live with it or just use the drive in the rear ports. This isn't really something we can fix from our side.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

This tune, the RAM was set to 1800MHz, so a noob question, how does DDR divider frequency affect the CUP core voltage?

AIDA64 shows throttling 2%, and heat got to 84c with above tune, as soon as stress test started, so I stopped it.

I have revert back to stock core multiplier 38x with XMP 1866MHz, and AIDA64 stress test for 6 hours, the voltage was at 1.279, everything was on AUTO part from selecting the XMP profile. Temp when under load was around 66c max.



This normal for just DDR oc?

Anyone with results?
Maybe my CPU is slightly defective or just a real bad quality one?

Just out of interest Raja, What's the% of CPU that ASUS have tested and found to have high voltage(above 1.200 at stock clock)?

Nothing wrong with your CPU. AIDA uses AVX which ramps the core voltage up high. As I said, the version of UEFI you are using does not have voltage locked at 1.275V

Follow what I said to you before and reduce the core votlage manually to whatever the CPU is comfortable at with the frequency.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Is there any news on the 1866 memory and XMP not working correctly with the 1007 UEFI on the Gryphon? Have you been able to replicate the issue yet? After reading more posts, it looks like I am not the only one having an issue

We have not been able to replicate this so far. Maybe some variance in CPUs with Intel's newer MRC. All tests we have conducted on our CPUs with 1007 have passed.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Can someone help an idiot? I was messing with the AI Suite 3 on my MVI Hero and picked one of the CPU presets (4.2 GHz). I'm having some stability issues in Windows 8 now (odd since temps are more than fine) and want to return to stock.

I set everything in the UEFI back to stock but AI Suite 3 stomps on it when I reboot and forces the overclock again. I can't find anything in AI Suite 3 to return to stock. Since I did the auto-preset I don't know what it changed and what the defaults are. Am I going to have to uninstall AI Suite 3, boot into UEFI to change the settings back, then go back to Windows 8 and reinstall AI Suite 3?

How did you set everything in UEFI back to stock? Clear CMOS, load optimized defaults? Something else?

You might have engaged some kind of profile in AI Suite, in which case maybe you will need to uninstall if you cannot retrace your steps.

 

[unihappytime]

Nothing wrong with your CPU. AIDA uses AVX which ramps the core voltage up high. As I said, the version of UEFI you are using does not have voltage locked at 1.275V

Follow what I said to you before and reduce the core voltage manually to whatever the CPU is comfortable at with the frequency.

OK, I'll try upgrade to 1007 again and see if I can replicate the error with XMP.

A noob question, dose increasing the DRAM MHz, from 1333 -> 1600 -> 1866 increase the VID when CPU clock rate is unchanged.

Thanks Raja!

 

[Raja@ASUS]

A noob question, dose increasing the DRAM MHz, from 1333 -> 1600 -> 1866 increase the VID when CPU clock rate is unchanged.

Thanks Raja!

If you have Vcore on auto, it will change as you change the CPU multiplier ratio. The DRAM ratios on their own won't affect it.


If you are going to try 1007 UEFI again, follow the advice I give to the user below. Clear RTC after flashing UEFI with the system in standby (PSU on, motherboard off).

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Is there any news on the 1866 memory and XMP not working correctly with the 1007 UEFI on the Gryphon? Have you been able to replicate the issue yet? After reading more posts, it looks like I am not the only one having an issue

This is from HQ for you to try:


1. If a full CLRTC (do CLRTC under G3 state) will make any difference? As this restarts the Intel ME.


G3 is system standby - move the clear RTC jumper over to clear the system and try again. We cannot replicate your issues on our side so far.

 

[theoryzero]

How did you set everything in UEFI back to stock? Clear CMOS, load optimized defaults? Something else?

You might have engaged some kind of profile in AI Suite, in which case maybe you will need to uninstall if you cannot retrace your steps.

Hi Raja,

I went into the UEFI and set all of the overclock related stuff to defaults and then did a Save and Exit.

All I did in AI Suite was try the one-click overclocking using the four-way optimization. So, I believe AI Suite did things behind the scenes and I didn't know what it did so I could undo it. I tried adjusting the overclock settings back down, but couldn't see that Turbo Boost was working.

This brings me to another question, is the AI Suite for the Hero cut down in terms of features compared to the Z-87 Pro, Expert, and Deluxe? I was just watching a video about that on the asus_rog channel on YouTube but it showed the Z-87 Pro doing this ten minute process where it finds the optimal overclock using the one-click overclocking feature. As near as I can tell, the Hero can only pick from a preset profile of 4.2, 4.4, and 4.6 Ghz.

Last question, I swapped out GTX 670's in my setup last night, same SKU so I figured as far as Windows 8 was concerned it would look the same. Well, it failed to boot into Windows, I just get a black screen. Doing a little searching, it would appear to be related to the Secure Boot feature. I'm not really familiar with this at all, but if I'm going to occasionally change my hardware am I going to want to disable Secure Boot?

 

[unihappytime]

If you have Vcore on auto, it will change as you change the CPU multiplier ratio. The DRAM ratios on their own won't affect it.


If you are going to try 1007 UEFI again, follow the advice I give to the user below. Clear RTC after flashing UEFI with the system in standby (PSU on, motherboard off).

New setting:

44x
max cache 41x

manual Core and Cache volt 1.260

DDR 1600 MHZ

so now I have to do 2 things,

First to set the voltages to adaptive but keep the MAX volt to 1.260v
The problem I see is, for the turbo voltage if I add 1.260v. it will load windows normally with the Voltage, however when i test with AVX (AIDA64) it hits 1.400v and thermal throttle.

Please advice on how I can achieve the MAX volt to be 1.26v on adaptive mode?
This will be my base oc.


Once this is done, I can move on to see if I can find the suitable voltage for 44x and 1866MHZ DDR.

Or I could try update to 1007 and do a full rest like Raja say and replicate what I have done so far

My final goal is a stable 1.280v or less 46x with 1866MHz (not likely).

Thanks for all the help an support here guys!

 

[Raja@ASUS]

You cannot do what you want to if you're going to run AVX stress tests. If you set adaptive voltage to counter the AVX hike, your normal VID may be too low to be stable. If you'll be running lots of AVX software, then use a manual VID (static) set to 1.26V.

-Raja

 

[Daneel]

Did you try disabling aggressive link state power management?

I tried that, and it seems to have no impact. The motherboard still doesn't recognise the drive at times. There's not even a cold / warm boot pattern. Also, if I didn't mention before, the drive is not recognised on the Asmedia ports under either 1007 nor 1204 BIOS.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

I tried that, and it seems to have no impact. The motherboard still doesn't recognise the drive at times. There's not even a cold / warm boot pattern. Also, if I didn't mention before, the drive is not recognised on the Asmedia ports under either 1007 nor 1204 BIOS.

Send me part numbers of all affected drives (any firmware info as well). Together with config info in a single post I can send to HQ for replication please.

-Raja

 

[unihappytime]

You cannot do what you want to if you're going to run AVX stress tests. If you set adaptive voltage to counter the AVX hike, your normal VID may be too low to be stable. If you'll be running lots of AVX software, then use a manual VID (static) set to 1.26V.

-Raja

Thanks for the advice! I just read up more on the subject.
Since I don't do any rendering (high intensive or possible AVX based programs) just game, movie and the net, I guess adaptive mode can be used daily without issues.


For testing, I will stick with manual VID.
I'll try the 1007 + CLCRT and see if that helps.

 

[syncopied]

does anyone know what settings would cause a computer to boot up by itself?

i have an asus gryphon z87 and i feel like i turned off all of the possible settings in the bios but somehow it still boots up by itself -_-

 

[Raja@ASUS]

does anyone know what settings would cause a computer to boot up by itself?

i have an asus gryphon z87 and i feel like i turned off all of the possible settings in the bios but somehow it still boots up by itself -_-

Any WOL settings active? Check OS settings as well.

 

[Daneel]

Send me part numbers of all affected drives (any firmware info as well). Together with config info in a single post I can send to HQ for replication please.

-Raja

i7 4770k
16GB RAM (2 x 8GB) Crucial BLS2C8G3D1609ES2LX0CEU 16GB 1600MHz CL9 DDR3 Ballistix Sport Memory Kit
Asus Z87-Plus BIOS 1007 (problems are worse with the 1204, HD never recognised by BIOS)
Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic (still not stable, like the HD, sometimes chooses not to work, though it is at least visible in device manager)
EVGA GTX 670 2GB Signature 2

Problem HD - Samsung HD103SJ 1TB SATA/300, Firmware 1AJ100E4

 

[Brampton_Boy]

Has the Sandforce SSD drives dropping in and out on z87 chip sets been resolved as yet?

I have an Asus Z87-A with a generation one Corsair Force 120GB drive. Like the issues encountered by Kyle, the drive drops in and out intermittently. However, applying the latest bios update (June 24th) did not resolve the issue.

Any suggestions?

Sorry if this has already been asked. I did a quick search on the thread, but the keyword sandforce didn't bring up any results.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Has the Sandforce SSD drives dropping in and out on z87 chip sets been resolved as yet?

I have an Asus Z87-A with a generation one Corsair Force 120GB drive. Like the issues encountered by Kyle, the drive drops in and out intermittently. However, applying the latest bios update (June 24th) did not resolve the issue.

Any suggestions?

Sorry if this has already been asked. I did a quick search on the thread, but the keyword sandforce didn't bring up any results.

Not patched, and I don't think it will be as the SF1200 controller is not SATA spec complaint for detection.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

i7 4770k
16GB RAM (2 x 8GB) Crucial BLS2C8G3D1609ES2LX0CEU 16GB 1600MHz CL9 DDR3 Ballistix Sport Memory Kit
Asus Z87-Plus BIOS 1007 (problems are worse with the 1204, HD never recognised by BIOS)
Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic (still not stable, like the HD, sometimes chooses not to work, though it is at least visible in device manager)
EVGA GTX 670 2GB Signature 2

Problem HD - Samsung HD103SJ 1TB SATA/300, Firmware 1AJ100E4

HQ were unable to replicate this so far. Checking if their drive had the same FW as yours.


Edit our test firmware was 1AJ10001, we are tring to gett eh same version as you at HQ. The fw we used had NO issues at all. Maybe see if you can get the same build and try it from Samsung.

 

[c3k]

Z87-Pro question: the manual states that there is a UEFI toggle for "Anti-Surge Protection". What does it do? Why would I disable it?

Thanks,
Ken

 

[mda]

Something I noticed upon updating to the 1205 Bios with the Z87 Pro.

Upon entering the BIOS, the language button keeps flickering.

Also, saving a BIOS name in the OC profile keeps entering the 'e' and 'g' keys for some reason.

Never happened with any of the previous versions.

My keyboard is a Ducky mech running on the USB port beside the LAN port. This should be the native Z87 port, right?

Edit: After a couple of restarts, the issue seems to have gone away, but it's kind of odd considering nothing was being pressed at that time. Will continue to observe this BIOS.

Edit2: After encountering weird issues such as mouse driver installing everytime after a boot (rendering the mouse unusable for ~15 seconds), I've tried using the flashback feature since you can't use the Windows utility nor the BIOS utility to downgrade the BIOS.

Edit3: Used flashback to return to the 1007 Bios. Needed either an older or a smaller capacity drive. Wouldn't work on the Sandisk Extreme 32GB. It did work on an older 16GB 2.0 drive though. Issues described in Edit1/2 gone. I'll probably wait for the next BIOS before updating again.

 

[JCNiest5]

Z87-Pro question: the manual states that there is a UEFI toggle for "Anti-Surge Protection". What does it do? Why would I disable it?

Thanks,
Ken

That is self-explanatory. It's to help with regulating any sudden surge that may damage your board or whatever you may have attached to your board or PC. The most crucial part is the motherboard itself.

 

[syncopied]

Any WOL settings active? Check OS settings as well.

ahh thanks- the OS settings were the issue here. Which settings in BIOS count as WOL? Do any of the fast boot count? I disabled fastboot just in case but would really like to enable it if possible

 

[c3k]

That is self-explanatory. It's to help with regulating any sudden surge that may damage your board or whatever you may have attached to your board or PC. The most crucial part is the motherboard itself.

Okay: why does it have a menu toggle to disable it? What benefit is there to give up some sort of surge protection? How many joules can it dampen? What does it "cost" in performance terms to have it?

A mystery.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

It just monitors the voltage thresholds on the rails and if they go over a certain value shutdown the board. It can be disabled because there are times during polling the Super IO may mis-read the voltage. I wouldn't waste much energy thinking about this feature personally.

 

[mls1995]

I just bought the Hero last night. Question: why is the Samsung Pro 840 SSD 128 GB drive in the QVL list but other capacities are not? Seems like people are having problems with hard drives being detected and I'd like to avoid this problem. Also, any advice for decent priced RAM to buy that will work properly? QVL list is daunting looking for a simple 2 x 8 GB 1600 RAM set.

 

[Mr.XL]

Dear Raja,

downloaded Z87-Pro 1205 Bios from Asus global website, unzipped it and stored it to harddrive.
When I use EZ flash from within bios it says: selected file is not an UEFI file.

Did the 1007 update (as well as dozens of similar updates on e.g. P6P67 deluxe board) in exactly the same way with no problems.

Any ideas?

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Try using a FAT32 formatted flash drive if your HDD does not work.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

I just bought the Hero last night. Question: why is the Samsung Pro 840 SSD 128 GB drive in the QVL list but other capacities are not? Seems like people are having problems with hard drives being detected and I'd like to avoid this problem. Also, any advice for decent priced RAM to buy that will work properly? QVL list is daunting looking for a simple 2 x 8 GB 1600 RAM set.

That drive believe it or not is VERY hard to get hold of in Taiwan for some reason. That's why it didn't make it on the QVL. The detection issues you speak of are centred on older SATAII drives (such as SF1200controller) being non-compliant.

 

[mls1995]

That drive believe it or not is VERY hard to get hold of in Taiwan for some reason. That's why it didn't make it on the QVL. The detection issues you speak of are centred on older SATAII drives (such as SF1200controller) being non-compliant.

Thanks Raja!

 

[dbw09]

This is from HQ for you to try:


1. If a full CLRTC (do CLRTC under G3 state) will make any difference? As this restarts the Intel ME.


G3 is system standby - move the clear RTC jumper over to clear the system and try again. We cannot replicate your issues on our side so far.

Heya Raja, I had no luck with CLRTC. I have since upgraded to 1206 to see if that makes any difference. I will post back when I have some time to play with it to see if the results are any different from the 1007 version.

 

[Milena]

Hi Raja,

when I turn off my power supply or remove its cable from the wall socket the Z87-WS will do a double power on/off loop before its starting. Is this behavior by design ?

Usually I just shutdown every evening and leave the power supply on so that the board has always power, I noticed this when I moved my PC to another spot and the power cord was pulled for a moment.

Thanks!

 

[Mike C]

Z-87 Deluxe problem: After restart or cold boot, all USB devices re-install.

Symptoms: 1st my wireless Logitech keyboard and mouse delay about 10-20 seconds before responding. Once logged on, all 3 external USB drives pop up "Auto Play" messages like they were just reinstalled

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Hi Raja,

when I turn off my power supply or remove its cable from the wall socket the Z87-WS will do a double power on/off loop before its starting. Is this behavior by design ?

Usually I just shutdown every evening and leave the power supply on so that the board has always power, I noticed this when I moved my PC to another spot and the power cord was pulled for a moment.

Thanks!

Yep, some of the settings require a double-pump after AC cycle.

 

[Raja@ASUS]

Z-87 Deluxe problem: After restart or cold boot, all USB devices re-install.

Symptoms: 1st my wireless Logitech keyboard and mouse delay about 10-20 seconds before responding. Once logged on, all 3 external USB drives pop up "Auto Play" messages like they were just reinstalled

Might be a facet of how UEFI hands them off. As for the logitech stuff - probably your drivers and such loading. Not sure UEFI settings will change anything but you can try USB "full initial" . Other than that, not much I can suggest.