Tuesday, April 5th 2022

Report: AMD Radeon Software Could Alter CPU Settings Quietly

According to the latest investigation made by a German publication, Igor's Lab, AMD's Adrenalin GPU software could experience unexpected behavior when Ryzen Master software is integrated into it. Supposedly, the combination of the two would allow AMD Adrenalin GPU software to misbehave and accidentally change CPU PBO and Precision Boost settings, disregarding the user's permissions. What Igor's Lab investigated was a case of Adrenalin software automatically enabling PBO or "CPU OC" setting when applying GPU profiles. This also happens when the GPU is in the Default mode, which is set automatically by the software.

Alterations can happen without user knowledge. If a user applies custom voltage and frequency settings in BIOS, Adrenalin software can and sometimes will override those settings to set arbitrary ones, potentially impacting the CPU's stability. The software can also alter CPU power limits as it has the means to do so. This problem only occurs when AMD CPU is combined with AMD GPU and AMD Ryzen Master SDK is installed. If another configuration is present, there is no change to the system. There are ways to bypass this edge case, and that is going back to BIOS to re-apply CPU settings manually or disable PBO. A Reddit user found that creating new GPU tuning profiles without loading older profiles will also bypass Adrenalin from adjusting your CPU settings. AMD hasn't made comments about the software, and so far remains a mystery why this is happening.
Sources: Igor's Lab, Reddit Thread
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31 Comments on Report: AMD Radeon Software Could Alter CPU Settings Quietly

#28
Guwapo77
RedBearFor one thing there's the fact that AMD's warranty doesn't cover overclocking, even when done using official software including Adrenalin, it's specifically mentioned in the "overclocking warning" of the release notes. On a related note, Tom's Hardware says that they asked a comment to AMD about the warranty implications of this bug.
I'm 99.9% certain that if their own software overclocked the CPU, they can't void the warranty. Its nice of Tom to ask, but AMD would lose in court. The overclocking warranty void warning is not given when you install the AMD graphics software either.
windwhirlThe problem is that it messes with user configuration without the user being made aware of the changes
Does it make it better or worse?
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#29
DeathtoGnomes
Guwapo77The overclocking warranty void warning is not given when you install the AMD graphics software either.
there wont be a warning, its a bug not a feature.
Posted on Reply
#30
Zubasa
HD64GA profound bug that needs to be fixed sooner than later. Easy fix should be also imho.
IMO AMD should just remove the whole CPU OC thing from their graphics driver.:pimp:
Posted on Reply
#31
Guwapo77
DeathtoGnomesthere wont be a warning, its a bug not a feature.
Indeed. I saw that later in a report. I will say I am a little disappointed as that would've been a nice feature to have.
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