AMD EXPO Memory issue Suddenly After 7months usage

[Lionheart]

Alright TPU gang I'll get straight to the point.

I'm having trouble running my RAM (G-Skill Trident Z5 Neo 32GB 6000Mhz CL32 Kit) at it's advertised speed all of a sudden after 7months of use without issues, only long boot times since AMD 7000 series/Memory training.

Now I can get it running normally at that speed once activated in the BIOS & it works fine in windows but my main issue is not being able to restart my PC, I keep getting freezes/hang ups & it just sits there, the motherboards debug RAM light lights up orange which "indicates DRAM is not detected or fail" According to MSI's manual obviously, & the only thing I can do is manually shut down the PC & turn it back on again & it boots up fine into windows at 6000mhz speeds, but not being able to do a simple useful task like restarting a computer is quite annoying. I'll list the trouble shooting things I've tried to remedy it.

1. Manually setting RAM speed @ 6000Mhz, timings, voltage, ect.
2. Manually setting RAM speed @ 5600Mhz/5400Mhz/5200Mhz, auto timings & rated overclocked timings & voltage @ 1.35 - 1.4v
3. Enabling Memory Context Restore & disabling
4. Power cycling multiple times and reseating the RAM
5. Updated the BIOS to the latest version (not a beta bios)

Btw this only started happening about 2 - 3 weeks ago, only thing I did was do a fresh install of windows. Help is appreciated.

 

[eidairaman1]

Get some different ram and try it.

 

[nguyen]

CPU is probably on its way out

 

[chrcoluk]

You running at the supported SOC voltages?

 

[Space Lynx]

So you say it yourself, the PC works fine, but only as long as you shut down the PC, not a restart. Am I reading that correct? Try turning off fast boot in windows settings.

How to Turn Fast Startup On or Off in Windows 11

Turning off Fast Startup does have its benefits, but how do you do it on Windows 11? Here's how.

www.makeuseof.com

personally, I never restart or sleep. I always do full shut down and turn on. its never bothered me personally.

 

[ir_cow]

CPU is probably on its way out

Maybe.... 6000 isn't bad, but we know know depending on the MB, some crazy high voltages were auto applied. So who really knows.

I would update the BIOS first and try again. nvm you already did. Next I would raise the VDDIO-mem voltage to 1.2 and see if that fixes it. Otherwise try another memory kit.

 

[Lionheart]

Get some different ram and try it.

I would but don't have a spare kit.

CPU is probably on its way out

That doesn't spark confidence within me. Can you enlighten on why?

So you say it yourself, the PC works fine, but only as long as you shut down the PC, not a restart. Am I reading that correct? Try turning off fast boot in windows settings.

How to Turn Fast Startup On or Off in Windows 11

Turning off Fast Startup does have its benefits, but how do you do it on Windows 11? Here's how.

www.makeuseof.com

personally, I never restart or sleep. I always do full shut down and turn on. its never bothered me personally.

Yeah basically. I know it's not a huge deal but I would still like to be able to restart my PC from time to time for updates, safe mode, DDU usage ect. Plus it's just such an odd issue to have which has me baffled especially after 7 months of usage and no RAM/boot related issues, just long boot times which apparently is normal for AMD 7000 series.

Thanks I tried disabling Fast Boot within windows, applied 6000Mhz, saved & windows started up fine, restarted and it still hanged there unfortunately. Back at 4800Mhz & restarts fine.

You running at the supported SOC voltages?

I tend to leave it on Auto, and the auto voltage is 1.312v.

Maybe.... 6000 isn't bad, but we know know depending on the MB, some crazy high voltages were auto applied. So who really knows.

I would update the BIOS first and try again. nvm you already did. Next I would raise the VDDIO-mem voltage to 1.2 and see if that fixes it. Otherwise try another memory kit.

Yeah BIOS is updated to the latest version. Thanks I'll give that a shot, if it doesn't work It's not a big deal, might end up buying a newer RAM kit.

 

[Space Lynx]

report the issue to MSI and hope for a BIOS update someday.

EXPO has bugs and you have to deal with shit as an early adopter.

until then you will have to shut down and power on and live with it. /shrug

 

[dgianstefani]

That doesn't spark confidence within me. Can you enlighten on why?

PSA update your AM5 bios right away. Overvoltage bug present across vendors.

FYI AM5 platform currently has significant bugs/firmware flaws leading to overvoltage that can potentially kill CPUs/motherboards or even start a fire. ASUS and Gigabyte have the worst issues it seems, but MSI, Asrock and potentially others have problems too.

www.techpowerup.com

 

[Lionheart]

PSA update your AM5 bios right away. Overvoltage bug present across vendors.

FYI AM5 platform currently has significant bugs/firmware flaws leading to overvoltage that can potentially kill CPUs/motherboards or even start a fire. ASUS and Gigabyte have the worst issues it seems, but MSI, Asrock and potentially others have problems too.

www.techpowerup.com

Thanks a bunch.

 

[chrcoluk]

Fingers crossed works out for you, I didnt reply again as you seem only slightly above the new safe voltage. Would be pretty unlucky if the cpu has actually degraded from that.

 

[ir_cow]

Yeah BIOS is updated to the latest version. Thanks I'll give that a shot, if it doesn't work It's not a big deal, might end up buying a newer RAM kit.

Yeah give a boost to that voltage. I've seen a few motherboards drop the voltage to 1.0 or 1.1 after the meltdown snafu. Playing it Super safe, but that also makes some users 6000 kits not work. Just depends on the quality of your CPU IMC. This is NOT the SoC voltage btw, but both SoC and VDDIO-MEM are part of what makes memory work properly.

Good news if your memory and CPU is under warranty

 

[eidairaman1]

I would but don't have a spare kit.


That doesn't spark confidence within me. Can you enlighten on why?


Yeah basically. I know it's not a huge deal but I would still like to be able to restart my PC from time to time for updates, safe mode, DDU usage ect. Plus it's just such an odd issue to have which has me baffled especially after 7 months of usage and no RAM/boot related issues, just long boot times which apparently is normal for AMD 7000 series.

Thanks I tried disabling Fast Boot within windows, applied 6000Mhz, saved & windows started up fine, restarted and it still hanged there unfortunately. Back at 4800Mhz & restarts fine.


I tend to leave it on Auto, and the auto voltage is 1.312v.


Yeah BIOS is updated to the latest version. Thanks I'll give that a shot, if it doesn't work It's not a big deal, might end up buying a newer RAM kit.

Disregard nguyen

 

[evernessince]

report the issue to MSI and hope for a BIOS update someday.

EXPO has bugs and you have to deal with shit as an early adopter.

until then you will have to shut down and power on and live with it. /shrug

You are likely referring to the SOC issues that some motherboard vendors had. EXPO just sets some memory timings and memory voltage same as XMP. It's essentially a switch that sets some values so it in and of itself is not going to have the bugs.

I'm having trouble running my RAM (G-Skill Trident Z5 Neo 32GB 6000Mhz CL32 Kit) at it's advertised speed all of a sudden after 7months of use without issues

To the OP, try these one at a time:

1) Reset the BIOS and then load EXPO profile
2) Switch RAM slots from A2 / B2 to A1 / B1 (if you have them in A1 / B1 switch instead to A2 / B2)
3) Disable fast boot and memory context restore
4) Remove the system's power cable and then the motherboard battery and keep out for at least 15 minutes. Effectively the same as a BIOS reset but useful is some cases as it sometimes fixes issues an BIOS reset cannot.
5) Run MemTest86 (ensure that EXPO is enabled for this).

You could also try breadboarding as a last resort.

In addition if you want to mess around with voltages like ir_cow mentions I recommend this video for educational purposes. It's an overclocking video but it'll give you an idea what everything you are tuning is doing. It's just for learning of course, you don't need to use his timings or frequency but the voltage numbers are definitely helpful for stability:

Yeah BIOS is updated to the latest version.

You stated that you updated to the latest non-BETA BIOS. You should update to the latest BIOS available regardless of if it's BETA or not as they cap the max allowed SOC voltage and come with some AGESA improvements.

When updating BIOS always make sure to reset to default settings before updating. Most motherboard manufacturers recommend this to avoid issues.

 

[ir_cow]

Don't follow Buildzoid voltages. He is good at killing CPUs and using unsafe voltages. Doesn't really make people aware of that either.

To be fair to him he doesn't generally tell people to type in these voltages but they're on screen and he doesn't say anything about not doing that...sooo

 

[chrcoluk]

Don't follow Buildzoid voltages. He is good at killing CPUs and using unsafe voltages. Doesn't really make people aware of that either.

To be fair to him he doesn't generally tell people to type in these voltages but they're on screen and he doesn't say anything about not doing that...sooo

I do respect him because the detail he goes into, we dont have to agree with him, but he makes an effort to explain what he knows.

 

[ir_cow]

Oh he knows a lot of stuff no doubt but I think he rambles for an hour for 5 minutes of information that's actually relevant to what he's talking about.

 

[evernessince]

Oh he knows a lot of stuff no doubt but I think he rambles for an hour for 5 minutes of information that's actually relevant to what he's talking about.

Oh for sure but it's useful for learning.

 

[Lionheart]

Fingers crossed works out for you, I didnt reply again as you seem only slightly above the new safe voltage. Would be pretty unlucky if the cpu has actually degraded from that.

Thanks a bunch, appreciate it. Yeah hopefully it hasn't.

Yeah give a boost to that voltage. I've seen a few motherboards drop the voltage to 1.0 or 1.1 after the meltdown snafu. Playing it Super safe, but that also makes some users 6000 kits not work. Just depends on the quality of your CPU IMC. This is NOT the SoC voltage btw, but both SoC and VDDIO-MEM are part of what makes memory work properly.

Good news if your memory and CPU is under warranty

Cheers for pointing out the difference between the SOC and VDDIO-MEM voltage settings, so many V settings I can't keep track of em.

Yup both mem & CPU under warranty no prob there

You are likely referring to the SOC issues that some motherboard vendors had. EXPO just sets some memory timings and memory voltage same as XMP. It's essentially a switch that sets some values so it in and of itself is not going to have the bugs.




To the OP, try these one at a time:

1) Reset the BIOS and then load EXPO profile
2) Switch RAM slots from A2 / B2 to A1 / B1 (if you have them in A1 / B1 switch instead to A2 / B2)
3) Disable fast boot and memory context restore
4) Remove the system's power cable and then the motherboard battery and keep out for at least 15 minutes. Effectively the same as a BIOS reset but useful is some cases as it sometimes fixes issues an BIOS reset cannot.
5) Run MemTest86 (ensure that EXPO is enabled for this).

You could also try breadboarding as a last resort.

In addition if you want to mess around with voltages like ir_cow mentions I recommend this video for educational purposes. It's an overclocking video but it'll give you an idea what everything you are tuning is doing. It's just for learning of course, you don't need to use his timings or frequency but the voltage numbers are definitely helpful for stability:

You stated that you updated to the latest non-BETA BIOS. You should update to the latest BIOS available regardless of if it's BETA or not as they cap the max allowed SOC voltage and come with some AGESA improvements.

When updating BIOS always make sure to reset to default settings before updating. Most motherboard manufacturers recommend this to avoid issues.

Appreciate all this useful info. I've tried number 1, 2 (kind of, using a mini itx motherboard so only 2 DIMM slots) , tried 3. I'll give 4 & 5 a go cheers.

Bios wise I didn't bother updating cause I didn't have any issues for the past 7 months of usage, figured I'd let others test out the new BIOS's and see the results Lol but yeah I do reset the bios settings everytime. Cheers

 

[sethmatrix7]

Alright TPU gang I'll get straight to the point.

I'm having trouble running my RAM (G-Skill Trident Z5 Neo 32GB 6000Mhz CL32 Kit) at it's advertised speed all of a sudden after 7months of use without issues, only long boot times since AMD 7000 series/Memory training.

Now I can get it running normally at that speed once activated in the BIOS & it works fine in windows but my main issue is not being able to restart my PC, I keep getting freezes/hang ups & it just sits there, the motherboards debug RAM light lights up orange which "indicates DRAM is not detected or fail" According to MSI's manual obviously, & the only thing I can do is manually shut down the PC & turn it back on again & it boots up fine into windows at 6000mhz speeds, but not being able to do a simple useful task like restarting a computer is quite annoying. I'll list the trouble shooting things I've tried to remedy it.

1. Manually setting RAM speed @ 6000Mhz, timings, voltage, ect.
2. Manually setting RAM speed @ 5600Mhz/5400Mhz/5200Mhz, auto timings & rated overclocked timings & voltage @ 1.35 - 1.4v
3. Enabling Memory Context Restore & disabling
4. Power cycling multiple times and reseating the RAM
5. Updated the BIOS to the latest version (not a beta bios)

Btw this only started happening about 2 - 3 weeks ago, only thing I did was do a fresh install of windows. Help is appreciated.

What CPU and what Motherboard?

 

[R-T-B]

Disregard nguyen

Disregard eidairman1.

Disregard RTB, while your at it.

Seriously speaking doubt the CPU is on it's way out. That's pretty rare. Possible? Sure, but very rare. If you want to be certain, you can always check the lga pads for the telltale burn/bulge damage. If you are that unlucky, AMD will cover it.

 

[evernessince]

Seriously speaking doubt the CPU is on it's way out. That's pretty rare. Possible? Sure, but very rare. If you want to be certain, you can always check the lga pads for the telltale burn/bulge damage. If you are that unlucky, AMD will cover it.

Yep, even though it's a very rare occurrence it couldn't hurt to be check.

Bios wise I didn't bother updating cause I didn't have any issues for the past 7 months of usage

To be fair there's usually no reason to update the BIOS but when something like this crops up might as well cover all the bases.

Speaking of, I did some digging up on Amazon and Newegg reviews of your motherboard (the one listed in your specs) and apparently you are definitely not the only one with booting issues when EXPO is enabled. Some users reported that they fixed their issue by replacing the CMOS battery (which makes sense given I've had this very issue on older systems I've fixed up in the past due to a bad CMOS battery as well). Can't say all the users reporting boot issues is down to the battery but it's worth a try to replace the battery.

 

[ir_cow]

Speaking of, I did some digging up on Amazon and Newegg reviews of your motherboard (the one listed in your specs) and apparently you are definitely not the only one with booting issues when EXPO is enabled. Some users reported that they fixed their issue by replacing the CMOS battery (which makes sense given I've had this very issue on older systems I've fixed up in the past due to a bad CMOS battery as well). Can't say all the users reporting boot issues is down to the battery but it's worth a try to replace the battery.

Here is the thing about CMOS, how is that related to XMP/EXPO? It's not really. If you had a bad battery the settings we reset to defaults every time you lost power, not cause issues when its enabled.

My question for @Lionheart is did you only start to have problems after updating the BIOS or beforehand?

Also to save a lot of time and headaches do what I said above and manually adjust the VDDIO_MEM (1.2V). While your at it, SoC (1.25V) as well. These are NOT damaging voltages, but probably more than you need for 6000 speed. Unless its dual-rank and that is a whole different ballgame. If you still get errors in memtest5. At least you know it isn't the motherboards fault with auto voltages.

Don't enable High-Efficiency Mode or Context Restore. Contrary to the name, Efficiency Mode actually is tweaking your memory sub-timings for more perf, which can lead to memory related problems if the voltages are not increased as well.

 

[evernessince]

It's not really. If you had a bad battery the settings we reset to defaults every time you lost power

A bad CMOS battery doesn't always cause the settings to reset but yes it's likely that said user was running into both a bad CMOS battery and a separate boot issue as boot issues with XMP / EXPO enabled seem to be the predominate reason for his motherboard's low rating reviews. It has a 3.7 rating on newegg and a 4.0 rating on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/MSI-B650I-Mo...=1&filterByKeyword=boot&filterByStar=one_star

 

[ir_cow]

@evernessince I mean it worth a try to replace it. The cost is about $1. I'm confident it is not though. I'll even pay for the battery if that ends up being the problem. Win Win for the op.