7th Gen Intel CPUs need Motherboard BIOS upgrades before install

[AndrewFergus]

The latest round of custom builds threw up quite a big curve ball. The 7th generation i3 processors were not compatible with the bios version on the ASUS motherboards. It took a couple of hours to diagnose.
Then we had to find the latest bios ver, stick an older i5 CPU onto the mother board of each computer, update the bios, remove it and then install the new i3's.
Quite a time waster - hopefully others can benefit from our troubleshooting.

 

[phaZed]

Yep, ran across a few Gigabyte boards (I think it was the Z170x Gaming 5, IIRC) - same problem. I keep a 6th gen pentium just for these BIOS/BOARD issues.

 

[PCX]

You will also experience this issue with some newer graphics cards too. Sometimes they wont display other times they take a long time to boot up. In either case, you have to update the BIOS for the motherboard to work with the graphics card properly.

 

[fincoder]

The 7th generation i3 processors were not compatible with the bios version on the ASUS motherboards

That's only if you're using motherboards with the older chipset designed for 6th generation CPUs (H110/B150/H170/Z170). For new builds you should be using motherboards with the new 7th-gen chipset (B250/H270/Z270) which work straight out of the box.

I think people are getting boards with the older H110 chipset because they're so cheap. There isn't any equivalent ultra-budget option on the market yet with native support for 7th-gen CPUs.

In my business we don't touch those ultra-budget boards anyway. Performance is fine obviously, and fancy features aren't important, but they're made with cheaper components and are more likely to have problems. We use B150 or B250 boards as a minimum.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

You will also experience this issue with some newer graphics cards too. Sometimes they wont display other times they take a long time to boot up. In either case, you have to update the BIOS for the motherboard to work with the graphics card properly.

Do you happen to recall the motherboards / video cards you've had this happen with just for future reference?

 

[PCX]

Do you happen to recall the motherboards / video cards you've had this happen with just for future reference?

Motherboard was a GA-X79-UD3. I don't remember which graphics card it was, but I know if was a newer nvidia.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

Motherboard was a GA-X79-UD3. I don't remember which graphics card it was, but I know if was a newer nvidia.

thx, was that mb rev 1.0 bios F20 posted 4 days ago that you got?

 

[PCX]

thx, was that mb rev 1.0 bios F20 posted 4 days ago that you got?

I didn't posted anything on the TN about it, maybe one of my techs did? In either case, I am not sure which rev number it was, but I can tell that the BIOS was the same for both rev 1.0 and 1.1.

 

[ComputerRepairTech]

I didn't posted anything on the TN about it, maybe one of my techs did? In either case, I am not sure which rev number it was, but I can tell that the BIOS was the same for both rev 1.0 and 1.1.

Oh sorry disregard that comment, i meant the bios was uploaded 4 days ago but its actually been years, i am having one of those days today @_@

 

[Altster]

Instead of "another generation of a chip" I wonder why Intel doesn't start another name convention. And of course while they are at it, the new chips should also require a new socket and chipset(s) to support it / them.

eeeeeeeeeeeesh!