Can't boot into windows with my 5900X in a B550I mobo but 5500 works?

[Ulti]

Hi Hexus,

It's been a while! Unfortunately I'm really stuck and confused as my 5900X doesn't boot in my MSI B550I Gaming Edge ITX mobo but it boots in my gf's AsRock B450 Steel Legend mobo.

Meanwhile her Ryzen 5 5500 works completely fine in my PC with the same mobo, RAM, SSD, GPUs, PSU etc. I've even tried to RMA my motherboard but it was returned as no fault.

I've used her 5500 and done both an hour of small and large OCCT CPU tests and games for hours without issue. Likewise I put my 5900X in her machine and did the same tests and she gamed too without any issues. As soon as I swapped CPUs back, her one continued to work fine, as expected, but my CPU fails to boot into windows again. I can post fine, get into BIOs etc but as soon as it starts the windows loading process with the spinning circle, it locks up (freezes) and just restarts.

Given they both pass tests I'm inclined to believe that all hardware is fine and I've got the latest BIOS update for my motherboard so this makes no sense at all.

Can anyone shine any light on this situation?

Thanks.

[Jonj1611]

Have you tried a live linux usb?

To see if you can get into at least something

[Saracen999]

I'm not confident (at all) this is relevant but just in case, do you have any form of RAM overclocking in use? Specifically I'm thinking EXPO / XMP type profiles? If so, turn 'em off when setting up for the 5900X. Get it installed, inc OS, then re-enable.

This is more likely if this is a new mobo or CPU, or both, despite having the latest BIOS. In fact, if you didn't have latest BIOS, that would be a suggestion too.

So the suggestion (for what it's worth) is :-

1) Boot into BIOS, disable EXPO, XMP, whatever they call it. Save and exit.

2) Boot (using default, base RAM timings). Install Windows.

3) Once sorted (if it works), reboot, back into BIOS, re-enable whichever you turned off.

Hope it helps.

[DanceswithUnix]

It sounds like RAM to me as well. ISTR the 5500 is a 5600G with the iGPU turned off, so the memory controller will be very different to the one in your 5900X. Other things to try:

* Try turning the memory clock down to 2400MHz.
* Try with just one memory stick.
* Try the RAM from the gf's machine in your machine.

[Ulti]

Have you tried a live linux usb?

To see if you can get into at least something

I've not tried a live linux USB. I think that will probably work if it's just loading it from the USB. I'll give that a try over the weekend or something when I have time again.

I'm not confident (at all) this is relevant but just in case, do you have any form of RAM overclocking in use? Specifically I'm thinking EXPO / XMP type profiles? If so, turn 'em off when setting up for the 5900X. Get it installed, inc OS, then re-enable.

This is more likely if this is a new mobo or CPU, or both, despite having the latest BIOS. In fact, if you didn't have latest BIOS, that would be a suggestion too.

So the suggestion (for what it's worth) is :-

1) Boot into BIOS, disable EXPO, XMP, whatever they call it. Save and exit.

2) Boot (using default, base RAM timings). Install Windows.

3) Once sorted (if it works), reboot, back into BIOS, re-enable whichever you turned off.

Hope it helps.

It sounds like RAM to me as well. ISTR the 5500 is a 5600G with the iGPU turned off, so the memory controller will be very different to the one in your 5900X. Other things to try:

* Try turning the memory clock down to 2400MHz.
* Try with just one memory stick.
* Try the RAM from the gf's machine in your machine.

I do have XMP on but I have also tried turning it off and leaving it as default. It's not a new mobo but it is a new CPU. I do have the latest BIOS installed.

I've tried just 1 stick from my RAM as well as (separately, not together) 1 from her machine, both failed to boot into Windows in my machine but I tried my RAM in her machine with the 5500 and it booted, as did my 5900X in her machine with my RAM. It honestly makes no sense to me as it implies everything is fine, just not specifically the combination of my CPU+RAM in my motherboard yet my CPU+RAM in her motherboard is fine while her CPU+RAM in my motherboard is fine, as is her CPU+my RAM in my motherboard.

I figured if my RAM, CPU etc all booted in her motherboard and not mine that my motherboard had to be faulty so I RMA'd it (to Scan). They found that they could not POST either so sent it to MSI, who had it for a month, only to send it back to Scan saying it was fine. Scan then sent it back and told me it was fine too. To be honest I don't think I bothered to try her CPU in my motherboard before I RMA'd it.

I did memtest on both my machine (with her 5500) and hers (with my 5900X) and also OCCT tests which both returned no faults...

[DanceswithUnix]

I did memtest on both my machine (with her 5500) and hers (with my 5900X) and also OCCT tests which both returned no faults...

Modern ram is *really* complex, which is why the initial boot can take ages (on AM5 machines can take minutes) while the CPU trains to the properties of the memory sticks. Hence my suggestion to underclock the stuff down to basic JEDEC 2400 speeds. Though just doing a reset to safe defaults in the BIOS should sort that.

If Windows is crashing, then it could be some sort of driver problem in Windows. It shouldn't be, I went from a 3700X to a 5900X here with no issues, but again there is so much integrated into the CPU these days that eg all your PCIe devices could renumber. Some change might be freaking out the HAL in Windows. Trying a Linux live USB stick is a good shout for testing that. If you have a spare SSD then you could also try a Windows install from scratch and see if that completes. Good excuse for buying a new SSD while they're cheap

If Windows is freaking out late enough in boot, then there might be something in the logs so could be worth a poke about in the event viewer if you can remember the time and date of your last attempt.

Does feel a bit like you might have been stiffed by MSI here. Many years ago I had a similar situation with Scan and a dodgy motherboard, and Scan let me pay the difference and upgrade to a better board. Sadly there seems to be almost no ITX options still.

[AGTDenton]

I know you've mentioned you have the latest BIOS, but I've found if you use MSI's own utility to update it, it doesn't always obtain the latest and can for whatever reason be years old. The best place to get the latest BIOS is directly from their website if you haven't already. (I've seen this issue with other mobo manufacturers too).

The minimum version of the BIOS you need is 7C92v17, and the latest is currently 7C92v1C. Which may also display a totally different number depending on which utility you use (thanks MSI). Obviously ignore all that if you've already downloaded from the website.

Something else I've experienced with AMD a lot is if you have a new BIOS but old drivers or an old BIOS but new drivers it can cause instabilities.
Make sure you have at least these Chipset drivers installed with the latest BIOS (which you may to do via safe mode):
https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/MPG-...support#driver.


If you happen to have a spare SSD/HDD can you try installing a fresh version of Windows?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

It might be worth buying a cheap SSD for £20,and installing a new copy of Windows on there and seeing if the same problems happen. You don't need a Windows key to do this either.

[cptwhite_uk]

I was just about to say the same thing, definitely could be a NVME SSD firmware / BIOS NVME compatibility problem. Needs ruling out at least.

[MrJim]

I had a problem with my MSI motherboard ages ago, which was only resolved by installing a 'beta' bios from the MSI website. I wasn't all that happy about using a pre-release bios, but it did solve the issue. It might be worth a try if all other suggestions don't work (assuming there's the option of a beta bios available, of course).

[Ulti]

Thanks everyone for their input so far.

Thought I'd just give an update that I've tried running it without the XMP settings on my RAM (it appears to run at 2400Mhz) and it appears to work fine with my CPU, RAM and motherboard combo now - booted into Windows without issue and passed an hour of both small and large CPU tests on OCCT. I did also manage to boot it with RAM at 3200Mhz but it would blue screen and would fail the OCCT tests with WHEA error immediately.

Oddly enough I'm sure it wasn't even working with that before, weird.

I've not had a chance to try on a different SSD/HDD yet or a Linux USB. Also not checked if there are any newer or beta BIOS or even drivers so I guess that will be next thing to check.

[DanceswithUnix]

Sounds to me like you've nailed the problem down to ram compatibility on that motherboard. That's a part of the BIOS's job.

I would be asking MSI for a fixed BIOS at this point. You seem to have a working RAM and CPU, just not in that board. Chances are if you just wait then it will get fixed in a future BIOS upgrade, but I would be pushing it along.

In the meantime, while 2400MHz is pretty slow, you may well find one of the intermediate speeds work OK. I've seen 3200MHz rated Corsair ram that didn't seem to work on any AMD setup work just fine at 2933MHz which is only giving up 9% until you get a fix.

[MrJim]

Just a thought - is your ram kit on the compatibility list for your motherboard, on the MSI website? If it is, and it won't work at the specified speed, all the more reason to put pressure on MSI to issue a bios fix.

[Ulti]

Yeah my RAM is listed on their website as compatible (HX432C16FB3AK2/32) with the "RX-5xxx" series up to 3200Mhz (https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/MPG-...FI/support#mem).

BIOS wise I was on the 7C92v1B version but updated to 7C92v1C and sadly there's no difference - 2400Mhz is still fine but 3200Mhz results in WHEA errors in OCCT very quickly (under 1 min gave 3 errors).

[Jonj1611]

I had no end of problems with MSI and XMP. Changed boards and worked fine. Doesn't help but I wouldn't go MSI again

[MrJim]

Yeah my RAM is listed on their website as compatible (HX432C16FB3AK2/32) with the "RX-5xxx" series up to 3200Mhz (https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/MPG-...FI/support#mem).

BIOS wise I was on the 7C92v1B version but updated to 7C92v1C and sadly there's no difference - 2400Mhz is still fine but 3200Mhz results in WHEA errors in OCCT very quickly (under 1 min gave 3 errors).

From what I've heard, there's a huge difference in the quality of the memory controllers on Ryzen CPUs - it could be that yours is 'marginal' in terms of its performance.

I had no end of problems with MSI and XMP. Changed boards and worked fine. Doesn't help but I wouldn't go MSI again

I know a sample size of one isn't much help, but I've never had any problems with MSI motherboards & XMP compatibility. My current system is an MSI Tomahawk X570 motherboard, 5900X & Kingston 3600 ram, and I've had no stability problems at all. I just enabled XMP & it's been rock solid ever since.