GIGABYTE X670 Aorus Elite AX Teardown and IC Analysis

[@TayTheMan17]

Can you change the battery without having to take everything out of the case? The cmos battery?

[@choppergirl]

LOL I think I screamed for a full hour about what stwp1d as h377 engineer designer in his CAD program would design a motherboard with the CMOS battery buried under a heat sink. Just the abject stwpidity of it blew my mind. One, if it's user replaceable, make it easy to access and replace. Two, heat from the heatsink is going to decrease the output of the button battery and can't be great for it. But mainly point #1. If you are a motherboard engineer, do not ever hide the CMOS battery under a heat sink. I mean literally, face palm. The amount of expletive curse words that flew out of my mouth when I saw this... you can't imagine. More so than having to do finger gymnastics plugging in connectors to pinouts along the edge of the motherboard crushed into a Corsair 5000x case with next to no clearance witht he 360 RAD.

[@vrekman256]

thanks again.... I'm interested in this mobo and amongst all other channel only you had macro shots.

[@choppergirl]

Was there any RGB LEDs under the VRM heatsink? The Gigabyte Control Center has an animated RGB Eangle taht matches it you change patterns of, but I see nothing happening on the VRM heatsink as far as ny lights showing up. Maybe this only exists on the Master, or... this is just a graphic in Gigabyte Control Cneter to indicate your' chaning the patern for all the onboard RGB headers to that setting? I have no clue, I'm blind, so I can't even make out the Eangle on the VRM now that my motherboard is installed. You can forget removing any screws at this point. I don't even know how I'm going to install the M.2's while blind now that it's all installed if there's one or two screws holding them down. I just used the SATA 3.0 ports and none of the Nvme slots (het). Which is ironic, because the 4 NVME slots was the main reason I chose this midrange board over others like the LiveMixer.

[@smillingDestina]

Thank you for the detailed video! I recently purchased an open-box version of this model and your video was incredibly helpful. Upon disassembling the VRM heatsink, I noticed that a thermal pad was missing in one section. Could you please share some information on the thickness of the thermal pads used in this model, specifically in the VRM and M.2 sections? I’ve observed some oil leaks and plan to replace them as well. Thanks.

[@crashedcorvette666]

How do you remove the backplate? I watched the first video.

[@waiting4theend962]

Does this board have any RGB? OpenRGB thinks it does, but I don't know the answer to how many LEDs there are when it asks for size.

[@StevesHardware]

This board does not have any integrated RGBs except for the status LEDs, which are just for diagnostic purposes. It does have a bunch of RGB and addressable RGB headers, so you can add rgb strips.

[@waiting4theend962]

@@StevesHardware I mean, I know it has RGB headers, but OpenRGB seems to think it has RGB LEDs, literally, named RGB1 top and RGB2 bottom

[@StevesHardware]

@@waiting4theend962 the board does not have RGB leds built into it, just headers. If they are using the BIOS to determine things then that's not going to be super reliable as there might be an indication of a feature from a different model.

[@waiting4theend962]

@@StevesHardware ya...must be different model. Pretty dumb it shows up if it's not applicable. Causing confusion...case in point me here talking about it haha

[@LuisRamirez-fy4lh]

Hey I have this board how would I verify if the motherboard is causing coil whine or 6800xt

[@Dmwntkp99]

Do you know if ASYN. clock feature in the BIOS ?

[@StevesHardware]

Do you mean the async clock where uclk=memclk or uclk=1/2memclk?

[@Dmwntkp99]

@@StevesHardware built-in clock generator that isolates CPU base clock from memory, PCIe, and the Infinity Fabric speed.

[@StevesHardware]

@@Dmwntkp99 there isn't an external clock gen on this board

[@Dmwntkp99]

@@StevesHardware O.k Thanks for your reply

[@catbunny8713]

hi, where do my AIO plugs go for this x670 elite ax motherboard? using the icue 150i cappelix cooler trying to build it rn but it a wall

[@StevesHardware]

I think a USB 2.0 header judging by the manual? Look at page 33 to 36 of your AIO's quick start manual, i found it on the product page. www.corsair.com/us/en/Categories/Products/Liquid-Cooling/iCUE-ELITE-CAPELLIX-Liquid-CPU-Cooler/p/CW-9060048-WW#tab-downloads

[@realgundamsonly]

my Hydro Series H80i H100i Intel LGA 1155 requires a backplate to latch on to motherboard. Any suggestions how to go about this with using this motherboard?

[@Troonielicious]

Is this board good for a 7950x? I had to RMA an Asus one

[@StevesHardware]

Should be fine, why did you RMA the asus? I can toss a 7950X in it, anything you want me to test specifically?

[@Troonielicious]

@@StevesHardware lots of MB errors, when it stayed on shut down and powered in the morning it would just give a cpu red light and got stuck so I had to turn it on and off until it boots, what else, it used to do that with everything, ram ,vga etc, the only way I could put it was in safe mode, after that it will boot fine, did all the bios updates and everything, no Overclocking only expo ram times but the ram was okay, checked both sticks, their good, checked the cpu it booted and everything the graphics all good too, so today I just had it frustrated, and started heari coil and whine from the cpu area so that was it I dismounted it and took it to UPS back to Newegg

[@StevesHardware]

@@Troonielicious Ouch, I know that in general AM5's memory training process takes a while. On the X670 Elite AX it doesn't take as long as on some other boards. With another board (X670E) I had to wait like 3-5minutes on first boot up, and it hung at the 15 code which means memory training for a long time, then it would go slightly further, then reboot and train again and then go slightly further, and then finally hit a screen. The like 2-3 times reboot thing is normal for a CMOS reset/CPU change, even on AM4, so I wasn't surprised at that, but the memory training can be long on a cold boot or a CMOS reset. Eventually it would pass, but every cold shut down it did the same thing. A BIOS update changed how often it did it and made it better, and you can disable full memory training in the UEFI after the fact. The X670 Elite AX is easier going with the training, it doesn't take as long. I was using pre-release BIOS with the X670E board, but with the Elite I am using a normal public release BIOS.

[@Troonielicious]

@@StevesHardware I’ll probably go with that mobo, or should I just wait for a B650?

[@StevesHardware]

@@Troonielicious it depends on how much you want to spend and what you need. B650 only has one chipset, so you will lose some connectivity and normal b650 will be like x670, where pcie5 isnt required for the graphics. It also really lowers the price since its a single chipset, and those are one of the most expensive costs on a motherboard. However, B650E hassimilar basic PCI-E 5 use requirements as x670E, but should be cheaper since it also only has a single chipset. I think B650 should be fine for most people, unless you really want future proof PCI-E 5.0 everywhere. Not sure about component quality and implementation or pcb quality differences.

[@DS-pk4eh]

I tried to remove cpu backplate, but its not moving. I can see screws from cpu socket being screwed to it too. But I fear to remove those screws. Anyone has any advice? PS: trying to install TH240 water cooler by using their AMD setup (made for AM4 but should work with AM5 ?)

[@GONICOJR.]

Essa placa aguenta tranquilo um ryzen 9 7950x em overclock?

[@MEDiCx148]

How am I supposed to change the battery without getting the whole mb out of my case?!?! WTF is this

[@TayTheMan17]

That's what I'm saying I'm currently in the same boat right now sadly. Seems like the only way to get to it 😢