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> this is beta, install on your own risk, this will void your warranty

I’ve seen an increasing number of products I own prompt me to join a beta program that, if accepted, voids the warranty of the device.

I help them vet early features before they roll them out to all of their users and, in exchange, they… ask me to let them maybe brick my device at my expense?

Who agrees to these terms?

if not maybe expode, whit asus at least you are not safe ¯\_('_')_/¯, but maybe you have your pc back.

Just so you know, overclocking also voids warranties regardless of manufacturer or vendor recommendations. This includes AMD EXPO[1][2] and Intel XMP[3][4].

If you want warranty coverage, don't overclock no matter how much the marketing encourages you.

[1]: https://www.amd.com/en/technologies/expo

[2]: Overclocking and/or undervolting AMD processors and memory, including without limitation, altering clock frequencies / multipliers or memory timing / voltage, to operate outside of AMD’s published specifications will void any applicable AMD product warranty, even when enabled via AMD hardware and/or software.

[3]: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/gaming/extreme-memor...

[4]: Altering clock frequency or voltage may damage or reduce the useful life of the processor and other system components, and may reduce system stability and performance. Product warranties may not apply if the processor is operated beyond its specifications. Check with the manufacturers of system and components for additional details.

[2] and [4] sound like manual clock/voltage configurations, not the automatic OC of modern AMD CPUs or included XMP Profiles. Those are configs the manufacturer provided.

[2] is explicit, saying "even when enabled via AMD hardware and/or software." If it wasn't clear, it's the footnote in [1].

Overclocking has always voided warranties, it's why overclocking has traditionally been the realm of enthusiasts and tinkerers who generally aren't concerned with reliability, safety, or monetary value and know what they're doing.

The more mundane users really should be made aware that overclocking is tantamount to playing with fire, sometimes literally.

amd expo is covered by warranty. expo also does not overclock the cpu. that amd expo changed cpu voltage was a decision by asus, not by amd, the asus implementation is basically not up to spec.

Overclocking RAM involves overclocking the memory controller which resides in the CPU.

AMD themselves also make it clear that users who overclock "assume all risks and liabilities that may arise out of overclocking and/or undervolting AMD processors" per the footnote on their EXPO page.

Overclocking will void warranties, this is a fact that anyone who wants to overclock has to accept. AMD should be ashamed for hiding the literature behind a hidden footnote, but that doesn't excuse end-user ignorance.

expo won't void warranty. amd replaces expo'd processors. they make advertisments with expo. in the eu/uk they would not stand a chance to refuse any rma whatsoever when expo was enabled.

According to Linus Tech Tips, the disclaimer was unintentional, they intend to honor the warranty, and they're working on removing the disclaimer.

>working on removing the disclaimer

This is a sentence on a website. If they wanted it would be gone in 5 minutes. You don't need to "work on it".

that sentence on a website is an indicator of internal corporate policy -- it's not the policy itself.

things must change internally before you express to the public that the change has occurred.

Just because one can open notepad.exe and delete a line in five minutes doesn't indicate that that's the speed of business.

You clearly never have worked in a large company. Changing a simple word can take weeks before it even goes to the translation team. Changing a disclaimer involves legal so expect a month of committee meetings before anything new is proposed.

I work for an extremely large organization. All it takes is someone in higher levels to decide this has to be dealt with now. The working on it tells you that leadership doesn't really care.

That's only when a mid-level or lower person/group wants to make a change. If it comes from the C-level, it gets done very quickly.

A friend told me this story: He works for a large company as a software developer. He made a PR to change a compiler setting. It was rejected because the build team believed it would cause them to have to add more machines to the build fleet, and they hadn’t met with the finance team to discuss that, yet. I wouldn’t have thought that changing a compiler setting would require capital expenditures, but here we are.

That sounds both plausible and also considerably dysfunctional from build team perspective

When your friend makes a PR to change compiler settings, it becomes a committee meeting. If the executive director says "GET RID OF THAT LINE ON THE WEBSITE ITS HURTING OUR BUSINESS" it's a 2 hour meeting between leadership, engineering, and legal, and communications and its done.

The speed of the change is proportional to personal authority within the organization of the person requesting the change. When ASUS says "we're working on it" what they mean is "leadership doesn't give a shit".

I assume it's automatically shown for every beta version, so removing it for a single beta release requires some actual technical work.

How does he know the disclaimer was unintentional vs. 'putting it in there to see if we can get away with it?'

It's impossible to really know because we don't have mind reading capabilities, but he believes that their intention was never to void warranties for this.

Nevertheless, by what reasoning does he believe this? Perfect knowledge is impossible, but persuasive argument is not.

I haven’t watched the content OP is mentioning, but Linus has a lot of industry connections so it seems very believable he’d be able to get in touch with someone who knows more about the situation.

The disclaimer is there on the beta firmware pages on archive.org from a year ago, meaning that it was a general policy for beta firmware that had been in place for some time rather than something added specifically for this particular beta.

Why did this clause exist to begin with? Why should installing firmware that Asus itself publicly released void your warranty? I doubt that clause can even be legally enforced.

I can't say for sure but I'd guess it was put in place by the legal team as a form of ass covering, since betas aren't always tested as extensively and there's rarely a good reason for normal users to want to install them.

This sounds exactly why software companies need to have strict liability. Can you imagine a hardware/software combo that blows up something you own is acceptable?

There is an earlier non beta BIOS that has the voltage limit correctly applied. The beta one has a buggy AGESA version that AMD already withdrew.

(Well at least for my tuf gaming x670e-plus wifi)

I have been out of the hardware loop for quite a while now. The referenced Beta BIOS in the GN video (the first link) is from May 2nd, and Steve claims that the voltage is still too high, as it is the boards task to set the correct VSOC setpoint, as the EXPO profile doesn’t have one per definition.

(Only half valid knowledge, just reiterating what I saw)

Anecdote: I recently had a very good repair experience with Asus. Free and fast shipping both ways via Fedex -- overall turnaround in a week, and the issues resolved. Based on the repair experience, I wouldn't hesitate to buy an Asus laptop again.

> Asus also failed to negotiate further sponsoring the channel by simply not getting back to requests.

This doesn’t really sound like an unbiased source with respect to the quality of Asus products.

Just wait until Windows Update automatically rolls out a beta BIOS update to every customer.

Honest question: Does Windows ever roll out BIOS updates?

I assumed not, but maybe I've just been away from it for too long.

Yes - well, EFI updates (you get, non-sarcastically, to guess at the reason for this design choice, but as a matter of fact it only supports the "EFI capsule" system popularized by AMI's Aptio and Insyde's H2O)

Anyway, if you're running Win8+ in EFI mode you'll see "Firmware" in Device Manager, which just like any other "device" in the list can have its "driver" upgraded, this unsurprisingly being a special case of driver: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/b...

And yes, if you know how commercial PC firmwares are made [cooperation between CPU/chipset maker and firmware corporation, who then sells the semi-finished product to the motherboard manufacturer - most famously "To be filled by O.E.M." :P ], some times it goes wrong, namely when two different designs get the same ID like the generic default: https://web.archive.org/web/20170101104905/http://www.minixf... (scroll down to post 10)

You do understand that this drama is for enabling them to get more views? Dude literally has two side by side mountains of free asus gear and is crying. The white motherboard, he doesn't say he bought it, he says he "requested" it and goes on to cry that his request for free shit wasn't handled properly. I ended up blocking his channel because sensationalist BS on youtube needs to die.

I do understand that there are channels out there doing drama for the sake of drama. I do understand that, after over 6 years of following now, JayzTwoCents and especially GamersNexus are no such channels. Furthermore, I do understand that if you have a business relationship with a sponsor, you request products which you will then show on your channel for the sake of reviewing. You are not getting it for free. Companies do get a review or visibility in return. That's how I do understand "sponsoring" and "marketing". So do you?

> Companies do get a review or visibility in return.

They get a favorable review or they cut the channel off. This is how media centered around consumable gear has always worked. Honest players aren't given early access or any at all so as to diminish their influence.

Which is why Steve/Gamers Nexus often has to buy hardware to review on their own dollar. They're not the least bit shy about being critical when it's called for, which has landed them on the blacklists of some hardware manufacturers.

How can I expect take any reviewer seriously when they're getting paid by the people they're reviewing? It sounds like the guy in this video didn't get a sponsorship agreement and went scorched earth. I can at least respect Steve to some degree despite his constant negativity, that he will say what he feels regardless. I don't alway agree with the doom and gloom, but that's his style and it seems to work for him.

I could understand this Jay person being with upset with Asus if they had some skin in the game but getting upset about free merchandize is outlandish, especially when you're requesting gear to essentially give away which is exactly what he mentions doing. The level of entitlement is off the charts. I'm also unsure why he mentioned the box having all sorts of labels from China on it.

Here's the real irony. Just weeks ago this youtuber built themselves a rig with a 7950X3D, and given all the offerings available, they chose Asus. He even uses language in his rant to describe Asus as "seemingly solid". So the question is, what is this really about?

It's not "free merchandize", as I outlined quite extensively a few posts above.

Why he has choosen Asus is also explained in the video. He doesn't rant about Asus because he didn't get a sponsorship, he rants about them because they screwed customers over and failed to stand up for their mistakes in present and past.

I think that's a huge difference.

It is for him. You don't get to complain about a product when you're not actually buying the product or when you are in fact getting paid by a product manufacturer to showcase their products under the guise of a "review".

He does rant about not having a sponsorship agreement with Asus. He clearly says all of his other sponsorship agreements finalized in Jan 2023, but that Asus hasn't.

He has no clue if customers have been screwed over because he's never been a customer, and if he is, let's say he used his own money to buy the Hero board he mentions in the video, why did he go Asus like 5 weeks ago for his own stuff if he thought they were bad products, or a bad company?

This sums up the entire ordeal perfectly, maybe it's backpedaling, but this doesn't seem like customers are getting screwed over.

https://www.reddit.com/r/hardware/comments/13g3yep/comment/j...

This is a good and healthy attitude to have and I do not want to diminish it. This is how I view all channels, generally.

In this case, at this time, Gamers Nexus is pretty well respected as an entity that re-invests its success in increasing technical validation capability, and has been cut off more than once by vendors, leading to having to purchase its own hardware. They currently have my respect and trust on this motherboard topic.

Jayz2Cents? His content is just not the same, but he does have a genuinely consumer-focused attitude, though.

This guy has way more credibility than regular gaming "journalists"!

0.02 > 0.01

He's not that guy pal...

The whole channel is a glorified infomercial. I have no clue what people see in it.