Summary of "ASRock answered me why Ryzen 9000 CPUs are dying on their Motherboards."

Summary of Video: “ASRock answered me why Ryzen 9000 CPUs are dying on their Motherboards”

Issue Overview

Premature failures of Ryzen 9000 series CPUs have been reported, particularly on ASRock mid-range and high-end AM5 motherboards such as the B650E, X670E Taichi, and B850 Steel Legend. The root cause is linked to aggressive Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) settings, specifically related to Electrical Design Current (EDC) and Thermal Design Current (TDC) limits.

ASRock acknowledged that early BIOS versions had overly aggressive current limits, pushing CPUs beyond safe thresholds and causing premature CPU deaths.

Technical Explanation

PBO settings control how much current and voltage the CPU can draw to boost performance.
Early ASRock BIOS versions set these limits too high, especially on boards designed to run Ryzen 9000 CPUs at maximum out-of-the-box performance.
Lower-end boards, such as the A620 HDV, are unaffected because their PBO settings are tuned more conservatively.
Recent BIOS updates have also tuned down shadow voltages (BIOS-controlled voltages that users cannot manually adjust) to improve safety.

BIOS Updates and Testing

ASRock released BIOS updates across affected motherboards to lower PBO limits, aligning them with competitors like MSI, ASUS, and Gigabyte.
Testing with the Ryzen 7 9800 X3D showed similar Cinebench performance before and after BIOS updates, with a slight increase in power consumption but a small drop in gaming FPS.
EDC and TDC values remained similar, indicating subtle changes aimed at improving CPU longevity.
ASRock claims these BIOS updates fix the CPU death issues.

Additional Insights

The issue is more pronounced when using high-end cooling solutions (e.g., AIO water coolers) because cooler temperatures allow CPUs to boost more aggressively, pushing limits further.
Both ASRock and AMD avoid placing direct blame; ASRock states they operated within AMD’s specified limits, but those limits were apparently too high.
An analogy used: AMD set a “rev limiter” at 8,000 RPM, but ASRock’s boards pushed CPUs to that limit causing failures; the new BIOS lowers the rev limiter to 7,800 RPM.
No official transparent public statement or detailed release notes from ASRock or AMD have been issued yet, which the presenter finds disappointing.

Community and Warranty Concerns

Many reports on subreddits indicate CPUs dying mostly on ASRock boards, suggesting a motherboard-specific problem.
Memory compatibility was ruled out as a cause by G.Skill.
Concerns remain about early Ryzen 9000 CPU samples and whether other manufacturers’ boards might show similar failures over longer periods.
Suggestions include safer default PBO settings industry-wide or extended warranties for affected CPUs.

Recommendations and Personal Opinions

Users should update to the latest ASRock BIOS to avoid CPU damage.
ASRock offers RMAs for faulty CPUs.
The presenter prefers stability and safety over pushing maximum performance out of the box.
Suggests motherboard vendors provide users with a choice at first boot between “stable” and “performance” PBO profiles.
Emphasizes that stability should be prioritized over peak benchmark scores.

Current Status

The presenter is waiting on AMD for a replacement Ryzen 9 9950X CPU.
A friend’s Ryzen 7950X on an ASRock board remains stable.
The presenter remains cautiously optimistic that the BIOS fixes will resolve the issue.

Main Speakers / Sources

Video Creator / Presenter: Tech YouTuber (likely Luke from Tech Yes City) who conducted testing and interviewed ASRock at Computex 2025.
ASRock Motherboard Team: Provided technical explanations and assurances about BIOS fixes.
G.Skill Representative: Confirmed memory is unlikely the cause.
AMD (indirectly referenced): Supplier of Ryzen CPUs and PBO limits; no direct statement given.

Key Takeaways

Ryzen 9000 CPUs were dying prematurely on ASRock mid/high-end motherboards due to aggressive PBO current limits.
ASRock released BIOS updates to lower these limits and tune shadow voltages to improve CPU safety.
Users should update BIOS to the latest versions to prevent CPU failures.
The issue highlights the tension between maximizing performance and ensuring hardware longevity.
Transparency and communication from ASRock and AMD are currently lacking but needed.
Stability should be prioritized over pushing CPUs to their absolute limits out of the box.