I have this board, bought as untested. Currently have a bronze cpu but q code on 00.
Upon further inspection I can see some small caps or resistors missing underneath.
Could someone take a photo of the underneath so I can identify what is actually missing?
And did you have any success?
Hmmm we may be out of luck…
Just had this reply from ASUS regarding getting an ES Bios…
Hi Tom,
Unfortunately not possible, these ES CPUs are only compatible with our ES PCH boards used during development stages.
Once mass production began we received new revision chipsets from Intel that are not compatible with these ES CPUs.
BR
Sony
Programmer either required due to something written in the FD region, or he didn’t want to explain how to use USB Flashback, which everyone knows = not the reason. So me thinks something at the FD region needs written (or ME too) This is how coffee is now blocked on Sky/Kaby boards, along with other stuff needing changed, one byte at the FD also needs changed
Rubbish listing, money grab trashy seller! Programmers cost $2.50 minimum, some expensive ones cost $50-100 and yes some $300-3,000 too if you want, but there is no difference when using the $2 one or a $3000 one, except one is faster and can do more chips at once, write only certain sections easier, more compatible with wider range of chips etc.
@levelud Didn’t try it yet, sorry, a lot of work. Hope will do this week.
@Lost_N_BIOS Two questions: 1. is it possible to flash ROM image without Asus capsule using usb flashback? 2. is it possible to create .cap image with signed capsule from modified unsigned ROM image to make it usable with ezflash tool? Thanks
@avd - sorry, I cannot remember if you can do that with .bin/.rom on new boards, maybe erall method?
For flashback though, you do not need to remove the capsule, you can edit with capsule in place and it will be fine, or you can extract body, edit, then place back into capsule it will be fine too. Flashback takes mod BIOS 
That’s why I said this guy is crazy, even if FD or ME region needs written, this can be done in various ways or with a $2 programmer…
On EZ Flash, no, not on modern boards, on old boards you could swap in mod body into capsule and EZ flash would take it, or mod while in capsule still, but that’s only on very old boards.
Not entirely relevant to the sage but to skylake as a whole. I’m testing a 50652 chip on lga 2066 and that appears to have the same issue as 50651/50652 on the sage. I also got word from evga that it is intel that’s forcing the change 
Hopefully whatever that guy on ebay did to the c621 bios, it can be ported over to other chipsets, it seems like it may become a requirement to get future intel generation ES chips working.
He may be lying, and wants your board to add/remove some tiny 0603 or smaller 0402/0201 resistor, that would be valid (but morally crap) reason to request board sent in and good reason to lie to customer (They’d never notice such small resistor changes)
And these are common things uses to enable/disable certain features.
Intel could force the change after the fact via ME or FD, or BIOS changes in general on top of that, but at the chipset level or board level they wouldn’t be able to make manufacturers do this except on new boards (and then only at board level, since most would already have purchases 10000’s of chipsets and wouldn’t buy new ones)
I’d find it weird that the disabling would be done via a resistor, else i’d asume no boards would work as intel is quite strict on what you can and cannot do. I have some x299 files so i’ll have a look around the pch / cpu see if there are any CFG resistors of interest.
Based on what i’ve heard back i currently think it’s a bios implementation in the same way nvidia does it, where all bios’s on consumer boards are basically bricks and you have the internal bios’s which give you a ridicoulous amount of options that’d normally be locked out. Or at the very least I think that’s what intel is trying to move towards.
I also have a sage but only retail chips so far, so I can’t help too much on this specific project sadly.
They’d remove the resistor for this in production boards, if they knew/planned early enough in sales/production to remove it (usually they would know and plan, if this was one of methods possibly used)
Intel has limited control on what they enable or disable on their boards after chipsets are purchased, aside from stuff like this they get crabby about later on (like non-Z OC and Coffee on Sky boards etc).
I was saying he may be adding or removing, stuff like back in early X58 days, you could move a resistor around and allow very high Bclk, some other boards I’ve added or removed a resistor to enable a feature, some NVidia chipsets like that too so you can enable AHCI or not etc.
Long list of stuff like this that can be controlled, enabled later, or disabled etc via a single tiny resistor, or a short here or jump there.
Asus would never give you an honest answer, maybe if you were really friends with someone that worked there, then you could get a real answer, but if you knew someone like that you’d get the “real answer” you want ie how to make it happen.
I can unlock this BIOS to give you 100’s of hidden options right now, but none that block/allow CPU that’s never a BIOS option even hidden one.
There’s always lots of options hidden on non-OEM boards, often for safety reasons, but other times just to re-use BIOS base on a lower end board and remove/hide/disable options for lesser models and not have to do major BIOS rebuilds from scratch
I’ve looked through the CFG resistors for x299, at least based off MSI documentation, and nothing stands out as that kind of disableing.
What i meant by Bios options is more like intel pushing out a new flash descriptor / having an entirely different flash descriptor for retail which has a different set of PCH straps and that does all the dirty work, or at least something along those lines.
Stuff like that would not be in any public documentation, you’d need internal datasheets for each exact motherboard and the internal PCH and socket sheets as well.
Flash descriptor is possible and stuff we can edit via hex or Intel FITc, transfer between boards/BIOS, change settings in etc, which is one of the things I mentioned earlier may be why he’s acting like you need him to program if (FD or ME change often can require programmer for the non-technical user or non-skilled person)
We can do with $2 programmer, $300 one he mentioned is no different in regards to editing flashing these regions.
You’ve assumed i’ve used public documentation 
Ha, yes I did, but you know what I mean, it would need to be internal Asus, Intel direct NDA required full sheets for the PCH and the socket trace paths etc.
I don’t think it’s in this, maybe PCH via resistor, but that was just my guess based on him “Having to have your board in hand” to reflash with his $300 programmer because your $2 wont work, which we know is rubbish, so it lead me to think outside the box and nefarious things aside from him just taking peoples money.
Maybe someone rich will donate $100 to this cause and send off a board, then dump BIOS for us to check out here, then we’ll know for sure if it’s in the BIOS or he did something to the board (If the image the board good enough, with heatsinks removed before and after, front and back etc)
I’d be willing to give this a shot if the seller can confirm that it will work for the QL29 parts that I have, but eBay won’t even let me send them a message! No idea why.
@malucul
Strange it gives me the option and im in the UK. I was was state side id happily send a board over but imports/exports etc would be a real pain!
You can message him here, from his account, not from the contact seller link on the listing - https://contact.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl…computer.buying (Select, “not about an item” just in case)
I too, can directly ask a question from the listing, so maybe due to location you can’t message him from the listing @maluul ? Says “Shipping to United States” only, everything else is excluded.
Thanks Lost. I sent them a message.
Just jumping in here as i have been pretty much following you guys behind the scenes. when i saw the ebay post i caved. i have been following along trying everything but still no bueno. I actually was working on this for a friends board but found a deal an the exact same board so i have been talking with the seller from ebay and he said for both boards he should have a turn around within 3-5 days of receiving them. IO am sending him both board and i ordered 2 6136 for myself as my new work station. i will keep you all posted when i get them back. I should be ghetting my Asus sage c621e tomorrow and then i will send both boards the following day.