Hello my new friends. I have used WinRaids wealth of knowledge for a long time now but have decided to take the plunge and get involved. With that said I hope to avoid any forum faux pas, but please bare with me as I learn.
I have owned a cpl different Asus Maximus boards I loved my Apex IX (Z270) with a 7700k. While I had planned to do the 9900K coffeelake mod I got a great deal on the Apex XI on ebay and decided to go that way instead. A quick gripe about Asus, constantly changing ports and connections. I used the Asus Fan Extension Card version 1 with the APEX IX and it worked great. Come to find that the Apex XI has a ‘Node’ connection which was quickly removed in subsequent Maximus Motherboards.
Onto my current mission. I was able to get an Asus Fan Extension Card II that connects to the NODE header. I plugged it all in but alas not showing up in the bios(version 2004) and not showing up in Windows 11 HWiNFO 64 nor Armoury Crate (sadly another thing I dislike about ASUS, its software) so I typically stick to the Bios for fan controls anyway. None of the new fan extensions nor temp extensions are showing up. The fans connected to the extension card are spinning slowlyu and removing the node connection while in windows makes them stop so I know its at least powered up and connecting. After a bit of hunting around online, the interwebs points me in the direction of needing to modify the bios. Asus seems to have left out this function for whatever reason. It was this post here for a different motherboard that led me to this conclusion [ASUS ROG Zenith II Extreme experience & discussion thread | Page 24 | Overclock.net]
Attempting to go thru the steps listed there led me to the AMIBCP Tool that ended with an error about the size of the UEFI file being too large to be properly opened.
I refuse to be defeated. This is not my first venture into bios modding. I have the CH341A Tool that I bought originally for the coffeelake on skylake mod. I am finding myself overwhelmed at the moment with loads of different web pages opened and hunting for the appropriate apps and tools. I have read thru the Sticky Topics here at Win-Raid and I am hoping that by starting a Topic at Win-Raid I can get some more precise help with this mission. My Motherboard is the Asus Apex XI z390 with the i9 9900k the bios is currently 2004, the most recent one from the Asus motherboards webpage and all I want is to have the Fan Extensions be accessible in the bios. Seems simple enough but It blows my mind and also doesn’t surprise me one bit that Asus neglected to add this to the Apex XI bios and then promptly gave up on the NODE header entirely. I would appreciate any effort and responses to helping me with my issue. I am happy to be getting involved with this community and hope I can provide some help and assistance of my own.
This is turning out to be much more complex than I had hoped. Im still trying to make progress but keep hitting various road blocks. Youd think it be easier to add this extension module. Any tips? Or perhaps utilize the ‘request’ section of this forum?
Well seems after all you haven’t been seeing this in the right way… you told you that you can add or remove features/modules in bios code? What you did saw int the OC forum was simply the unblock of a “present” feature/string, hidden already in the code, nothing more, so take out the ideia of merging features from the previous APEX or others with FEXT support.
Dont want to be negative on this and im sorry but we dont have a bios lab eng/coder in retirement mode willing to violate is NDA, willing to help us assembling new AMI based code…indeed a pity.
Maybe the recent MSI leaker will share more resources for us (modders across the web)…who knows.
But by all means, keep your position “I refuse to be defeated”
Good luck.
I appreciate your help. any negativity is simply done outta love so i can understand. This probably comes down to neglect on the part of ASUS. Yes i was hoping this was simply about ‘turning on’ certain features. clearly this is not the case. guess i can chalk this up as something i should have researched more before purchasing and assuming that an Asus ‘NODE’ header would work out of the box as did the first fan extension header from my old Apex IX Z270. Quite a circus.
ok progress. sorta. seems that this being the first series of motherboards with the Node header there is no functional aspect in the bios for any of the motherboards from Gene to Extreme. in fact the Extreme comes with an older Asus Fan Extension Card 1 and the old header. which is not on the APEX. understandable as this is a XOC motherboard. Anyway even the Extreme has a NODE header but no functionality written into the bios that I could see. HOWEVER I did find that the next Maximus XII series of motherboards does. My question is this now. on a scale of 1 - 10 how outta my damn mind am I to expect to be able to port functionality from XII to XI Bios? you don’t have to use my silly 1 to 10 scale. just curious if this is even a doable venture before I dive any deeper.
Theres no “real” reports of merging/port new code/modules successfully… theres some success reports of cross flashing bios but this seems not an option in your case.
Just to finish in this subject as its to unlikely to reach success…ill point it to 1 in your scale. This is only my opinion…nothing more and im not an hole mighty bios mod GURU…
rofl. love your style my friend. I assume you mean there is no chance of cross flashing bios as that would mean a change in Processors size correct? the 9th gen was the last of the 14nm 1151 ‘skylake refreshes’ man that skylake refresh stuck around forever eh? thanks for your help if nothing else i learned a bunch of stuff about exploring Bios. how to use the UEFI Editor program and that ASUS can be a finicky bunch. O and just because a motherboard has a header doesn’t mean its actually programmed in the BIOS to work
No… the code is present in bios but its only activated upon HW/Module/Add-on detection.
In your case its a non-existence of the code in the bios… and you would like to add it…
Only very VERY similar models models with same pcb design/hw chips implemented, tend to have success in cross flashing
you are correct sir. I thank you for your help in this attempt. Perhaps I can resell this Fan Extension hardware I bought more likely it will sit in a box and gather dust as do most things that I give up on. lol… DEFEATED. kinda mad at ASUS for adding a header on my motherboard to nowhere. I am a bit of a weirdo in this but I do enjoy populating headers on things. rofl. at least it was only $30. I have certainly made bigger costing blunders when it comes to hardware. dragging a metal wrench across the ram traces of a (new at that time) Asus IX Formula comes to mind. Tho it did make a good sacrificial board for other efforts like the coffeelake hardware mod on z270. Not sure if you are familiar but either way I appreciate your help.
seriously tho, having read other posts that have your ‘no nonsense’ responses to them I can really appreciate your approach and efforts. sometimes a swift back hand is the best medicine.
Oh… i have my own “hate” / appreciated" fan list… some users dont like to read what they get for an answer… some are more reasonable and less brainsless… but yes, some times its to much trouble, even for my own issues, its then better to move on the best we can, cheers, all the best.
