On request of numerous users I revisited the Biostar X370 GT7, their complaint: Biostar have made zero attempt to fix firmware problems or provide a similar level of support to other motherboard manufacturers such as Asrock, MSI, etc. These are complaints of the most serious nature when I review any hardware it is my reputation that is attached to those articles so I decided to investigate the claims and complaints. After concluding my investigations the conclusion I came to is that sadly as good as the GT7 is on a hardware level the firmware is woefully inadequate, absolutely awful, not even close to the level of quality offered by other manufacturers. Still. After 1.5 years. Rest assured IF I decide Biostar are worthy of my time and a review in future I will not be giving them the benefit of the doubt as I did in the original review I wrote and published on XtremeSystems and here at Win-Raid (which you can read HERE, AND HERE) nor will this current situation with the GT7 (and X470 GT8, most of the problems I found are highly likely to apply to that board as well) be forgotten. It is rare I come across a manufacturer so unconcerned with supporting the products they sell, to name but a few of the more severe complaints I could verify is a broken Gear Down option once you set a memory frequency higher than 2400MHz causing the system to fail to POST, the system failing to display any image after the POST splash screen when switching from “Legacy” to “UEFI” from the Compatibility Support Module with a GTX980 (even a vBIOS update to the latest there is did not help), no option in smart fan control to allow the user to specify for themselves a CPU temperature limit at which any manually input or preset fan values are ignored, severely lacking memory divider options compared to other boards, the list goes on, and on, and on, and on, and on. Even after a considerable amount of time with Biostar R&D trying to get them to resolve these issues they have not, from which I can only conclude three things; 1. They do not care, 2. They are incompetent, 3. They are THE definition of disingenuous and there should be a picture of Biostar R&D next to the word “disingenuous” in the Oxford dictionary and Thesaurus.
So, to try and alleviate a lot of these troubles and woes for people being a former R&D guy I decided with @Lost_N_BIOS with some input from @barisuraz to make a highly modified firmware addressing a lot of these problems. The modified firmware is rather comprehensive in the changes we are making so be sure to check the changelog regularly. In terms of development the best I can say is that in the past 1.5 weeks or so we have made more developments, fixes, and improvements than Biostar have made over the last 1.5 years.
Given Biostars track record do not expect updates to be very often, MAYBE there will be an update for each new AGESA there is but I had to really push Biostar to even get a firmware update with AGESA 1004c to fix the serious memory divider bugs 1002a had. Shockingly it did not seem like they knew about anything I was telling them, astounding for something that is meant to be a large chunk of R&Ds job. Take that for what you will. As a former R&D guy, one of those positions being with a large memory manufacturer, I am appalled by the lack of understanding Biostar R&D have exhibited and it truly leaves me wondering how those R&D people at Biostar still have jobs.
UPDATE: 22/10/18: Nope, you aren’t even going to get an updated firmware with each new AGESA update, heres the reply I got from Biostar R&D and my reply back to them of how that conversation went;
"We’ve just updated AGESA Pinncle Pl 1.0.0.4c recently. Because Pinncle Pl 1.0.0.6 doesn’t have critical improvements, so we’ve decided temporarily not update this one."
My response (which may or may not get passed to them in entirity or partial form)
“According to my sources PinnaclePI 1006 provides compatibility improvements that very much comes under the category of critical improvements. Besides that, every other manufacturer will be updating to PinnaclePI 1006 when it has passed their verification stages this I have had confirmed by multiple sources. This level of support is expected in the west, no exceptions. Failure to realise this will see yourselves never making a dent against the likes of Asrock, Asus, MSI or Gigabyte.”
!!DISCLAIMER!!: Myself and LOST_N_BIOS are happy for owners of the GT7 to freely download and use this firmware however we do NOT give permission to Biostar to take the work we have done. We expect to be appropriately compensated for clearing up a lot of your mess Biostar if you want to save time and take our work.
Updated UI Design
Splash Screen
Firmware UI
You’ll have to forgive this next rather crummy looking image for some reason the screen capture would not work with the clock open.
AMD PBS
Biostar completely broke this module it would appear, fixed now.
Bio-Flash Screen
Hopefully these images give you a good idea about the level of effort that was put in to the firmware itself and making the UI something much easier to look at to stop all those bleeding eyeballs.
CHANGELOG:
DRIVER UPDATES Date Format: DD/MM/YY
Updated Realtek Dragon LAN UNDI driver to >> v2.045 (26/4/18)
Updated Realtek Option-ROM Boot Agent GE to >> v2.66 (26/5/17)
CPU Microcode update to >> 0800820B (20/6/18)
Updated EFI AMD GOP to >> v2.4.0.0.0_signed (9/5/18)
Updated second EFI AMD GOP to >> v1.66.0.15.50_Signed (23/4/18)
Updated Raven Ridge Option-ROM vBIOS to >> v016.002.000.007.000000 (8/6/18)
Updated Carrizo Option-ROM vBIOS to >> N/A Latest Available
Updated AMD EFI RAIDXpert2 to >> v9.2.0-00070 (14/5/18)
Updated both AMD RAIDXpert2 O-ROMs to >> v8.1.0-00064 (8/6/17)
UNLOCKED FIRMWARE SETTINGS
UNLOCKED: ACPI Settings
ACPI Auto Configuration
Hibernation
Legacy Resources
UNLOCKED: Promontory Common Options
SATA Configuration >
SATA Device Sleep options
UNLOCKED: Smart Fan Control
Fan Ctrl FULL option
UNLOCKED: CPU Configuration
C6 Mode option
UNLOCKED: PCI Express Settings
Relaxed Ordering
Extended Tag
Extended Sync
Link Training
Link Training Timeout
Unpopulated Links
UNLOCKED: USB Configuration
USB 2.0 Controller Mode
USB Mass Storage Driver
USB power-up delay options
UNLOCKED: Chipset Configuration
Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) options
Universal Asynchronous Reciever-Transmitter (UART) options
UNLOCKED: ONE Menu
MOSFET temperature sensor reading
VRM temperature threshold option
MCT Configuration >
Bank & Channel Interleaving options
Memory Hole option
AMD CBS UNLOCKED:
CAD Bus Configuration options
Custom P-State Overclocking
FIXES / IMPROVEMENTS
1. Fixed AMD PBS module that Biostar have completely broken.
2. Professionally overhauled UI to a much more modern and easy on the eye design, default UI is terrible it looks like some intern made it on their lunch break.
3. Added new boot logo because the default one is awful.
4. Synchronised [Failsafe] and [Default] parameters to avoid potential quirks.
5. Optimised firmware [Default] settings.
6. Tuned default manual fan setting values.
7. Renamed some items and options for clarity.
8. Added much better explanations for a lot of items.
9. Increased Fan Ctrl FULL from 70c to 85c. No more going insane through the whirr of fans at 100% speed where manual fan values are ignored when the CPU reaches 71c.
10. Improved memory compatibility through unlocking CAD Bus options.
11. Fixed bad layout, spelling, and grammatical issues.
12. Attempt at improving various compatibility and performance aspects, including memory. (needs wide scale testing)
13. Added Precision Boost Option.
HOW TO FLASH:
Bio-Flash Method
1. Place image on a USB stick
2. Reboot, enter Bio-Flash
3. Select the file and flash as normal
DOS Method (thorough)
1. Copy the content of THIS ARCHIVE to a USB drive
2. Place the modified firmware you want to flash in EFI > BOOT folder
3. Restart and select your USB drive to boot from it
4. At the shell prompt type the following hitting enter each time;
fs[InsertDriveNumber]:
CD EFI
CD BOOT
AFUEFIX64 FirmwareName.ROM /P /B /N /K /REBOOT
The system will then automatically restart after the update. The update might take a while as this method fully erases the ROM and reprograms it.
NOTE 1: It is strongly recommended to perform a full CMOS reset after any firmware update (remove CMOS battery, power cord, set CMOS jumper to “clear” position, press power button 2-3 times to discharge capacitors)
NOTE 2: If you are not sure of the fs drive number your USB stick is using just type fs0: then press enter then enter LS and press enter again. This will list the files on that drive. Just keep repeating this process increasing the fs numeric number each time until you find your drive.
KNOWN ISSUES / TO DO:
Unless otherwise stated the issues here are inherent and outstanding from the default Biostar firmware. Believe me, this list is substantially shorter than it otherwise would be if you are using the default Biostar firmware.
1. Using a 0.5 or 0.75 CPU multiplier results in the DRAM frequency being reported and / or set wrongly in the UEFI.
2. M.2 SSD [WD Green 120GB, model WDS120G1G0B-00RC30] fails to be recognised when “CPU Clock” is set to anything but [Auto].
3. Gear Down: Disabled causes a no POST with a memory frequency above 2400MHz. [G.Skill F4-3200C15D-16GVK]
4. Memory timings are not read and / or applied correctly from the XMP profile. [G.Skill F4-3200C15D-16GVK]
5. Generally awful memory overclocking / compatibility. Fixing Gear Down would be a good start to remedy this.
6. No HPET (High Precision Event Timer) or Spread Spectrum options. The former saves having to go through numerous command line hoops in Windows whilst the latter is useful for overclockers.
7. Add fan type support, as far as I have seen there is no reason why the GT7 cannot support PWM and DC (4 and 3 pin fans) it is just a case of implementing the ability in the firmware.
8. Failure to display anything after the POST splash screen when switching video from Legacy to UEFI with a Gigabyte Windforce3 GTX980.
I’m moving options outside of those suppress constraints though as that then allows me to repurpose the suppress constraints if needed.
only set free, set it all free! 
