Official statement about burning Ryzen 7000 processors from AMD and manufacturers

Since last week there have been several cases of AMD burning on their next-gen Ryzen 7000 and Ryzen 7000X3D processors. First of all, let me state it again, the number of problems experienced is not very high, but the problem itself is serious. So much so that both the AM5 socket motherboard and the processor became completely unusable in systems with the problem. An explanation came from official sources on the subject.

The issue was reportedly caused by overvoltage to the chip, which damaged both the AM5 motherboard and the CPU. The problem was found to be caused by voltage settings that were raised during overclocking in the BIOS provided by the manufacturers. A few motherboard vendors like MSI and Asus have reacted early to this and released updated BIOSes for their current AM5 motherboards to throttle voltages.

Official statement from AMD

Official statements made by AMD to Anandtech stated: “We are aware of a limited number of online reports claiming that excessive voltage may have damaged the motherboard socket and pin pads while overclocking. We are actively investigating this situation. We work with our ODM partners to ensure that voltages applied to Ryzen 7000X3D CPUs via motherboard BIOS settings are within product specifications. Anyone whose CPU may be affected by this issue should contact AMD customer support.”

On the other hand, the problems are not limited to AMD Ryzen 7000X3D 3D V-Cache CPUs, as we’ve seen over the last few days, standard Ryzen 7000 CPUs are also affected by this issue. The voltages raised by manual overclocking can permanently damage both the processor and the motherboard.

While AMD has asked users to reach out to customer support, it’s unclear whether any product replacements will be offered, as AMD and motherboard manufacturers say the problem is caused by manual voltage and overclocking, which is not covered by the official warranty. As far as I can see, the change requests of those who have the problem have been positive.

Official statement from motherboard manufacturers

Asus, which is one of the motherboards with the most burning problem, has removed/removing all the old BIOS versions that have already been released for AM5 motherboards. Only up-to-date BIOSes will be available on the product pages. Similarly, MSI, ASRock, Biostar and others are also releasing updated BIOSes. The common points of the statements made by the companies say the same thing: Overvoltages instantly kill the Ryzen 7000X3D processors.

As it is known, Ryzen 7000X3D processors cannot be overclocked, but performance tuning and DRAM overclocks are allowed through PBO2 and EXPO memory. However, as a result of the investigations made by both AMD and manufacturers, it turns out that as soon as EXPO is activated, the CPU SOC and CPU VDDIO/MC voltages can rise to 1.36-1.4v, sometimes even up to 1.5V. These are particularly high values ​​than the Ryzen 7000X3D processors can withstand.

Asus and MSI (possibly others as well) have started limiting voltages to 1.3V in their new BIOS versions. Therefore, if you are using Ryzen 7000X3D or Ryzen 7000 processors, we recommend that you upgrade to the new BIOS versions. If you have already overclocked memory or CPU, we recommend that you undo them and update your BIOS. On the other hand, I would like to state once again that there is no question mark in the minds: The problem is affecting a small number of users. For non-overclocking users, there is no risk, including current BIOSes.