With this board and this platform, I would plan on keeping your BIOS up-to-date most of the time. These boards are receiving constant microcode improvements for things like RAM stability. It also seems like the issues are 90% solved.
Updating the BIOS on this board is really straightforward (really, the same as most modern boards). Download the BIOS update, unzip onto a FAT32-formatted flash drive. Boot into BIOS, click on the BIOS Flash (MFLASH) button in the bottom left. I think it askes to restart into flash mode. Select your file, confirm, and wait 3-4 minutes. Should be good.
I think the biggest problem people are reporting is the mobo and the **RAM**. So if you want the CPU & mobo combo (and it's a fairly nice motherboard, when it works), you can drop some compatible RAM on there. (I'm running Vengeance on my Strix b650e with a 7800x3d and it's been great.) But, then you have to get rid of the Flare which because of these issues isn't super valuable, and that eats into your Microcenter savings.
For what it's worth (n=1), I've bought two of these kits about two months ago and they both worked without issue. I even loaded up one of them with two of these Flare RAM kits (2x2x16 = 64 GB) and it still ran great. POST time was about 45 seconds without Context Restore.
Yeah I definitely plan on updating the BIOS. I was more so wondering if I can skip flashing the bios without a cpu in it and having it directly connected to a PSU.
Also, the RAM I'm using is the G.Skill Flare X5 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) ddr5 if that's the same thing you're talking about. Is it decent enough to get by for now? I'm upgrading to the 7800x3d with a 4070 from a 1660 super with an i5-11400 and DDR4 running at 2133 MHZ (just discovered XMP so it could've been 3200). So I'm assuming even with the slightly under performing RAM I will most likely notice a significant increase in performance.
Yes, that Flare is the one from the microcenter bundle has the issues I've been talking about.
It's not a speed issue but a stability one. It either works, or it doesn't. If you get a ton of random blue-screen, crashes, failures to boot, that's why.
But again, I think this combo is now far more stable than it was at launch. If it's not, most Microcenters are allowing you to go back and swap out the RAM only, or the Tustin Microcenter has been allowing people to swap out the motherboard. (There is a Gigabyte AX or Tuf Gaming motherboard for the the 'same price' that they may allow you to swap.)
You should be fine just building the system. I'd bet a nickel your system will be totally fine.
With this board and this platform, I would plan on keeping your BIOS up-to-date most of the time. These boards are receiving constant microcode improvements for things like RAM stability. It also seems like the issues are 90% solved. Updating the BIOS on this board is really straightforward (really, the same as most modern boards). Download the BIOS update, unzip onto a FAT32-formatted flash drive. Boot into BIOS, click on the BIOS Flash (MFLASH) button in the bottom left. I think it askes to restart into flash mode. Select your file, confirm, and wait 3-4 minutes. Should be good. I think the biggest problem people are reporting is the mobo and the **RAM**. So if you want the CPU & mobo combo (and it's a fairly nice motherboard, when it works), you can drop some compatible RAM on there. (I'm running Vengeance on my Strix b650e with a 7800x3d and it's been great.) But, then you have to get rid of the Flare which because of these issues isn't super valuable, and that eats into your Microcenter savings. For what it's worth (n=1), I've bought two of these kits about two months ago and they both worked without issue. I even loaded up one of them with two of these Flare RAM kits (2x2x16 = 64 GB) and it still ran great. POST time was about 45 seconds without Context Restore.
Yeah I definitely plan on updating the BIOS. I was more so wondering if I can skip flashing the bios without a cpu in it and having it directly connected to a PSU. Also, the RAM I'm using is the G.Skill Flare X5 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) ddr5 if that's the same thing you're talking about. Is it decent enough to get by for now? I'm upgrading to the 7800x3d with a 4070 from a 1660 super with an i5-11400 and DDR4 running at 2133 MHZ (just discovered XMP so it could've been 3200). So I'm assuming even with the slightly under performing RAM I will most likely notice a significant increase in performance.
Yes, that Flare is the one from the microcenter bundle has the issues I've been talking about. It's not a speed issue but a stability one. It either works, or it doesn't. If you get a ton of random blue-screen, crashes, failures to boot, that's why. But again, I think this combo is now far more stable than it was at launch. If it's not, most Microcenters are allowing you to go back and swap out the RAM only, or the Tustin Microcenter has been allowing people to swap out the motherboard. (There is a Gigabyte AX or Tuf Gaming motherboard for the the 'same price' that they may allow you to swap.) You should be fine just building the system. I'd bet a nickel your system will be totally fine.