Intel - Karmi's Musings & Tech

ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 mATX MoBo: Restore an Image and/or do a Clean Install

August 12, 2025January 31, 2024 by Karmi

The Intel® Rapid Storage Technology (Intel® RST) driver holds the controllers (?) and storage drivers I needed to do a Backup and Restore (Windows 7) of a Win11 Pro saved image, and/or to do a clean installation of Win11 Pro – on an ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 MoBo.

I am no expert at motherboards, but I sometimes do more ‘Tinkering’ with my main computer (‘Apevia’) than I should—hence the reason for using the Backup and Restore (Windows 7) utility that comes with Windows 11 before actual ‘Tinkering’ starts.

Long story, but I don’t really want to go thru the ‘Nightmare’, in great detail, again. Doubtful that I could remember all the details anyway, since a lot of the experience involved luck, searching, banging away, more searching, more banging away mixed in with deep thought & pondering, experimenting & testing, and a stroke of good luck in the home stretch. 👍😳👌🙂

How to turn a $314.57 Chromebook into a Fedora Linux Laptop/Tablet/Sketchbook

August 12, 2025September 22, 2023 by Karmi

NOTE: This 6/18/2021 post was transferred from my old Linux Newbie – Since 1996 blog, and has been edited to fix links, outdated info & etc., but the conversion from Chrome OS to Fedora info should still be correct.

This was done using ‘Sam’ my new 12.2” Samsung Chromebook Plus V2 XE521QAB. Tried this same method on the new HP Chromebook – 14a-na0023cl (‘Chromebook’) ‘n it didn’t work. I had purchased two Chromebooks wid the hopes of turning one into a Fedora Linux laptop.

Here’s closer look at System Settings wid that so-called “weak” Chromebook Celeron 3965Y ‘n just 4 (“3.7”) GiB memory (6/19/2021 NOTE: forgot to upgrade to Fedora 33 from 32, ‘n so here’s the new System pic):

ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 mATX MoBo – BIOS & Drivers

July 28, 2025June 24, 2023 by Karmi

I have found that finding the right ASUS Z790M PLUS D4 drivers can be frustrating for this one. Since 2005/2006 I have purchased $60-$90 motherboards for my builds, but decided to ‘splurge’ on the ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 mATX MoBo – $171.89 + $12.03 Tax = $183.92.

Requirements were – Micro ATX, Intel Z790, LGA 1700, and 1Gb LAN motherboard. Have moved away from the big ATX & small ITX boards, and prefer the mATX boards and cases now—fact is, I was going to be removing (intact) an older board from my favorite case, a APEVIA X-QPACK3 mATX case, and building a new Intel® Core™ i9-13900K system in it.

I didn’t find a huge mATX selection, and PCPartPicker only had TWO listed, and I went w/ the ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4.

(*1/31/2024 UPDATE: new info in ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 mATX MoBo: Restore an Image and/or do a Clean Install post*)

Builds & Upgrades — Part 4 (“Delivered Today” – NOT!)

August 12, 2025June 7, 2023 by Karmi

OK, ‘Thangs have slowed to a crawl – fortunately I am in no rush ‘n just keep spending more money whilst I wait. 😁👍 However, instead of four Parts there will be a Part 5: here are the links to Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

Let’s get started…

‘Delivered Today‘

I knew that “$50 drop in the price of an Intel® Core™ i9-13900K CPU” mentioned in Part 3 looked unusual for the 2nd ‘Fastest average effective speed CPU‘ right now:

Builds & Upgrades — Part 3 (Costs Incurred to Date)

August 12, 2025June 3, 2023 by Karmi

Part 1 (5/29/23) was about ‘Planning‘ a new Intel® Core™ i9-13900K Build whilst reusing an Apevia case, its 32 GB RAM, its 500 GB SAMSUNG 970 EVO M.2 PCIe NVMe (for OS), a Adata XPG SX6000 Pro M.2 PCIe NVMe (for data), and a Kingwin KF-251-BK Dual-Bay Hot Swap Rack.

No rush or actual date for finishing the Build was set; however, an ASUS Prime Z790M-PLUS D4 LGA 1700 mATX MoBo had just been purchased for $183.92 w/ Tax ‘n free shipping.

Whilst writing Part 1 – I had noticed PCPartPicker showing a large drop in price for a ASUS Dual NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti OC Edition – a drop from over $425++ to $364.00 ($390.54 w/ Tax) and I also purchased it.

Part 2 (6/1/23) was removing the MoBo from the ‘Apevia‘ computer and placing it (mostly intact) into the ‘Rose‘ computer – a huge Intel® Core™ i9-10900K Upgrade for that computer. I am now using ‘Rose‘ as my main PC until ‘Apevia‘ is re-Built.