Garbage Asus Software

[FreedomEclipse]

Anyone seen this yet?

 

[Bill_Bright]

Can you just give a quick, one or two sentence recap? I hate these videos and don't watch them typically because they take 15, 18, 20, 25 or more minutes to say what could be said in one or two sentences.

Edit comment: Fixed minor typo.

 

[Frick]

Can you just give a quick, one or two sentence recap? I hate these videos and don't watch them typically because they take 15, 18, 20, 25 or more minutes to say would could be said in one or two sentences.

I just report these threads as spam.

 

[Easy Rhino]

Clickbait trash?

 

[FreedomEclipse]

Can you just give a quick, one or two sentence recap? I hate these videos and don't watch them typically because they take 15, 18, 20, 25 or more minutes to say what could be said in one or two sentences.

Edit comment: Fixed minor typo.

The TLDR is that Asus have quite a few holes in their software (I think its armour crate??) that someone could maliciously exploit and use the app as a piggyback or launcher to unknowingly install malware via executable or batch script onto someone elses machine.

 

[cvaldes]

The TLDR is that Asus have quite a few holes in their software (I think its armour crate??) that someone could maliciously exploit and use the app as a piggyback or launcher to unknowingly install malware via executable or batch script onto someone elses machine.

There are lots of applications that have holes that can be exploited by bad people for malicious intent.

The best course of action is to assume that any piece of software that connects to the Internet has vulnerabilities. It's up to the individual user to decide whether or not the software author is generally trustworthy and competent or not (relative to other software publishers).

As pointed out earlier, these videos are typically a huge time suck. What typically takes ~20 minutes to describe in some random vlogger's monetizing video can usually be summarized in a short paragraph that can be digested in 30-40 seconds.

Even if you limit your viewing of these videos to a handful of reputable sources (examples: der8auer, GamersNexus) you are probably spending a couple of hours per week watching this stuff. From a time-usage perspective it really makes less sense to watch videos from random schmucks from a potential value offering.

These sort of videos had more weight twenty years ago before vlogging became commodified.

The chances of wasting 20 minutes watching something that could have been communicated in 30 seconds or less is just too great in 2025. Not worth it anymore IMHO. If you watch these as entertainment, that's fine. If you watch these with the intent to actually gain new knowledge, it's usually a big waste of time.

 

[Shihab]

ASUS has a lot of flops with its software. But still, even for security ones, you can easily summarise the faults, their technical explanation, the response to them, and throw in a couple of criticisms in a 3 minutes article. e.g.

ASUS DriverHub flaw let malicious sites run commands with admin rights

The ASUS DriverHub driver management utility was vulnerable to a critical remote code execution flaw that allowed malicious sites to execute commands on devices with the software installed.

www.bleepingcomputer.com

As for the title: Yes. Asus software is garbage. But the truly sh1te move is defaulting to enable the borderline rootkit installer they bundle with their mobos.

 

[freeagent]

I just turn Armory crate off in the bios, easy peasy.

 

[_roman_]

The TLDR is that Asus have quite a few holes in their software (I think its armour crate??) that someone could maliciously exploit and use the app as a piggyback or launcher to unknowingly install malware via executable or batch script onto someone elses machine.

Thank you for the summary.

windows 11 pro forced me to activate tpm.

Once tpm is disabled it is permanently disabled on my ASUS Prime x670-p mainboard, regardless which firmware version so far. A long term ASUS bug. So i had to upgrade flash the uefi to get the windows update done. I forgot to disable armory crate so I had that malware auto downloaded in windows 11 pro. I read out w11 pro with hwinfo to check for tpm active or disabled state - regardless if the option is active or disabled in uefi. I did check that again after the windows update. Set it off = tpm off. Set it on = tpm still off. Long term ASUS bug. ASUS has bad software, lots of security holes. no and very delayed uefi updates.

I would not complain when the asus armory crate software would be automatically disabled by default. As it is malware.

this topic is important. People should be made aware of that it'S not only ASUS but also MSI related. CVE exists. If the other boardmakers also are in the boat i did not research.


Summary: Do not use windows 11 pro or setup every hidden option in ASUS and MSI mainboards first before using any windows 10 / 11 or future operating system. This also applies for any mainboard vendor software which auto downloads without asking the user, do you really want to download ASUS malware. The asus armory crate attack vector can be avoided by not booting up windows operating system.

--

Note:

Check this community spreadsheet to see which mainboard get an uefi update and not for the past

AM5 AGESA/UEFI/BIOS List | SMU AM5/AM4 Table

docs.google.com

-- I have a Msi mainboard now lying on my table. The asus mainboard will be sold after I have swapped the mainboard and fans and cpu cooler in my pc.

-- when you never update the uefi, armory crate once turned off is not an issue. Else it is a big problem.
I doubt a user with no knowledge will update the uefi and disable that option on every uefi update. I highly doubt a user know this. I highly doubt a user know about that CVE

 

[Event Horizon]

MSI, Gigabyte, and ASUS, all have really bad software suites. They can make impressive boards but they can't make a secure, lightweight, functional software suite. Not sure if Asrock is any good in this regard.

 

[Bill_Bright]

Asus have quite a few holes in their software

There are lots of applications that have holes

This is actually why I will go to great efforts to avoid installing any software that comes with hardware. I learned this years (decades?) ago with printer software, where HP, for example, wanted users of new printers to install their software "suites" with new printers. I never, as in NEVER EVER do that. In almost every case, you can visit the product's web page and find the basic drivers necessary to make the device function just fine without a full suite of excessively bloated junk no user needs.

If you install their suites, you likely will get a bunch of programs you don't need, but frankly, probably don't want. Some may even be considered spyware - adware at least. For example, (this applies to most HW makers and to most software too) we really don't need most of our HW or programs to have auto-updater programs starting with Windows and running full time to check for updates. The only exceptions may be for the OS itself, and our real-time security programs.

Avoiding these suites has actually become easier in recent years as the major hardware makers and OS developers (including Microsoft) have agreed to and comply with industry standards for communications between HW and the OS. In many cases, Windows already knows how to communicate with the device and will find the correct drivers.

Even monitor makers have been doing this bloatware thing. No one needs to install special software for their monitors. Typically, all it does is provide the monitor's model number and it grays out the resolutions it does NOT support.

Essentially all motherboard makers provide firmware and driver updates on their sites that do NOT require special software suites to install. Always look there first.

 

[R-T-B]

Always look there first.

I agree, but the new UEFI preload shenanigans adds an extra layer to watch out for. I hope whoever thought that up has a cactus spontanously appear wherever he plans to sit.

 

[FreedomEclipse]

This is actually why I will go to great efforts to avoid installing any software that comes with hardware

The point being. Not everyone is tech savvy. I have a friend that insists on installing every bit of software that comes with the disk of his MB. Same thing with a lot of the peripherals he uses where the software is optional.

The people of TPU are highly unlikely to fall prey to malicious software compared to the average joe.

 

[Sithaer]

Armory crate yeah no thanks, it was bad enough to try to completely get rid of it after trying it out once.
I only use their legacy version of Asus Aura cause its very simple and works with my RGB parts where I set my colors once and then only use it again when I feel like switching to a different color theme.

Gigabyte I've had issues with 2 times in the past with 2 different software. Their Xtreme utility that came with my GTX 950 Xtreme almost fried that card once cause for some effin reason one day it decided to ingore the fan settings and it wouldn't spin up the fans while gaming and I've only noticed it when it was already throttling due to the high temps.
Next time it was their RGB Fusion or whatever the heck which ended up having some serious conflict with the Adrenalin driver settings and it kept messing up my undervolt and fan profiles until I've uninstalled the whole thing.

Msi I have no experience with cause its been ages since I've had any hardware from them.

 

[Bill_Bright]

The point being. Not everyone is tech savvy.

True but why come to this site then if not wanting to learn?

Going out to a product's webpage and look for a driver for one's device is not some super challenging task only advanced users can do. In fact, in many cases, no action is required at all - Windows, in many cases, does the work for us (regardless our skillsets) - "IF" we just let it.

 

[bonehead123]

TLDR is that Asus have quite a few holes in their software

Well, this is NOT news, as it has been an issue for many, many years....so much so that many folks I know refer to it as "Armory Crap" !

Since you're on here frequently, I can't believe you haven't heard about it before now

 

[phanbuey]

Not just a few holes - there was an RPC daemon running on port 53000 that accepted calls from anywhere that could download and then run files from anywhere, with admin permissions, with minimal effort.... This was less of a hole and more of a landing strip.

They patched it within 10 days of report - so that's good

 

[R-T-B]

Not just a few holes - there was an RPC daemon running on port 53000 that accepted calls from anywhere that could download and then run files from anywhere, with admin permissions, with minimal effort.... This was less of a hole and more of a landing strip.

They patched it within 10 days of report - so that's good

If you had windows firewall at least it should block it by default from all but localhost, but still... jesus.

 

[AusWolf]

All motherboard software is crap. There are no exceptions.

There, it took me 20 seconds to type this on my phone. Maybe I should make a 15-minute video.

 

[Ruru]

The worst thing is that some motherboards have a setting enabled by default which makes the OS install their software automatically. Some non-experienced user will most likely just install it without questioning anything since it's the motherboard manufacturer's software.

And my bad if it's mentioned on the video, not going to watch it since the Armory Crate itself is the topic on this thread.

All motherboard software is crap. There are no exceptions.

There, it took me 20 seconds to type this on my phone. Maybe I should make a 15-minute video.

Yeah, no need for those, and aren't there universal software for RGB tuning for example?

I can't type that fast on my phone since iPhone SE is so damn small and I typo from time to time.

 

[phanbuey]

All motherboard software is crap. There are no exceptions.

There, it took me 20 seconds to type this on my phone. Maybe I should make a 15-minute video.

That’s like eating a hamburger that immediately causes all of your toes to fall off, and then saying - “well you know all junk food is bad for you, nothing new here”.

Yeah - true, but a bit different in the level of bad here.

 

[freeagent]

Well, since you put it like that..

 

[AusWolf]

That’s like eating a hamburger that immediately causes all of your toes to fall off, and then saying - “well you know all junk food is bad for you, nothing new here”.

Yeah - true, but a bit different in the level of bad here.

It's not like that at all. It's more like complaining that eating a lot of a certain candy bar makes you fat. All sweets make you fat, so there's nothing new there.

 

[freeagent]

If you install AC, to uninstall it you need to use the uninstall tool, a separate download. AC literally installs soo much shit, and runs it. Totally not needed.

Edit:

Also it is the only software that I know of that will keep memory in sync with the mobo lol..

 

[phanbuey]

If you install AC, to uninstall it you need to use the uninstall tool, a separate download. AC literally installs soo much shit, and runs it. Totally not needed.

Edit:

Also it is the only software that I know of that will keep memory in sync with the mobo lol..

try openRGB...