TPM 2.0 support and Windows 11 (intel)

As Win10 support is ending this year, I was looking to update my PC to Win 11 and came across this thread. While the intent of this sticky is good, unfortunately I find the OP to be quite inadequate. I immediately had follow-up questions, such as, what is the exact meaning of "it does not support TPM 2.0?"--does that mean natively, out of the box, the board does not have that capability built in? But what about all those TPM modules all over eBay? Are you saying that such a board will NEVER support TPM 2.0 even with such a module?

If anyone else is still looking for help with such questions, and is confused like I was, hopefully the following will clear things up.

Firstly, ASRock has a helpful page to tell you exactly which version of TPM your board is compatible with:
https://www.asrock.com.tw/mb/spec/card.asp?Model=TPM-S%20Module&cat=Support

If your board is on that list, then you need to buy the corresponding add-on TPM module to enable TPM. (Unless maybe if it's built into your CPU? It could be that the board has a discrete TPM module, but the CPU also has it built in. My guess is that could be the case for some board/CPU combos. Not sure.) The "»TPM-S Module" link lists approved modules for ASRock.

However, if my understanding is correct, TPM 1.2 and 2.0 are not compatible, and it's a hardware thing. So, I believe that means that a BIOS update can't make a board designed for 1.2 compatible with 2.0 even though the pin layout may be the same. In any case, if your board is listed in the 1.2 section in the above link, there's no point buying a TPM 2.0 module for it as it will not work!

However, TPM 1.2 is still okay for installing Win 11 with just a bit of registry tweaking.

I found a TPM 1.2 module for my H81M-HDS, and it works. If you need such a module, you better hurry because it looks like they have almost completely disappeared from the market due to low demand. The one I got is from Authikey, and it uses a different chip from the one listed by ASRock. Looks like the "officially supported" 1.2 module, with the Nuvoton chip, has been discontinued everywhere.

Here are a few articles that provide good summaries about TPM and Win11.
https://www.zdnet.com/article/why-windows-11-requires-a-tpm-and-how-to-get-around-it/
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/10/how-to-upgrade-to-windows-11-whether-your-pc-is-supported-or-not/

tonymy01 wrote: a game he plays, Valorant, demands TPM2.0 if the computer is running windows11.

Wow, that's really frustrating! Did you install Win 11 with bypassing TPM completely? Or do you have TPM 1.2 on this board?

tonymy01 wrote: So please please Asrock can you produce TPM2.0 versions of F/W for TPM1.2 motherboards?

Lol. Check my above post. There's no point in asking this. You may as well ask them to make a board for Intel CPUs compatible with AMD CPUs.