Asus A8V

[Sierra_abx]

Ooooo, good luck. Have you decided on a board yet? 939 mobos seem to be in scarce supply atm. I'm glad I bought my A8V early on. I've noticed the resellers have jacked up the price.

[:PopCorn]

Well, the Asus is still on my shortlist. I know where I can grab one, but yeah, it's been jacked up. I have nothing against the Asus VIA solution, I just wanted more choice.

I really want an Nforce 3 250 Ultra. One reason is because I like the feature set but also, there's a good chance I'm grabbing a 6800 Ultra. Since ATI has made me wait this long for a XT PE, I will have a choice between XT's & 6800 Ultras shortly. And I've read that the Nforce 3 & 6800 Ultras may have optimizations that increase performance. I think I read something about this at Anadtech a while back. So that peaks my interest. I'm getting a little tired of waiting but that isn't my fault. All the hardware companies are paper launching and providing very small quantities to the market. So since they have made me wait, I'm taking my time and I'll grab what interests me as it becomes available.

I got side-tracked over the last 2 months in my quest to overclock my 2.4c up from 3.2 on air to 3.6 on water. Once I accomplished that last week I got bored. So now the FX project has all of my attention.

[White94Cobra]

Well it appears the best o/c I can get stable now is 248x10.5. Super PI crashes on 32M with an error about 15 minutes in at anything higher, no matter what the voltage is. Even at 1.775 Vcore I can't bump the FSB up by even 1 MHz. I have lowered my Vcore to 1.6 and it seems stable. I know the CPU craps out around 2.68 GHz so either my memory won't make it higher than 248 or the motherboard won't. Since the memory is brand new OCZ PC4000, it should at least make it to 250. My CPU temps are 34-38c idle and 44-48c load (depending on whether the AC is on or not).

[Sierra_abx]

Originally Posted by White94Cobra

Well it appears the best o/c I can get stable now is 248x10.5. Super PI crashes on 32M with an error about 15 minutes in at anything higher, no matter what the voltage is. Even at 1.775 Vcore I can't bump the FSB up by even 1 MHz. I have lowered my Vcore to 1.6 and it seems stable. I know the CPU craps out around 2.68 GHz so either my memory won't make it higher than 248 or the motherboard won't. Since the memory is brand new OCZ PC4000, it should at least make it to 250. My CPU temps are 34-38c idle and 44-48c load (depending on whether the AC is on or not).

I don't think your memory is the problem, though higher VDimm would certainly help. I think the CPU is maxed out with your current cooling. 2.65 seems to be about the norm based on various user experiences. You could try using the dividers if you want a higher clock speed. But I've always believed that 1:1 is the way to go.

[White94Cobra]

What's strange though is if I lower the FSB and increase the multiplier, I can get the CPU stable up to about 2.68 (11x244). 250x10.5 is only 2.625, so the CPU should be fine. Oh well, there's very little performance difference between 248 and 250, it's just that 250 seems like a nice number to run it at

BTW - I know the 940 FX53 didn't support cool and quiet, but does the 939 FX support it?

[Sierra_abx]

Originally Posted by White94Cobra

BTW - I know the 940 FX53 didn't support cool and quite, but does the 939 FX support it?

Yes. You should see an option in the BIOS. AMD recently came out with an updated driver for Cool N Quiet. Here's a link:

http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/...1_9706,00.html

[White94Cobra]

Interesting... I did try that driver and enabled it in the BIOS, but the CPU never budged from 1200 MHz. Even if I ran Super PI and the CPU was at 100% it still showed 1200 MHz (as shown in the Asus Cool and Quiet App).

[Sierra_abx]

Yeah, I keep it disabled because I'm told Cool N Quiet changes the multiplier whenever it feels like it. Hard to run benches that way.

[Purple Lizzard]

Sierra,

sorry about the lan chip, you were lucky it was somegthing that easy and you aren't looking for a new mobo.

I heard the the newer 1006 BIOS still don't support the PCI/AGP lock is that correct? If so I assume that you are still using BigToes betas

If my chip ever get here I'm going to have to decide which mobo to purchase

[Sierra_abx]

Hi Purple Lizzard. I'm using Bigtoe's beta BIOS. It's my understanding that 1006 does not offer the lock option.

As far as which board to get, well, hard to say at this point. Gigabyte's nForce3 board is out, but the results I've seen have been mixed. It may be easier to volt mod that board. But my impression is that the stock Gigabyte board is not any faster than the stock Asus board. Also, the Gigabyte's VCore only goes up to 1.7v versus 1.8v in the Asus board.

[Purple Lizzard]

Sierra,

Thanks for all of the info on this mobo you have provided to us so far

I am glad that I don't have to decide yet. It seems damned if you do and damned if you don't. No clear winner at this time. issues on each chipset

It seems strange that a beta 1005 has the locks and the production 1006 don't. Makes you wonder

[Sierra_abx]

I think the reason for the BIOS confusion is that Asus probably did not intend to ship the boards with any working lock, which is why the official BIOS does not have that option. Thankfully there's the beta BIOS.

My guess, and this is just a guess, is that the VIA and nForce3 boards are going to all have similar performance, give or take a few MHz. I think it will come down to what features you want. But as the saying goes, only time will tell.

[Purple Lizzard]

Do you know if BigToes BIOS were hacked?

[Sierra_abx]

Originally Posted by Purple Lizzard

Do you know if BigToes BIOS where hacked?

I don't know. You could ask him. He occasionally visits ABX.

[Purple Lizzard]

Yes prior to bleeding edge and OCZ he was here all the time.

I'll post on BE