$80 Gigabyte GA-8SRX, 1.6a, now 2.41 Ghz!

[dAv]

Not bad for an $80 MB
Only flaw so far - the temp monitor is not working right. It reads anywhere from 3C to 255C.
Still doing stress test with prime 95 but here's the story:

Gigabyte GA-8SRX from MWave.com
1.6a retail fan from MScomponet.com for $148
(Malay, 1/12/02, batch L147B201-0961)
Artic Alumina
1.60V
Crucial 256MB 2.5 PC2100 Auto settings (Sandra says 2.5-2-3CL)
FSB 150
Ram 125
AGP 62
PCI 31

Other hardware:
Evercase with Enhance 300W & side fan
WD 100GB 2MB cache (Sam's club $119 AR)
ATI AIW Radeon
Win 98se
Iomega 12X10X32
Belkin 10/100 NIC ($.81 from Dell)

Sisoft Sandra 2002
Dhrystone 4228 Mips
Whetstone FPU/iSSE2 1392/2692 MFlops

I went a little conservative with the Ram and bus speeds, I'll try inching them up later
if these settings hold.



Update

Ran Prime95 for 5 hrs, set Ram to 150, AGP to 75 and PCI to 37.
New Drystone 4250
New Whetstone 1398/2890
So far so good!

Update

Highest stable FSB is 151 - 2415Ghz
Drystone 4524
Whetstone 1447/2978

 

[WetWilly]

Not bad at all. Couple of questions for you - does that board have adjustable DDR voltage? Also, in what steps are the multipliers adjustable - 1MHz or is there a pre-defined table of values?

 

[dAv]

The DDR, AGP and PCI voltage can be adusted +.01v .02v and .03 independent of each other.
CPU clock is adustable 100-200 1Mhz at a time
The DRAM, AGP and PCI can be adusted up or down independently, with the CPU
clock setting affecting the ratios. For instance:
CPU 150
DRAM 300 250 225 200 187 150 125 120 112 107
AGP AUTO(?) 100 75 60 50
PCI AUTO 37 30 25

CPU 100
DRAM 202 176 166 151 141 133 126 121 100 88 84 80 75 72
AGP AUTO 66 50
PCI AUTO 33 28 25

VCORE is adustable up to 1.85v

 

[WetWilly]

Thanks for the info - those are definitely some interesting DDR speeds. Sounds pretty good, and Gigabyte is supposed to be using the A2 stepping of the 645 as well, which should mean slightly better performance than most other 645 boards.

 

[Insane3D]

Just ordered the exact same combo. Looks like a good setup. I've two sticks of Crucial that will do 160mhz+ @ 2.7v. I'll post my results when I get it all setup.

 

[WetWilly]

Yeah, I'm kind of leaning toward this combo too. I particularly like the fact that you don't have to decode divider ratios.

BTW, either dAv or Insane3D (when you get your combo in) - does the CPU temperature reading work properly? Looks like it doesn't in the MSI 645 Ultra and possibly the Asus P4S333.

 

[Insane3D]

WetWilly -

I'll let you know when I get everything in by Wednesday or so. I just got done getting a Iwill XP333-R up to a 188mhz FSB @ CL2 so now I wanted to try something different. Pretty much done it all with the AMD CPU's..hehe.

 

[WetWilly]

Pretty much done it all with the AMD CPU's..hehe

Hmmm ... by the looks of things, I'd say that AMD is waiting for you to get over "Northwood Fever" to introduce Thoroughbred

 

[zzzz]

I also took the plunge and ordered the GA-8SRX and 1.6A today..Will keep me occupied till Tbreds are in the market..

 

[Insane3D]

LOL..maybe. The P4 was never very attractive to me before, but the 1.6ghz Northy is pretty nice. I didn't really have to pay for the mobo since I just sold a 8K7A+ for $80, and that covered the Gigabyte. I also already had a couple of Crucial sticks hanging around that will do 160mhz+. So $150 for a 2.4ghz machine was too good not to try. I did choose the Sis645 chipset though so I haven't fully converted.

I find it funny that most people are jumping on the i845D, but to me the Sis645 seemed to be a nicer chipset. I was going ot go with the Epox, but I could not find any concrete evidence on how their bus speeds are adjusted..or even if they are for that matter.

 

[WetWilly]

I did choose the Sis645 chipset though so I haven't fully converted.

What???!!!! You didn't pick a P4X266 board??? You're obviously one of those VIA haters with delusions of PCI latency issues. And you just came off a ALi Magik board. That proves it.

I find it funny that most people are jumping on the i845D, but to me the Sis645 seemed to be a nicer chipset.

Exactly. Plus the 845D-645 price differential can be invested in 1/2 stick of DDR 333 RAM or goes a ways toward moving from a 1.6A to a 1.8A. The only thing the 845D boards offer is the AGP/PCI lock at 66/33MHz. I was also looking at the Epox 4SDA+ since $99 with RAID was tempting; only thing is that Epox hasn't put the manuals (or BIOS updates if they were needed) up for any of their P4 DDR boards. Gigabyte has the manuals and 4 BIOS revisions up already; they've also released both SDR and DDR versions of their 645 board. Seems like Gigabyte is more on the ball with the 645.

Epox does have adjustable FSB speeds (100 to 200MHz in 1MHz increments); the big thing Epox has over Gigabyte is the voltages are adjustable higher - way higher - both AGP and DDR can be adjusted up to +0.7v. I still haven't seen anything that states how the dividers are implemented/selected. I guess Epox is too busy releasing new boards to support "old" boards.

Speaking of divider selections, Abit really gets the "Most Overcomplicated BIOS Option" award with the SD7-533's divider selections. At the minimum they should ship a handheld calculator with each mobo to figure out the dividers.

 

[Insane3D]

"What???!!!! You didn't pick a P4X266 board??? You're obviously one of those VIA haters with delusions of PCI latency issues."

Ahh, the PCI Latency thing. I find doing two things fixes any lack of bandwith on my KT266A boards. Adjusting the PCI latency from 32 to 96 and disabling "PCI Delay Transaction"... I haven't heard too much good about Via's P4 DDR boards..

 

[WetWilly]

Insane3d

One more thing ... I'll assume you check under the system chipset heatsink for grease/tape before you mount the board. If you do, could you check which stepping of the 645 northbridge you got on the Gigabyte (A0/A1/A2)?

Thanks.

 

[Insane3D]

Oh yeah... I always do that. I was surprised the Iwill NB HSF was bare underneath. Also, the XP333's orb-style HSF may look cool, but functionally it is pretty cheesey. I'll write down the complete numbers on the chip.

 

[WetWilly]

Thanks.

XP333's orb-style HSF may look cool, but functionally it is pretty cheesey

Yeah, I'd heard those were a joke. Thought it was rather amusing that Iwill was selling them separately to users (KK/KD/KA series?) who got passive heatsinks on their board and wanted orb-style cooling.

 

[dAv]

Holding 151-151-75-37 for 2415Ghz. Running prime95 and copying TV to hard drive at the same time, no problems aside from erratic temp sensor. Heatsink very cool to the touch.
Overclockers.com's CPU database has a GA-8SRX running 2560 at 1.65v with stock heatsink!
I can't go any higher at 1.60v and 2.5 DDR.
Is there any point underclocking the RAM to get a higher FSB?

 

[WetWilly]

no problems aside from erratic temp sensor

How erratic is the temp sensor?

Overclockers.com's CPU database has a GA-8SRX running 2560 at 1.65v with stock heatsink!
I can't go any higher at 1.60v and 2.5 DDR.

Have you tried upping the voltage? Most of those high-end overclocks are at 1.65-1.8v.

Is there any point underclocking the RAM to get a higher FSB?

Probably depends on what you're doing and how far you can push the CPU with underclocked RAM. From that database 2560-2600 is the high end for air-cooled 1.6As. I'm not sure that an extra 100MHz of CPU speed would offset the inefficiencies (for lack of a better term) of running the memory bus async.

 

[golfreak]

Thanx for all the INFOs dAv....I've been deciding for weeks to see which board to get for my 1.6A but I think I will settle on this Gigabyte GA-8SRX.

Lots of options and only $7 more than the MSI 645ultra and this board Vcore can go up t0 1.85.

BTW, you're being to conservative....bump the Vcore beyond 1.60 and see how high you can get that CPU running.
And hows the on-board sound ?? I know its not the C-media but its should be better than the old AC97

 

[dAv]

golfreak
I just installed my Sound Blaster 5.1, don't know how the onboard sound is.
Even with the Vcore up to 1.80 and the DDR bus underclocked, it won't boot
over 153 FSB.
I think I discovered a small quirk, if you try to shut down and reset the FSB
and reboot right away, the I think the CPU gets hotter for lack of fan for a minute or so
after shutdown. I know this happens to a car after you turn it off.
After playing with the FSB settings, I couldn't reboot back to 151!
I let it sit for a couple of minutes to cool down and then it booted normally
at 151 again. My computer has been working all day, I will try to put up my FSB
from a cold start later and see if I can get any higher.

WetWilly
The temp sensor is useless. It goes from 2C to 255c and anywhere in between.
By the way, the VCore voltage can be adusted down to 1.10! Don't know what
you could use that for.
Also, the USB works fine.

 

[WetWilly]

Even with the Vcore up to 1.80 and the DDR bus underclocked, it won't boot over 153 FSB

Have you tried upping the DDR voltage? Also, have you overclocked that RAM before so you'd know if it's capable of more than 153? Guess we can wait and see what Insane3D hits with his pending rig.

The temp sensor is useless

Wonder if there's any 645 board that has a functional/marginally accurate CPU temp sensor?

 

[Insane3D]

According to Fedex..my stuff will be here tomorrow..

 

[dAv]

WetWilly
I set the DDR clock to 125, I don't think the Ram is the problem.

 

[WetWilly]

I set the DDR clock to 125, I don't think the Ram is the problem.

OK, one down...

I think the CPU gets hotter for lack of fan for a minute or so after shutdown. I know this happens to a car after you turn it off.

You should be able to check this by touching the heatsink. Between the IHS and the heatsink, the CPU shouldn't get that hot that quickly. If that were the case, the heatsink would have to be rather hot to the touch. Of course it's times like these that a functional temp sensor would be nice.

What about the PCI and AGP buses? What speed were those set to?

 

[golfreak]

Placed my order at Mwave today and it has already been shipped out. $239 shipped with a 1.6A.

Lots of features for a board that cost only $80.
Oh well, If I don't likie like, it'll just cost me 15%.

 

[dAv]

With the DDR set to 125, the AGP was 62 and the PCI was 31.
I just don't think this chip will go much higher.
I can live with 2415 Ghz
I see a lot of people with 1.8a chip having problems going over 2.4Ghz.