8rda3+ concerns...

[phill9700]

hi guys
I have a 8rda3+ board and im having a few teething problems with it..
when my girl friend had the board, she was getting no end of problems when she was running the board at 11 x 166 (with corsair xms 3200 LL memory) @ 1.55vcore as everytime she was loading up the pc, it would crash.
well after figuring out what the problem was motherboard monitor 5.3.2.0 version, its now seeming ok, but nothing special..
whilst playing about with it seeing how high it will go fsb wise, i managed to get it to 222fsb (i think) and now it seems to have problems trying to manage 10.5 x 200fsb.. why would this be happening?
i also have a 8rda+ board and that was limited to 190fsb because of the stepping on it.. was A2 or something.. but the 8rda3+ was meant to be better because of this C1 stepping.. is this correct?
my girl friend is now using the same cpu as before, but with a nf7-s rev 2 board and is working at a lovely 10.5 x 200fsb.. which i couldnt get close with the 8rda3+ board.. is something majorly wrong or have i just got a cpu problem?
should i consider getting rid of both boards and trying another nf7-s board or what about this DFI lan party board i read great things about from amandtech as i did on both the epox boards i seem to be pretty limited by.. what does anyone recommend? some advice/views if people have the same board/problems would be really nice to hear.
thanks for the help, for a really annoying problem..

 

[AngryGames]

I have just read over at HardOCP that they too are having mixed results with overclocking this board. Seems that half the time, ppl are not able to get much more than a 10Mhz overclock on the FSB without it going belly-up.

I bought the 8RDA3+ because of some good reviews, and it was my first NForce2 motherboard ever. And it was nothing but problem after problem after problem, until I finally returned it and got the DFI LanParty KT400A (awesome board, but its still not an NF2). Mainly the problems were memory (it hated every stick I put in it except for some cheap CAS2.5 Crucial...???), couldn't get it to overclock at all once I got it running...and the NF2 drivers crashed everything.

I am pretty sure a new BIOS could fix a lot of the problems with it, or a new revision.

what cpu are you running btw? I can get 2.01Ghz without even touching the FSB on a 2500Barton (won't know the core/stepping until tomorrow when i pull it to put it in the NF2), and plenty of guys are getting excellent o'c's out of these cpus.

There are some reports from the AMDMB forumers about Barton2500's and how theres a few that just won't run higher than 2.1Ghz without some sort of problems, yet the T-Bird "B" 2600's and such are still monster overclockers =/

dunno if any of this helps, but its another former 8RDA3+ owner's opinion at least!

 

[AngryGames]

oops double post sorry =(

 

[Peter D]

well i just checked out the review for the board over at [ H ] and they said overclocking with it was quite an issue, it was really swing or miss. They couldnt even maintain a stable 10mhz overclock! :Q

Linkage to the review...

 

[SpideyCU]

Originally posted by: AngryGames
There are some reports from the AMDMB forumers about Barton2500's and how theres a few that just won't run higher than 2.1Ghz without some sort of problems, yet the T-Bird "B" 2600's and such are still monster overclockers =/

I'm assuming you mean T-bred. I'd be floored if you got any Thunderbirds up to 2600.

Anyhow, I'd give this board a month or two to stabilize on the BIOS updates/drivers and then check back...but that's more advice for people who haven't bought it yet. All I can say at the moment is that it's up to you to decide if it's worth it to wait it out.

 

[phill9700]

i have just updated the bios and it seems to be working 'ok', but when it comes to overclocking its just pooh...
the best i can get out of the cpu thats in there at the moment and the board is 10 x 200.. anything more just goes completely pete tong..
on my 8rda+ i used to be able to get 190 x 12.5 which was a real monster of an overclock, but now im stuck with it at 11.5 x 190 @ 1.55vcore which i dont think is too bad, im getting 100% cpu usage and its upto 46C.. which i didnt think was too bad...
i did read the same review at hardcop, they said they hadnt even bothered with overclocking it because of all the mixed reviews they have had when reading through a few threads in forums...
i like the barton 2500 idea myself, its just a question of what motherboard to try that in...

 

[phill9700]

i am just using a 'special' xp1700 which like i said i can get to work at 190 x 11.5 in the 8rda+ i have, but in the 8rda3+ board, i cant get the darn thing to work over 10 x 200... so annoying!! its ment to be a better board as well!!

im just aiming for a cool 200 fsb and whatever speed i can get from it..
im doing live capture and i need the speed to help capture at better quality as otherwise theres no real point in me doing it!! although saying that, im told anything over a 1ghz is meant to be ok... (i have no idea.. i just like number over 2.xxx ghz!!)
thanks for all the help so far!! at least its not just me!! (but thats a bad thing!!)