All kinds of problems with the GA-P35-DS3L Rev 2.0

[Mikie46]

I'm so burnt out on this board already. Burnt out because of all the problems it has caused me since purching it from Newegg.

I purchased this board, along with a new sata HD, Power suppy, Ram, Graphics card, E8400 Wolfdale etc which has cost me just over 700 bucks. The biggest hurdle is this damn board. The first one was DOA. Spent a week waiting for a replacement. Once i received the replacement board it would refuse to power up. I say, the powersupply, and the entire computer refused to come up after connecting the POWER SW header. I played with it for 4hrs trying to get it too start when i finally said TO HELL WITH IT and decided to start dissambling it. Well at least the first board i sent back came alive but didnt post.

As soon as i removed two of the mounting bolts the whole thing came to life. Whats up with that? Then, with the power connector still plugged in a reseated the board and completed the installation.

While seating the board i accidently pulled on the Northbridge and I thought it was going to come off the board. What a flimsy installation of the Nortbridge i must say. It seemed like it was still partly secured so i left it.

After installing my new E8400 and powered up the unit i noticed the floppy drive power led still on. Hmm. I dont think it takes a genius to work out how to connect a floppy drive to system but i checked it anyway. Once, twice and three times. The power led is still on and refuses to go off. Not only that, the cd that came with the motherboard is completely unreadable. I had to revert to downloading the drivers from the Gigabyte website but im not convinced i have everything. Still, im pissed as hell about it because its something important that really should be working.

I still need to flash the bios to support my E8400 though. How can i do it if i dont have access to a floppy drive? Since the light is always on and the bios version is F7 i really need to at least flash to the next bios version F7a.

I also purchased this drive. http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16822136073 According to the reviews this sata drive, the first sata drive I'v owned, is supposed to be extremely quit. Every so often there is an annoying clicking sound coming from this drive. IS THIS NORMAL? Hell, my IDE drive is quieter than this drive. Click, click and more clicks and its annoying enough to write about it. As another reviewed it only formats 465GB! I know that you generally loose a little on a new drive, but 35 GB!! GASP.

All in all, i have had nothing but frustration with this board. If i can get the floppy drive led to go away so i can use it i might be able to flash my bio for my CPU type. And the clicking sound from the drive, well i have no idea if this is normal or not.

Thanks

 

[Qbah]

The DS3L model is the Lite model (ie. cheapest, maybe they use a bit worse components?). As for the booting up, perhaps your motherboard-to-case mounting screws are not evenly screwed in? And the board was bent alot when you fastened everything? And a DOA arrival can mean everything, maybe the mailman was playing a rugby match with your box? And how can you 'accidentaly pull on the northbridge'? A motherboard is a highly technical, sophisticated device, you really need to treat it like one when you're installing it. And not play with it like with a pizza cake

As for the drive, it's a drive issue. A motherboard has nothing to do with how loud a HD operates. Be it IDE or SATA.

As for the floppy drive, the light is always on until the drive does a self test during POST. At least that was the case years back, when I had one. Can't you use a USB drive to flash the BIOS? I think there's an option for that, though you need to get to BIOS for that Doesn't the board start at all? Or is the CPU wrongly indentified? If everything fails you can buy the cheapest LGA775 CPU (even an oldie Celeron 400 series works) and then just sell it, yeah it is a hastle, but there's no way around it I'm afraid. Or perhaps one of your friends has one that's supported with your BIOS and is willing to borrow it for a few hours?

 

[Mikie46]

The entire system is up and running but the floppy drive light is still lit. Apart from the clicking of the drive, yes i know its not a board issue but i thought i would throw that in, its all up. I just need to find out why the floppy drive is lit. Should i send the board back again based on being unable to use the floppy drive? Howabout the unreadable CD? And i dont like the HD clicking. Sounds like the drive is about the go.

 

[Qbah]

Did you turn the floppy drive on in BIOS? I don't think they're detected and turned on automatically. As for the CD, everything on it is older than the download stuff on the Gigabyte site, so I don't think it's worth it if you manage to start the floppy up.

Too bad for teh HD though, never had that myself Lucky me... Or perhaps the mailman is less than delicate with the stuff he drives around?

EDIT: 465GB is correct, the manufacturer states 500GB (500 x 1GB, ie. 500 x 1000 x 1000 x 1000) but in reality it's: 465 x 1024 x 1024 x 1024 = 499GB 500GB just sounds better than 465 but both of them are correct

 

[Winterpool]

Dang. I was choosing between this and the Abit IP35-E a couple of months ago. Went with the latter to save $30, but now I wonder if that was a lucky choice for me in other ways. I still recommend the GA-P35-DS3L to punters building budget P35 systems, but I do seem to read more and more complaints. Have there been many problems with rev 2.0? If this board is no longer dependable, then there may no longer be any qualite P35 options under $100.

I definitely wouldn't depend on that SATA drive. Audible annoying clicking means something is certainly not right. Run manufacturer physical disk scan and then RMA.

Ah, I see Qbah has beaten me to it: 465 GB is the number when we count 'binary'. To end this confusion, IEC would actually prefer us to call that 465 Gibibytes, as 'giga-' is a decimal prefix. So, 500 GB = 465 GiB, or something like that. Unfortunately, almost no one in the real world uses the 'official' binary prefixes save Linux developers: the decimal prefixes are too ingrained, and 'gibi-', 'mebi-', etc unfortunately sound rather ridiculous to Anglo-Saxon ears. Personally I think it would have been easier for the drive manufacturers to convert to binary rather than shift the usage of hundreds of millions of English speakers and computer users.

 

[imported_dorian]

Sorry to hear that, I also got a GA-P35-DS3L 2.0 and E8400 from newegg and had no problems (didn't even need to update the BIOS, it recognized the CPU from the box), and the driver CD works too..

About the floppy light staying on.. did you connect the floppy power cable upside-down?

 

[alfa147x]

Originally posted by: dorian
Sorry to hear that, I also got a GA-P35-DS3L 2.0 and E8400 from newegg and had no problems (didn't even need to update the BIOS, it recognized the CPU from the box), and the driver CD works too..

About the floppy light staying on.. did you connect the floppy power cable upside-down?

same here

 

[JasonandBecky]

The CD that came with your motherboard is a DVD. That would be why it was "unreadable". It says its a DVD right on it.

I do not understand how its the motherboards fault you yanked on the northbridge? Maybe I am missing something there.

Floppy light staying on is normally from having the cable upside down, or your floppy could be bad.

As far as your HDD, it sounds like it might be bad.

 

[ronach]

I assembled a sys with this mobo about a month ago..the install went just fine..same f7 bios as you. I didn't even have to re-install XP..coming from a via chipset mobo..just un-installed all the old mobo drivers..went into the registry and deleted all the via entries..shut her down and installed the DS3L. The boot up process found all the new stuff..then installed the Gigibyte software that I had downloaded previously. Must have been lucky..all my previous builds were not all fault free..most..but not all. The other guys are on to your most likely problem with your floppy..for your info the data ribbon cables red stripe should be toward the power connector. If you have failing eyes like me, it is easy to get a floppy connector cable on backwards or put the data cable on and fail to notice that you have either bent a connector pin..or missed one complete row of pins while putting the cable connector onto the floppy unit.

This mobo is easy to O/C if one doesn't push the envelope and rush the job. My sys is at 3.1 gig now on air..default heatsink..she is stable and running my games much faster than my old Via VSTA build. I am happy with my DS3L.

 

[rothchilds]

bummer. I just picked up this board from zipzoomfly open bos for $55 shipped, couldn't beat it to pair with my e8400. I have been running gigabyte mobos for the last 3 years, and have always had good results with them.

I am using the board with the bios revision that shipped with no problems. If you need to flash, they have a nifty little online update process available thru @bios.

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: JasonandBecky
The CD that came with your motherboard is a DVD. That would be why it was "unreadable". It says its a DVD right on it.

I do not understand how its the motherboards fault you yanked on the northbridge? Maybe I am missing something there.

Floppy light staying on is normally from having the cable upside down, or your floppy could be bad.

As far as your HDD, it sounds like it might be bad.

Sometimes you just have to wonder? Just yesterday, My cup holder broke. That little tray just wouldn't come out? Kept pushing the button, but its just plain broken

 

[kpo6969]

I purchased the same board and cpu from Newegg 3 weeks ago.
Mobo was rev 2.0 with F7 bios
E8400 booted right up with the F7 bios even though F8a is the update for Wolfdale.

 

[Michel Joseph Cardin]

I'm aware of this post is old but I needed to mention that I still use it since approx 2006 or so and it never screwed up on me with a quad core that I even made my dried up paste moist again by adding veg. oil or margarine or something like that.

 

[DigDog]

i kept my GA P35 until 2014 ...