ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 - Socket 939 with PCI-E and real AGP and Socket AM2 upgrade path

[Dragonfly47]

There's another guide to mobo/processor replacement here:

http://www.theeldergeek.com/replace_motherboard.htm

If it were me, I'd backup my irretrievable stuff, and do a fresh install, but that link will walk you through the alternative. Use and XP disk slipstreamed with SP2 and it should pick up the features of your new stuff. Then add in your Win updates and driver updates.

A fresh install is ALWAYS the best practice in cases like this, however. Good luck.

 

[Gstanfor]

That's not a bad guide, not up to the standard of the Ars thread IMO. Getting the new motherboard recognised doensn't trouble me to much, should be relatively painless, as I said before though I'm more concerned with getting the cpu features correctly recognised (anyone who took their system from an original socket A athlon to an Athlon XP series and noticed SSE wasn't correctly supported without reinstalling windows will know what I'm driving at here).

 

[Araemo]

Gstanfor, I've never tried it, personally. But you may want to try following the same directions used to upgrade from single-core no-hyperthreading(IE, any single-core athlon) to a dual core and/or hyperthreading CPU. It involves forcing windows to update the CPU driver. I'm not sure how well it will work for what you want though.

(I think you would just 'update driver' and select ACPI Uniprocessor PC, and reboot?)
Edit: Doh, you're getting an X2, so you'll have to do this anyways(and select ACPI Multiprocessor PC). That MAY do it? I dunno though, it might be a completely seperate version of the HAL(I DOUBT it, but finding the correct drivers to load/unload and how to do it could be a major endeavour)

Edit: Another brainstorm. If you update the computer(HAL) driver to the multiproc driver, AND load AMD's processor/cool'n'quiet driver, that might do it for you.

I believe updating the "Computer" driver changes the HAL. Doing that alone MIGHT make it redetect your CPU's capabilities. If it doesn't, I would bet the AMD driver would do it. If that doesn't do it, I think you'll have to reinstall.

 

[Araemo]

As an aside: Has anyone successfully used A64 tweaker on this board(Preferably with a single core opteron) to enable the 150Mhz memory multiplier? That one would get my ram right back to 200 mhz, which would make me happy.. but I'm hesitant to try anything after my last experience changing the memory(though I was using the bios for that).

 

[Gstanfor]

Thanks for the info. That's roughly what I thought I'd have to do. Can you configure the cool n quiet driver? My idea of "cool n quiet" is a thermalright XP-120 heatsink/fan unit (I'm aware I'll need a metal backplate).

 

[Araemo]

Well, you can disable cool'n'quiet completely. Thats how I have my rig set up currently. I'm considering playing with one of the utilities listed in this thread:
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=28&threadid=1809980&enterthread=y

but.. well.. this system is 5C(Load)-15C(idle) cooler than my last one, and about the same loudness, so.. I'm not terribly motivated.

I did find my answer to my previous question: A64Tweaker works. The 0.60Beta has the 150Mhz divider listed directly, and my ram is now purring along at 200.2 Mhz w/ 267 LDT. I boot w/ the 133 divider though for safety, which runs my ram at 172Mhz.

Installing the AMD Driver and disabling Cool'N'Quiet in the bios has 0 downsides as far as I'm aware? But I don't know of any upsides either. ;P When I Had cool'n'quiet installed w/ my CPU at stock clock, cool'n'quiet didn't even seem to kick in unless I changed the Windows power control panel to something other than 'desktop'(Like max battery).

I suppose the driver might have kicked in if I ever had a power outage and was running off battery, and that would be rather cool, but I didn't do extensive testing. ;P anyone know if there are any actual advantages to the AMD CPU driver if you don't want cool'n'quiet?

 

[Gstanfor]

Can someone confirm that this motherboard will run Opteron cpu's? I have Rev 1.05 of the board and I'm tossing up between A64 X2 4400+ $725AU, Opteron 175 dual core $799AU and the A64 X2 4800+ $970AU

The X2 4400+ is a good price (all prices are australian), but I don't like that it only has 512kb of L2 cache per core. The Opteron has 2mb and the X2 4800+ has 1mb per core.

Thoughts and opinions welcomed.

 

[Araemo]

The opteron only has 1M per core. It's probably the best deal for you.

I have an opteron 144 on mine, and it detects it properly.

Heres the official CPU support list:
http://www.asrock.com/support/CPU_Support/show.asp?Model=939Dual-SATA2

 

[Gstanfor]

Thanks for that, the parts supplier I was looking at must have gotten the cache size incorrect for the opteron.

 

[Jacksn]

100% Compatible w/ the Socket 939 Opteron series!

 

[SynthDude2001]

bump for new BIOS info

 

[DanK414]

Can anyone tell me how to up the HTT to 300? Or can it be done? I have the 1.5ver bios. I can't go higher than 270.... Using Opteron 165 @ 2.44ghz at 1.2volts. I need more HTT.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: DanK414
Can anyone tell me how to up the HTT to 300? Or can it be done? I have the 1.5ver bios. I can't go higher than 270.... Using Opteron 165 @ 2.44ghz at 1.2volts. I need more HTT.

The surest way is to use OCWB1 or OCWB2 (there will be a few warm boot issues, but it should still work - I've successfully booted at 300x9 before on OCWB1/2). On the more recent offical BIOS releases (1.2 and newer), there seems to be what's known as the "274 Lock".

If you look at the bottom of the first post, I've mentioned a possible workaround for >274 HTT on official BIOSes, but I can't guarantee that it'll work (it's worth a try though, it's not like it could mess anything up). Basically, you set the CPU-NB Link speed down to 200MHz (1x), and people on another forum claim that this mostly fixes the non-boot problem at high HTT speeds.

 

[Araemo]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
If you look at the bottom of the first post, I've mentioned a possible workaround for >274 HTT on official BIOSes, but I can't guarantee that it'll work (it's worth a try though, it's not like it could mess anything up). Basically, you set the CPU-NB Link speed down to 200MHz (1x), and people on another forum claim that this mostly fixes the non-boot problem at high HTT speeds.

Will setting it THAT low have a negative impact on system bandwidth? Disk and network bandwidth?

I know memory bandwidth will be uneffected, and the difference between 800 and 1000 is negligible, but that's a much lower level... Anyone feel like doing it and doing some testing?

 

[DanK414]

yah i forgot about that well at least i have it working at 2.47 at 274htt....

OCWB1&2 are the beta versions right?

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: Araemo

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
If you look at the bottom of the first post, I've mentioned a possible workaround for >274 HTT on official BIOSes, but I can't guarantee that it'll work (it's worth a try though, it's not like it could mess anything up). Basically, you set the CPU-NB Link speed down to 200MHz (1x), and people on another forum claim that this mostly fixes the non-boot problem at high HTT speeds.

Will setting it THAT low have a negative impact on system bandwidth? Disk and network bandwidth?

I know memory bandwidth will be uneffected, and the difference between 800 and 1000 is negligible, but that's a much lower level... Anyone feel like doing it and doing some testing?

One of the members/admins of another forum did a few tests here. His conclusion was that setting the link speed that low really doesn't affect bandwidth or performance in any meaningful way. I've not yet been able to verify that for myself, but it's something to try anyway.

Originally posted by: DanK414
yah i forgot about that well at least i have it working at 2.47 at 274htt....

OCWB1&2 are the beta versions right?

Yes, those are the beta versions (the early ones anyway) - here's a link to OCWB2.

 

[Araemo]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
One of the members/admins of another forum did a few tests here. His conclusion was that setting the link speed that low really doesn't affect bandwidth or performance in any meaningful way. I've not yet been able to verify that for myself, but it's something to try anyway.

Thanks for the link - The first post's tests are worthless. Why would the CPU or memory bandwidth change at all if you leave the CPU speed and memory speed the same?

The test at the end of the thread is more useful. HD bandwidth isn't affected, but it looks like his video card starts saturating the CPU->NB link at that speed. That would be unacceptable for my usage. :/

Edit: Read more of that thread. The 400 mhz divider works too? The 200 mhz looks like it hampers his X800... but if you can double the bandwidth, it should fix that and still have some overhead.. that might be worth trying.

 

[nJett]

just got my mobo/CPU replacement installed - ASRock 939DUAL & A64 3000+ - it was one of the easiest I've ever done, everything went smoothly. Only issue was my RAM detected at 333mhz, bumped it to 400mhz without issue though and changed a few other BIOS settings. Next step is to see how far I can OC, this is my first A64 so I'm excited. So far this board seems awesome, amazing it's a "value" mobo!

 

[DanK414]

BTW I never really thanked you SynthDude2001! Yah, the CPU-NB Link
Speed definately helped me unlock my HTT~ I'm running my Opteron 165@ 2.71 ^^ at 1.35volt haha*stock* need to run Prime95..... Hope it works.

Now need to ask this question. I'm having issues with my video card. Running a 9800pro 256mb. I read the all the posts and I know I'm supposed to keep it at 64mb in bios. But anytime I load a game it dies about 5-10min mark. So I changed it to 128, 256mb and the screen goes blank at 10-15min mark. I know it's the video card that's killing it and nothing else. Can it be something to do with power supply?

Please helpful suggestions only guys, but please HELP. I'm still just a newb.

 

[Gronich]

I ran my 9800pro for 2 months with no problem (upgraded to a 7800gt - also ignore my signature I will update it soon). I would suggest it is your power supply having experienced the same problem a number of times of the last 15 years - I'm currently using a 480Watt PSU with my X2 3800+ clocked at 2.7Ghz.

 

[Araemo]

Originally posted by: DanK414
BTW I never really thanked you SynthDude2001! Yah, the CPU-NB Link
Speed definately helped me unlock my HTT~ I'm running my Opteron 165@ 2.71 ^^ at 1.35volt haha*stock* need to run Prime95..... Hope it works.

Now need to ask this question. I'm having issues with my video card. Running a 9800pro 256mb. I read the all the posts and I know I'm supposed to keep it at 64mb in bios. But anytime I load a game it dies about 5-10min mark. So I changed it to 128, 256mb and the screen goes blank at 10-15min mark. I know it's the video card that's killing it and nothing else. Can it be something to do with power supply?

Please helpful suggestions only guys, but please HELP. I'm still just a newb.

Make sure you have spread spectrum enabled in the bios.

When I disabled spread spectrum, my 9700 pro became VERY unstable. I was actually able to fix the instability by uninstalling the drivers... but as soon as I reinstalled them, it became unstable again. Turning spread spectrum back on fixed that.

 

[Creig]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: DanK414
Can anyone tell me how to up the HTT to 300? Or can it be done? I have the 1.5ver bios. I can't go higher than 270.... Using Opteron 165 @ 2.44ghz at 1.2volts. I need more HTT.

The surest way is to use OCWB1 or OCWB2 (there will be a few warm boot issues, but it should still work - I've successfully booted at 300x9 before on OCWB1/2). On the more recent offical BIOS releases (1.2 and newer), there seems to be what's known as the "274 Lock".

If you look at the bottom of the first post, I've mentioned a possible workaround for >274 HTT on official BIOSes, but I can't guarantee that it'll work (it's worth a try though, it's not like it could mess anything up). Basically, you set the CPU-NB Link speed down to 200MHz (1x), and people on another forum claim that this mostly fixes the non-boot problem at high HTT speeds.

There's a new Beta OC BIOS available now (OCW Beta 7) that does not have the 274MHZ HTT limitation.

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2006/asrock/bios/bios.htm

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: Creig

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: DanK414
Can anyone tell me how to up the HTT to 300? Or can it be done? I have the 1.5ver bios. I can't go higher than 270.... Using Opteron 165 @ 2.44ghz at 1.2volts. I need more HTT.

The surest way is to use OCWB1 or OCWB2 (there will be a few warm boot issues, but it should still work - I've successfully booted at 300x9 before on OCWB1/2). On the more recent offical BIOS releases (1.2 and newer), there seems to be what's known as the "274 Lock".

If you look at the bottom of the first post, I've mentioned a possible workaround for >274 HTT on official BIOSes, but I can't guarantee that it'll work (it's worth a try though, it's not like it could mess anything up). Basically, you set the CPU-NB Link speed down to 200MHz (1x), and people on another forum claim that this mostly fixes the non-boot problem at high HTT speeds.

There's a new Beta OC BIOS available now (OCW Beta 7) that does not have the 274MHZ HTT limitation.

http://www.ocworkbench.com/2006/asrock/bios/bios.htm

Thanks for the update, this may be what we've all been looking for (and I'll add the link to the first post)

I imagine it's based on the latest official BIOS 1.7?

 

[SynthDude2001]

Wow! I just flashed to OCWB7 and I'm amazed. Booting at >274HTT (even over 300) looks like it works perfectly now, no cold/warm boot problems. I could boot right up at 270x10, 280x10, 311x9, etc. I'm pretty sure I can get my overclock a bit higher than 2.6 now, I just need to find a setting that doesn't run my RAM faster than it can handle (but also not below 200MHz).

Overall I'm very impressed, I think everyone should upgrade to this BIOS right now

 

[Araemo]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001
Wow! I just flashed to OCWB7 and I'm amazed. Booting at >274HTT (even over 300) looks like it works perfectly now, no cold/warm boot problems. I could boot right up at 270x10, 280x10, 311x9, etc. I'm pretty sure I can get my overclock a bit higher than 2.6 now, I just need to find a setting that doesn't run my RAM faster than it can handle (but also not below 200MHz).

Overall I'm very impressed, I think everyone should upgrade to this BIOS right now

*Drool*

Very tempting, but at the same time, I am rather cautious to touch this motherboard again.

If it gets me running at 300x8 (or something like that) it could be worth it though.