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

[radeonboy]

Okay hi guys,

I just did the VID4 vcore mod with solder. Everything went smoothly, I triple checked and I know I did it correctly.

Now my problem is that IT DOESNT WORK FOR ME! I am using OCWBETA2 bios and I set the CPU vcore to 1.1v in the BIOS. It booted into Windows, I checked with the latest CPUZ software and it said 1.1V!!!

Now what the heck is wrong???

 

[teiresias]

Well, I think I'm going to end up just buying new RAM for this mobo. One of my 512MB OCZ sticks works fine, but the other is flakey, and always gives me about 2000+ errors at the end of Test #5 in memtest86. Unless I were to rip out my entire system and rebuild my old one using my NF7-Sv2 there's not way for me to test if the stick has gone bad between the builds or if it's just a compatibility issue with the Asrock. I can use the functioning 512MB stick in a build from my own hardware for my brother.

In any case, looking at DDR prices it seems like the most reasonable thing is to get a 2GB DDR kit, but which one? Does anyone have any recommendations considering what they're running on this mobo in terms of memory? I'd prefer not to have another bit of possible compatibility issues if I can help it. Thanks guys.

[EDIT] Well, I ended up just buying a G. Skill 2GB kit, the one here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820231047 . Crossing my fingers.

 

[DarkManX4lf]

so does this board support x2 processors? and does this support extra usb ports, like the ones that are in front of cases?

 

[teiresias]

yes and yes

 

[Navid]

Originally posted by: radeonboy
Okay hi guys,

I just did the VID4 vcore mod with solder. Everything went smoothly, I triple checked and I know I did it correctly.

Now my problem is that IT DOESNT WORK FOR ME! I am using OCWBETA2 bios and I set the CPU vcore to 1.1v in the BIOS. It booted into Windows, I checked with the latest CPUZ software and it said 1.1V!!!

CPU-Z version 1.35 does not show the voltage correctly.
Try version 1.33.1.

 

[JM Aggie08]

Originally posted by: Navid

Originally posted by: radeonboy
Okay hi guys,

I just did the VID4 vcore mod with solder. Everything went smoothly, I triple checked and I know I did it correctly.

Now my problem is that IT DOESNT WORK FOR ME! I am using OCWBETA2 bios and I set the CPU vcore to 1.1v in the BIOS. It booted into Windows, I checked with the latest CPUZ software and it said 1.1V!!!

CPU-Z version 1.35 does not show the voltage correctly.
Try version 1.33.1.

QFT

 

[DarkManX4lf]

well i just ordered one hopefully it should come by this week...purchased it from newegg...

i got another question...the AM2/ddr2 card upgrade...i know it will be in a tight position but is it poosible to fit something like a TTBT on it ?

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
well i just ordered one hopefully it should come by this week...purchased it from newegg...

i got another question...the AM2/ddr2 card upgrade...i know it will be in a tight position but is it poosible to fit something like a TTBT on it ?

My guess is no (but I don't know for sure). Are you actually going to use the AM2 card?

 

[genghis9021]

Hi, first post.

I'm pretty happy with this board. Super stable at 2.53 GHz with a gig of RAM. Using an X800XT PE AGP board and a Raptor for the boot disk.

I have ONE small problem.

The IDE light on my Antec P160 won't light with this board ! ? !

 

[DarkManX4lf]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
well i just ordered one hopefully it should come by this week...purchased it from newegg...

i got another question...the AM2/ddr2 card upgrade...i know it will be in a tight position but is it poosible to fit something like a TTBT on it ?

My guess is no (but I don't know for sure). Are you actually going to use the AM2 card?

well i wont use the am2 card right now but maybe in a year or two ? or maybe not at all... but for now im just gonna use it for x2 3800+ (hopefully i can clock it to 2.7ghz like i did on this a8v deluxe) and a 6800GT agp

 

[Double Echo]

Can anyone recommend to me a PCI-E video card that they've had luck with? I recently tried out a Powercolor X800GTO GDDR3 256mb from NewEgg, and the first card gave me freezeups and VPU Recover errors. I RMA'd it, and the second card did the same damn thing. A comment on NewEgg on the 128mb card stated that the card was incompatible with an ASRock 939 SLI board, so I'm assuming this card is incompatible with the ASRock 939 Dual SATA2 board too.

So, what PCI-E cards are you using? I need something better than a Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb, but something that's under $200.

 

[Navid]

I have used 7800GT and now use 7900GT on this board.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: Double Echo
Can anyone recommend to me a PCI-E video card that they've had luck with? I recently tried out a Powercolor X800GTO GDDR3 256mb from NewEgg, and the first card gave me freezeups and VPU Recover errors. I RMA'd it, and the second card did the same damn thing. A comment on NewEgg on the 128mb card stated that the card was incompatible with an ASRock 939 SLI board, so I'm assuming this card is incompatible with the ASRock 939 Dual SATA2 board too.

So, what PCI-E cards are you using? I need something better than a Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb, but something that's under $200.

I've had no issues with my X1900XT, but of course that isn't under $200. Maybe you could look for a used PCI-E X850XT or something similar?

 

[Double Echo]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: Double Echo
Can anyone recommend to me a PCI-E video card that they've had luck with? I recently tried out a Powercolor X800GTO GDDR3 256mb from NewEgg, and the first card gave me freezeups and VPU Recover errors. I RMA'd it, and the second card did the same damn thing. A comment on NewEgg on the 128mb card stated that the card was incompatible with an ASRock 939 SLI board, so I'm assuming this card is incompatible with the ASRock 939 Dual SATA2 board too.

So, what PCI-E cards are you using? I need something better than a Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb, but something that's under $200.

I've had no issues with my X1900XT, but of course that isn't under $200. Maybe you could look for a used PCI-E X850XT or something similar?

I did some more Googling and found that some people have had to completely reinstall Windows when switching from AGP to PCI-E. It's something to do with the PCI to PCI bus drivers that are installed during the main Windows installation (The ULi Integrated Drivers have nothing to do with this). I'm going to try a fresh reinstall and see if this works. It's not a big deal to me, since I've got a Ghost image of the drive that I can restore it with if this doesn't work.

Might give me a reason to try WinXP 64 too!

 

[Killrose]

Originally posted by: genghis9021
Hi, first post.

I'm pretty happy with this board. Super stable at 2.53 GHz with a gig of RAM. Using an X800XT PE AGP board and a Raptor for the boot disk.

I have ONE small problem.

The IDE light on my Antec P160 won't light with this board ! ? !

Did you try to turn the connector the other way? Its an LED or Diode and is polarity sensitive.

 

[BlueWeasel]

The board and X2 chip should arrive in the next few days and I hope to get around to installing them over the weekend.

What's the recommended installation order of the ULi drivers? I'll be reinstalling XP Pro SP2 from scratch.

I was thinking of this install order:

1) XP Pro (SP slipstreamed)
2) Windows Updates
3) ULi drivers (AGP, sound, network, etc.)
4) 9800 Pro Omega drivers
5) Remaining hardware drivers

 

[Berek Halfhand]

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
well i just ordered one hopefully it should come by this week...purchased it from newegg...

i got another question...the AM2/ddr2 card upgrade...i know it will be in a tight position but is it poosible to fit something like a TTBT on it ?

It was YOU! I was up that early morning trying to figure out if I wanted the board or not. I decided to get it but when I went to purchase it, it was out of stock as of minutes later from when it was in stock! This was at like 2am in the morning right at your time indicated . Well, good luck with the board. I ordered from Computer3G to get it. Hopefully it will be a good one, as I always buy from Newegg.

As for the discussion here about which board, I've done a lot of research on the ASRock and a lot recommended it for a cheaper upgrade path. I'll post a review here when I get it, but I would say go for it as it may save you a lot of money. I can put my AGP video card in it now, and still wait for a directx 10 video card instead of force buying a pcix video card now that will still cost a lot, then buy ANOTHER once directx 10 roles around.

 

[JM Aggie08]

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
well i just ordered one hopefully it should come by this week...purchased it from newegg...

i got another question...the AM2/ddr2 card upgrade...i know it will be in a tight position but is it poosible to fit something like a TTBT on it ?

My guess is no (but I don't know for sure). Are you actually going to use the AM2 card?

well i wont use the am2 card right now but maybe in a year or two ? or maybe not at all... but for now im just gonna use it for x2 3800+ (hopefully i can clock it to 2.7ghz like i did on this a8v deluxe) and a 6800GT agp

got my 3800+ up to 2.51ghz on the board, dosent seem to really like it any higher, but let me know your settings if you do in fact get it that high

 

[Double Echo]

I reinstalled Windows twice with no luck. I'm definitely going to send this card back for a refund. In the meantime I ordered a Sapphire X850XT PCI-E card, so if that card doesn't work the only thing I could think would be that the PCI-E lane was bad and I'll need to RMA my ASRock board.

 

[teiresias]

OK guys, got the new RAM in yesterday, ran each one seperately through memtest and everything checked out. I installed both, held my breathe, and . . . yay no issues, thank you G. Skill

In any case, I have WinXP installed, ULi integrated 2.20 installed, as well as the AMD Dual Core Driver, the MS Hotfix, and the AMD Optimizer. Everything seems to work fine up to this point. Today I'll active Windows, make my barebone WinXP HDD image, then finish installing all of my other drivers.

I have only a couple of questions regarding some BIOS settings. I read in this topic about people having issues with the SATAII port. So right now I have both my HDD and my DVD burner through the SATA port. However, in the BIOS I have it set to non-RAID, and I didn't need to install any drivers during Windows install (with SP2 slipstreamed in, maybe that had something to do with it because I had to install drivers before). With the ULi integrated 2.20 drivers installed should I switch that back to RAID instead of non-RAID?

Also what are people's experiences with using the SATAII controller? Some people seem to have issues while others don't.

Also, Spread Spectrum - Yes or no? I know it's supposed to reduce EMI, but I'm wondering if anyone has played around with it. I wouldn't expect it to have any real noticeable performance effect for the most part.

Thanks for your help everyone.

 

[Wi1z]

Originally posted by: teiresias

I have only a couple of questions regarding some BIOS settings. I read in this topic about people having issues with the SATAII port. So right now I have both my HDD and my DVD burner through the SATA port. However, in the BIOS I have it set to non-RAID, and I didn't need to install any drivers during Windows install (with SP2 slipstreamed in, maybe that had something to do with it because I had to install drivers before). With the ULi integrated 2.20 drivers installed should I switch that back to RAID instead of non-RAID?

Also what are people's experiences with using the SATAII controller? Some people seem to have issues while others don't.

Also, Spread Spectrum - Yes or no? I know it's supposed to reduce EMI, but I'm wondering if anyone has played around with it. I wouldn't expect it to have any real noticeable performance effect for the most part.

Thanks for your help everyone.

My SATA I/F decided to go funny and now I sitck to my SATA II and all seems perfect, I dont think my SATA I/F was ever really 100%, I was using IDE then switched to SATA and boot issues and all sorts, plopped it into SATA II, perfect )

Spread Spectrum, I have no idea what it does technically, but I found when enabling it, it decreased my 3D performance, so I have left it off ever since ).

 

[SynthDude2001]

I've also read that Spread Spectrum should be disabled while overclocking...I've always disabled it on my boards, anyway. As far as SATAII, I'm running my primary hard drive (Seagate 250GB 7200.8) on it with no issues...leave the SATAI ports at non-RAID unless you're actually going to use RAID, it'll shorten the boot time (since the SATA RAID BIOS doesn't have to initialize), and you won't need drivers to read those hard drives (from a Windows setup or whatever)...

 

[teiresias]

So maybe I'll move my HDD (Seagate 7200.9) over to the SATAII channel and leave my DVD burner on the first port of the regular SATA controller with non-RAID set. I'm guessing (not at home to check) that the SATAII drivers are installed with the ULi integrated drivers right?

Thanks guys.

 

[teiresias]

Yeah, I've just found that my PC decides to just completely lock up at random times. Well, maybe not completely random, it always seems to happen when there's slightly heavier HDD access.

it's happened when my PC was scanning to get updates at WindowsUpdate, it happened when I was installing a piece of software, and it happened when I was copying some files over to the HDD from an external HDD.

Right now the HDD is on port 1 of SATAI, so I think I'll move that over to SATAII and see if that helps the situation.

[EDIT] Then again, i've read that people have experienced freezing with that AMD Dual Core Optimizer installed. right now i have the amd driver, optimizer, and the MS hotfix installed. Maybe getting rid of the optimizer will help, that will probably be the first thing I try, since it doesn't involve opening the case . . . again.

 

[DarkManX4lf]

Quick question, I bought this board and I'm supposed to recieve it today...I'm switching from a A8V Deluxe to this Asrock board, but I'm keeping the hard drives, video, and sound cards that i currently have...What I wanted to know is should I reformat my hard drive and reinstall Windows? or can I just run with the current install that I have?