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

[Wi1z]

You can do a repair install of XP but its never as nice as a nice fresh clean install, and if you run into any problems, you will just never know if its due to the repair over-install or whatever. I have done several repair over-installs and usually they are fine, although not with X64, always with Win2k or XP 32. You cant plug and play your hdd because your old MB was a VIA chipset and your new one is ULI. I guess you can go for a repair over-install, and see how it goes.

installation is, XP, ULI drivers, Updates / Video, Anti Vir/Spyware etc. I'm not convinced you need to install CPU driver, its single core.

 

[Double Echo]

Ok, if anyone still cares, or for future reference for ASRock 939 Dual SATA2 users (or any other 939 ASRock board), I got a new PCI-E video card today. The card I got was a Sapphire X850XT 256mb (http://www.newegg.com/product/produ...N82E16814102688), and the card is a friggin' beast. On top of that, it works flawlessly in my board. I can't imagine that two brand new cards of the same model would have the exact same defect, and act exactly the same, so I'm going to put a warning out here for ASRock users that the Powercolor X800GTO models (128 and 256mb) are not compatible with this board. I'd highly recommend the Sapphire card, since it also has 16 pixel pipelines instead of 12 and was only $30 more.

Mystery solved!

 

[DarkManX4lf]

whats the max vcore that this board supports? i have a x2 3800 and i can only go up to 1.4v...is there anyway i can go higher? (i need at least 1.45v)

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
whats the max vcore that this board supports? i have a x2 3800 and i can only go up to 1.4v...is there anyway i can go higher? (i need at least 1.45v)

The board limits dual-core CPU's to 1.4V if it's not voltmodded. Only way to get more is to do one of the mods...

 

[DarkManX4lf]

is it possible that asrock might release a bios update that will enable more vcore settings?

 

[radeonboy]

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.

Okay I will try 1.33.1. But I doubt that it still works. Speedfan was reading the same as CPU-Z if I remember correctly. But I will try and see>>>crosses fingers!

 

[radeonboy]

Originally posted by: 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

What does QFT stand for?

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: radeonboy

Originally posted by: 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

What does QFT stand for?

"Quoted For Truth"

I didn't think about it when I first saw your post (the one at the inside of the nested quote here), but if you were really at 1.1V you probably wouldn't even be able to boot into Windows...like they said, use version 1.32 or 1.33 of CPU-Z to verify (It should also show the correct actual voltage in the BIOS as well.)

 

[radeonboy]

IT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKSIT WORKS IT WORKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Man awesome!!! 1.3.3.1 works like a charm.

 

[Bill Kunert]

I've had the board for a couple of months and have had only one problem. VISTA will not load on my board. Emailed Asrock tech support and they reply that this board is not VISTA compatible. They have a new version of the board lablelled VSTA that is guaranteed to work with VISTA. Can't see any physical difference between the boards but the new one does use a different bios. I know lots of people have loaded VISTA on this board but if you can't, and wonder why, this is the reason.
Regards
Bill

 

[flashbacck]

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert
I've had the board for a couple of months and have had only one problem. VISTA will not load on my board. Emailed Asrock tech support and they reply that this board is not VISTA compatible. They have a new version of the board lablelled VSTA that is guaranteed to work with VISTA. Can't see any physical difference between the boards but the new one does use a different bios. I know lots of people have loaded VISTA on this board but if you can't, and wonder why, this is the reason.
Regards
Bill

Why would only some people be able to load Vista on this board?

 

[Bill Kunert]

Originally posted by: flashbacck

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert
I've had the board for a couple of months and have had only one problem. VISTA will not load on my board. Emailed Asrock tech support and they reply that this board is not VISTA compatible. They have a new version of the board lablelled VSTA that is guaranteed to work with VISTA. Can't see any physical difference between the boards but the new one does use a different bios. I know lots of people have loaded VISTA on this board but if you can't, and wonder why, this is the reason.
Regards
Bill

Why would only some people be able to load Vista on this board?

I have no idea why but Asrock acknowledges the problem and has brought out a VISTA compliant version of the 939 Dual SATA2 called the 939Dual VSTA. I have seen on other websites where there has been aproblem getting VISTA loaded on the Dual SATA2. Neither version would load. It would reach the point of the first reboot and never load windows. The hard drive light would stay on but nothing happened. I once waited for an hour. Don't know why, just know it happened. I also had a computer a few years ago that wouldn't load ME so Microsoft refunded my money. I guess I was lucky 'cause ME was a waste.

Bill

 

[BlueWeasel]

I purchased a used ASrock board from the FS/FT forum that had already been Vcore modded. I've been experimenting all weekend with the board and a X2 4200+. I've got a somewhat mediocre 4200+ as it takes 1.52v for 2.6Ghz.

I've got a v1.04 board, but I'm still having warm boot issues regardless of the BIOS I use. I've tried the OCWBIOS8 and official 1.7/1.8/2.2 ones, but the warm boot problem is always there when OCing.

I thought the 1.8 BIOS or newer was supposed to get rid of the warm boot issue for good, but no luck here.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: BlueWeasel
I purchased a used ASrock board from the FS/FT forum that had already been Vcore modded. I've been experimenting all weekend with the board and a X2 4200+. I've got a somewhat mediocre 4200+ as it takes 1.52v for 2.6Ghz.

I've got a v1.04 board, but I'm still having warm boot issues regardless of the BIOS I use. I've tried the OCWBIOS8 and official 1.7/1.8/2.2 ones, but the warm boot problem is always there when OCing.

I thought the 1.8 BIOS or newer was supposed to get rid of the warm boot issue for good, but no luck here.

I've read that people who have the warm boot problem have been able to eliminate it by disabling "Boot Guard" (or whatever it's called, I forget the exact name) in the BIOS. I don't know if this still applies to newer releases but it's probably worth a shot...

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: BlueWeasel
I purchased a used ASrock board from the FS/FT forum that had already been Vcore modded. I've been experimenting all weekend with the board and a X2 4200+. I've got a somewhat mediocre 4200+ as it takes 1.52v for 2.6Ghz.

I've got a v1.04 board, but I'm still having warm boot issues regardless of the BIOS I use. I've tried the OCWBIOS8 and official 1.7/1.8/2.2 ones, but the warm boot problem is always there when OCing.

I thought the 1.8 BIOS or newer was supposed to get rid of the warm boot issue for good, but no luck here.

I've read that people who have the warm boot problem have been able to eliminate it by disabling "Boot Guard" (or whatever it's called, I forget the exact name) in the BIOS. I don't know if this still applies to newer releases but it's probably worth a shot...

Ah, that's one thing I've not tried yet and makes sense. I'll see how it goes.

 

[dethman]

anyone have problems with a 3rd party ide PCI card? i have my promise TX2 card installed but boot will hang if any device is plugged into it. the card works fine if there are no devices plugged into it, and it works correctly in my old nf7-s 2.0 board. it's as if the additional IDE devices confused the bios as to where to boot from.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: dethman
anyone have problems with a 3rd party ide PCI card? i have my promise TX2 card installed but boot will hang if any device is plugged into it. the card works fine if there are no devices plugged into it, and it works correctly in my old nf7-s 2.0 board. it's as if the additional IDE devices confused the bios as to where to boot from.

I haven't used a third party IDE controller in years, but I have noticed that whenever a "new" hard drive shows up (in my case this happens because I must have an issue with loose connectors or something; one of my drives always disappears after a while and I have to tighten connections) the boot process slows way down because it always looks at the newly connected hard drive first...and I have to go back into the BIOS to set the right boot device order. Without knowing anything else it sounds like this might be related to the issue you're seeing, but I have no idea how third party storage controllers work with this board.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: dethman
anyone have problems with a 3rd party ide PCI card? i have my promise TX2 card installed but boot will hang if any device is plugged into it. the card works fine if there are no devices plugged into it, and it works correctly in my old nf7-s 2.0 board. it's as if the additional IDE devices confused the bios as to where to boot from.

I've got a Silicon Image (Sil680) PCI IDE card and it works fine with two burners plugged into it (the HDs use the onboard IDE ports). The BIOS recognizes each burner, but using a bootable CD proves to be an issue sometimes.

 

[BlueWeasel]

Originally posted by: BlueWeasel

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: BlueWeasel
I purchased a used ASrock board from the FS/FT forum that had already been Vcore modded. I've been experimenting all weekend with the board and a X2 4200+. I've got a somewhat mediocre 4200+ as it takes 1.52v for 2.6Ghz.

I've got a v1.04 board, but I'm still having warm boot issues regardless of the BIOS I use. I've tried the OCWBIOS8 and official 1.7/1.8/2.2 ones, but the warm boot problem is always there when OCing.

I thought the 1.8 BIOS or newer was supposed to get rid of the warm boot issue for good, but no luck here.

I've read that people who have the warm boot problem have been able to eliminate it by disabling "Boot Guard" (or whatever it's called, I forget the exact name) in the BIOS. I don't know if this still applies to newer releases but it's probably worth a shot...

I tried disabling the "Boot Guard" with no luck.

I keep reading on other forums that the OCWBIOS1 and OCWBIOS2 seem to be the best for overclocking, even though the cold/warm boot issues weren't completely fixed in those releases. I plan on giving the earlier BIOS'es a try tonight.

 

[qsrk]

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert

Originally posted by: flashbacck

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert
I've had the board for a couple of months and have had only one problem. VISTA will not load on my board. Emailed Asrock tech support and they reply that this board is not VISTA compatible. They have a new version of the board lablelled VSTA that is guaranteed to work with VISTA. Can't see any physical difference between the boards but the new one does use a different bios. I know lots of people have loaded VISTA on this board but if you can't, and wonder why, this is the reason.
Regards
Bill

Why would only some people be able to load Vista on this board?

I have no idea why but Asrock acknowledges the problem and has brought out a VISTA compliant version of the 939 Dual SATA2 called the 939Dual VSTA. I have seen on other websites where there has been aproblem getting VISTA loaded on the Dual SATA2. Neither version would load. It would reach the point of the first reboot and never load windows. The hard drive light would stay on but nothing happened. I once waited for an hour. Don't know why, just know it happened. I also had a computer a few years ago that wouldn't load ME so Microsoft refunded my money. I guess I was lucky 'cause ME was a waste.

Bill

That not good. What rev is your board? Hopefully newer revs are compatible.

 

[Bill Kunert]

Originally posted by: qsrk

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert

Originally posted by: flashbacck

Originally posted by: Bill Kunert
I've had the board for a couple of months and have had only one problem. VISTA will not load on my board. Emailed Asrock tech support and they reply that this board is not VISTA compatible. They have a new version of the board lablelled VSTA that is guaranteed to work with VISTA. Can't see any physical difference between the boards but the new one does use a different bios. I know lots of people have loaded VISTA on this board but if you can't, and wonder why, this is the reason.
Regards
Bill

Why would only some people be able to load Vista on this board?

I have no idea why but Asrock acknowledges the problem and has brought out a VISTA compliant version of the 939 Dual SATA2 called the 939Dual VSTA. I have seen on other websites where there has been aproblem getting VISTA loaded on the Dual SATA2. Neither version would load. It would reach the point of the first reboot and never load windows. The hard drive light would stay on but nothing happened. I once waited for an hour. Don't know why, just know it happened. I also had a computer a few years ago that wouldn't load ME so Microsoft refunded my money. I guess I was lucky 'cause ME was a waste.

Bill

That not good. What rev is your board? Hopefully newer revs are compatible.

I can't see a revision number on the board without tearing the system apart. One utility I have identifies it as a revision 1. I've only had it a couple of months and I bought it from New Egg so I doubt it was in their warehouse collecting dust for a long time. I don't think there will be newer revisions since they brought out the VSTA version of the board which appears to be identical except for the name.

Bill

 

[Double Echo]

If you're buying hardware right now in anticipation of Vista, I think you're cheating yourself. If ASRock has another great offering of a motherboard by the time I'm ready to upgrade from XP/XP64 to Vista, I'll buy it. Until then, I'm sticking with the AM2CPU board and waiting until at least Vista SP1. By then, the hardware should be better; If you buy "Vista compatible" hardware now, by the time Vista SP1 rolls out you'll be kicking yourself.

 

[DarkManX4lf]

will this board be able to run vista...eventually? (the 939-Dual Sata II)

 

[DarkManX4lf]

..2x posted..sorry

 

[Double Echo]

Originally posted by: DarkManX4lf
will this board be able to run vista...eventually? (the 939-Dual Sata II)

My guess would be no, but I'm not an offical ASRock spokesman, so don't take it as the end-all-be-all. But I'm guessing no because they had to make an entirely different board, not just a BIOS update. This leads me to believe that it's something to do with the programming or type of chip on the board, and not something that a firmware update can fix.

I wouldn't worry dude. Like I said above, by the time Vista's really ready, you'll want to upgrade again. Hell, by the time Vista SP1 rolls out it could be 2-3 years from now.