MSI K8N Neo4 nForce4 Ultra Socket 939

[GeezerMan]

No problem for me booting from a SATA. The SATA 1 port is the second one down. That might make a difference..

 

[Lurker1]

well, this was a blast. Got the memory down to 166 w/ 3-3-3-8 timings (how nice they're out of order...) The HTT is running @ 236 (10X), and my 3800 is now running @ 2360. Temps are staying right around 51C. Not shabby. I wonder if adding an 80mm fan to the top of the duct will help cool the CPU? (I'm still going for quiet) Actually, the real question here is, should I go get an aftermarket cooler This is running stock voltage with the stock AMD cooler that came with the CPU - it's an aluminum block thingie that probably doesn't do anything even moderately special.

Evidently memory's got issues, I POST fine, but going to 166 RAM speed before tweaking the timings, I'd only get to the boot loader, select an XP installation, and then the PC would go into la la land or reboot. Handy for resetting those timings....

So what are the acceptable temps again? Should I go higher?

 

[seannj]

Originally posted by: kenton
I really doubt the stock 4 piper is any different than the A64FPro, but if you're feeling bored swap out heatsinks for us and report back. I suppose I could do the same, but I'm lazy

In my case (Antec Sonota I), AC Freezer 64 Pro runs the CPU about 5-8C cooler than the stock AMD 4 heatpipe HSF. CPU 32-34 vs 37-41. My Opt 165 runs at 266 MHz x9 with 2x512MB Kingston HyperX DDR400 at Cas2, 1T. If I try 278x9, then sometimes can not pass POST.

My 2x1G Ultra DDR400 cannot pass the first run of Windows Memory Diagnostic. Failed tests WMATS+ and LRAND.

Sean

 

[kenton]

55C is pretty much the max I'd take any processor. I have occasional spikes under dual load to 57C sometimes but nothing in reality will stress both cores.

 

[kenton]

Can you please link me to Windows Memory Diagnostic? I would like to run it. I ran memtest with a 500% coverage.

 

[GeezerMan]

I read the temp spec for the 165 is " Maximum package temperature 49 ? 65o C "
I have seen my flash briefly as high as 60 during my Prime test that's still running from 8AM this morning. Been about 55 to 57 this afternoon average. My artic silver has not cured yet, so that will probably drop some.

 

[LeonarD26]

Nice overclock Geezer... glad its working out for you. My 165 is currently at HTT250 and my core temp his a max of ~51 using the AMD heatpipe/AS5 combo.

My new 7200.10 250gig SATA drive arrived the other day, so I'll post back here this weekend with some results of the install...

 

[GeezerMan]

Originally posted by: LeonarD26
Nice overclock Geezer... glad its working out for you. My 165 is currently at HTT250 and my core temp his a max of ~51 using the AMD heatpipe/AS5 combo.

My new 7200.10 250gig SATA drive arrived the other day, so I'll post back here this weekend with some results of the install...

and thanks to you my man. If it was not for you posting this deal, I probably would not have done it...not that it really needed to be done anyway, but what else do I have to do?

 

[seannj]

Originally posted by: kenton
Can you please link me to Windows Memory Diagnostic? I would like to run it. I ran memtest with a 500% coverage.

It's from Microsoft:

http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp

You need to put it on a floppy or booable CD to run it.

Sean

 

[zephyrprime]

Don't bother with the microsoft memory diagnostic. It's pretty worthless. I've used it before and it misses memory errors that memtest picks up. In my epxerience, Gold Memory is better than Memtest. Gold Memory has detected errors that memtest has not. However, most people use Memtest+ nowadays and I don't know how it compares to Gold Memory. I think the key to detecting memory errors is simply heat. You need a test that generates a lot of heat in a chip and then even a relatively simple test can detect errors. All the fancy memory patterns and things used by memory testing programs are pretty useless in my opinion. The best way to test memory would be to figure the way to generate the most heat on a dimm (probably reading from the 2 adjacent rows in a dimm again and again).

Anyway, I just got this. I flashed it with the Neo4 FI bios and it worked fine. By the way, the way I flashed the bios was to boot off of a Freedos CD and then flash from a USB flash drive. FreeDos recognizes usb drives so this is the best way to flash in my opinion. Floppies were never very reliable.

 

[Lurker1]

Originally posted by: zephyrprime
Anyway, I just got this. I flashed it with the Neo4 FI bios and it worked fine. By the way, the way I flashed the bios was to boot off of a Freedos CD and then flash from a USB flash drive. FreeDos recognizes usb drives so this is the best way to flash in my opinion. Floppies were never very reliable.

Man, that was another fun story - who has floppies these days? So I wound up booting off an old Win98 CD to the DOS prompt as the flash program won't work with other CD bootable DOS versions according to the docs, popped the CD out, put in the DVD with the flash program and BIOS revision (don't ask, my old system decided not to burn CDs, only DVDs) and flashed it. Big long hoopla that took almost 2 hours, as I wasted significant time trying to figure out why my old machine wouldn't burn a bootable CD.

 

[kenton]

What I do is I use the bootdisk.com "no144" flash, scroll down till you see something called "No 1.44?", anyways it's called flashcd.zip. I burn that ISO to a fresh CD-R, then I burn a second CD containing my flasher.exe and the bios.rom. Boot the computer with the flash disc (DOS prompt), swap discs, flash away.

 

[shinson]

I hate to keep this thread going but since the Motherboard is still available for $40.00 then I guess it's OK to bump...

My FX-55 is in this board running at 12 x 240 = 2880

It runs as high as 3000 until I start playing BF2 and it crashes.

CPU runs @ 37c idle and 52c full load @ 1.45V

MB + CPU + 250GB sata disk = $242.99
2 GB Corsair Ballistix (3-3-3-8) was $200 - $30 rebate
Cooler Master Centurion was $50 and the Ultra Infinity-X was $9.99 a few months ago.
MicroCenter X850XT vivo was $150 earlier this year and is $139.00 now.

Very smooth in BF2 and CS:Source on a 24inch Dell 2405.

I used the Windows Flash to get the latest BIOS after I installed the ethernet driver.. no problem.

Great Deal! Thanks OP ! ! !

 

[GeezerMan]

What I don't get is the several reviews on Newegg that say the Opteron 165, some with the same stepping as mine, that say under load it runs at like 43C. What?
Under load, how much of a load? Mine runs hotter than that. Maybe they are using windows based reporting utilities. My MSI utility called PC Alert shows a temp around 6 degrees cooler than speedfan while under load. Idle temps are much closer between the two. . I assume speedfan is more accurate.

 

[GeezerMan]

OK, I have a question. Being that most of my PC knowledge comes from being here, and google, I have holes in my knowledge. Maybe my temps being higher than some others is related to my HSF speed. I thought speedfan showed the CPU fan as fan 3, but the MSI utility shows the RPM for that fan is the power supply. It looks like speedfan Fan1 is the system fan (case fan?) Fan2 is the CPU fan, and Fan3 is the power supply fan. My AMD heatpipe has the 3 wire conductor, ground black is on top, power red is the middle, sensor blue is the bottom. Well, Fan2, that I think is the CPU fan, stays about 2700 RPM no matter what the load, even full load. I think it should go into the 5000 RPM range.

Thanks

 

[zephyrprime]

5000 RPM is very fast for a fan. The stock fan will not go anywhere near that.

 

[GeezerMan]

I was going by the madshrimps review of the AMD heatpipe that says it will go to 5200 RPM when needed. Speedfan will slow my HSF down, but at 100% it's only at 2766 RPM

 

[kenton]

I believe there's a temperature sensor on the fan. Anyways, truthfully, the two systems I have a four piper on, they've never exceeded 2700-2800RPM.

I believe there's a way to "hack" the fan to make it run at full tilt all the time, but I don't know how.

 

[GeezerMan]

Originally posted by: kenton
I believe there's a temperature sensor on the fan. Anyways, truthfully, the two systems I have a four piper on, they've never exceeded 2700-2800RPM.

I believe there's a way to "hack" the fan to make it run at full tilt all the time, but I don't know how.

So even under a 100% load each core, 2800 RPM may be normal for the fan?

 

[kenton]

It's normal for this board (with my Venice), it's normal for my dad's KN1 Lite with a 7600GT (he games a little) and it's normal for my crappy S754 board with that 2.76GHz Venice I told you about

 

[GeezerMan]

well okie dokie then.

By the way, I decided to order another 1GB stick of the Ultra while the rebate is on. I figured I might get another one of the good Aeneon chips. It came in today, and I got lucky again. So, I now have 2GB of nice performing ram, right now at set at 3 3 3 8, 2.8 volts, speed is 482. Heck of a deal for 50.00 a stick......

 

[kenton]

Damn that is NICE

 

[imported_maildude]

Originally posted by: GeezerMan
What I don't get is the several reviews on Newegg that say the Opteron 165, some with the same stepping as mine, that say under load it runs at like 43C. What?
Under load, how much of a load? Mine runs hotter than that. Maybe they are using windows based reporting utilities. My MSI utility called PC Alert shows a temp around 6 degrees cooler than speedfan while under load. Idle temps are much closer between the two. . I assume speedfan is more accurate.

I think you have to be careful in reading these reviews. They might be considering under load as just running a few games or surfing the internet as compared to just sitting idle. This doesn't come close to the load that running Prime will achieve.

 

[scaper]

I've owned MSI motherboards in the past and was very pleased.

 

[GeezerMan]

Originally posted by: maildude

Originally posted by: GeezerMan
What I don't get is the several reviews on Newegg that say the Opteron 165, some with the same stepping as mine, that say under load it runs at like 43C. What?
Under load, how much of a load? Mine runs hotter than that. Maybe they are using windows based reporting utilities. My MSI utility called PC Alert shows a temp around 6 degrees cooler than speedfan while under load. Idle temps are much closer between the two. . I assume speedfan is more accurate.

I think you have to be careful in reading these reviews. They might be considering under load as just running a few games or surfing the internet as compared to just sitting idle. This doesn't come close to the load that running Prime will achieve.

Hey Maildude, fellow Geezer, when you gonna build yours?