Need Help Fast! GA-8IEXP Issue's...

[DhootiMaDhamal]

I'm buliding a Intel 845 E based PC, I need a mobo, I looked into the reviews, I saw great reviews on the Gigabyte GA-8IEXP, but this mobo only handles up to pc2100, can I use pc2700? I plan to purchase, 2x Corsair 3000 pc2700 to run on this mobo, I want to run a 1GB of ram on this setup, Will this work? Sorry I'm a N00b, first-time building my pc...., I have already received my Lian-Li pc71 case, logitech optical wireless mouse and keyboard, Enermax 431 whipser psu, I don't plan on O/C this yet... I plan to purchase the processor in the next week or so.... as soon as the 2.4b or 2.53b, fall around the $250 price range.... Can someone help with my memory issue?

Thanx In Advance

DhootiMaDhamal

 

[Psy7th]

You can use PC2700 RAM, but i845E motherboards don't allow RAM frequencies above 266Mhz (w/o OC). What you might want to check is i845G based motherboards which support PC2700 RAM (unofficially!), but I heard (not experienced) that it runs stable at DDR333 only with one ram stick, forcing to lower RAM frequency to 266 if using more than ram stick (what you intend to do I guess). A i845G Roundup will appear soon on anandtech.com, don't miss it.
If you are not in a hurry with your purchase (which I doubt), wait for the i845GE based motherboard since it will officially support PC2700.

Psy7th

 

[Sukhoi]

You're still OCing the i845G board. They just happen to have a 5:4 memory ratio that will let you run DDR333 at a 133 MHz FSB. To get DDR333 on an i845E board you need to run a 125 MHz FSB with the 4:3 ratio.

I'm currently running DDR333 just fine on my Gigabyte 8IEXP.

 

[Richdom]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi
You're still OCing the i845G board. They just happen to have a 5:4 memory ratio that will let you run DDR333 at a 133 MHz FSB. To get DDR333 on an i845E board you need to run a 125 MHz FSB with the 4:3 ratio.

I'm currently running DDR333 just fine on my Gigabyte 8IEXP.

Sukhoi, you can be the answer to my prayers. I need some help doing what you just described. Here is my info.

Gigabyte 81-EXP 845i Mobo
BIOS version: F6
P4 2.53 (Running at 2.85mhz)
FSB currently at 4x150mhz (600mhz)
Vcore: 1.6V
Idle temp: 38C Full load: 59C

2x 512mb Cosair XMS 3200 memory CAS2
Running at 2x200mhz(400mhz)
Stepping at 2/5/2/2

MSI Ge4 Ti4000 128meg
Running at 275/550mhz

Sandra scores:
CPU: 5299, 1471/3560
Memory: 2200 (average,I run this test a lot)
MMedia: 11336/13797

3Dmarks: 12497


What do I have to do (use very small words, I am not very tech-savvy) to get my memory to perform better? I didn't buy this 3200 memory for nothing!!

What BIOS version do you use?

Thanks a million!

 

[gsethi]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi
You're still OCing the i845G board. They just happen to have a 5:4 memory ratio that will let you run DDR333 at a 133 MHz FSB. To get DDR333 on an i845E board you need to run a 125 MHz FSB with the 4:3 ratio.

I'm currently running DDR333 just fine on my Gigabyte 8IEXP.

The GA-8IEXP is not a board w/ I845G chipset. It has the i845E chipset and hence no 4:5 memory ratio. If i remember correctly, it only has 1:1 and 3:4 memory ratio.

Search for this board in this forum.....i had tested this board thoroughly about 2 months ago and had a huge thread for it.

thanks

 

[Sukhoi]

The GA-8IEXP is not a board w/ I845G chipset. It has the i845E chipset and hence no 4:5 memory ratio. If i remember correctly, it only has 1:1 and 3:4 memory ratio.

Search for this board in this forum.....i had tested this board thoroughly about 2 months ago and had a huge thread for it.

thanks

Right, but I'm still running DDR333 because I'm currently running a 125 MHz FSB.

Richdom, I understand how you are running DDR400 (150 x 2 x 4/3), but where are you getting that 2x200 MHz from?

 

[Richdom]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi

Richdom, I understand how you are running DDR400 (150 x 2 x 4/3), but where are you getting that 2x200 MHz from?

I didn't do anything! Just moving the FSB up to 150mhz moved my memory speed up to 200mhz. I haven't actually moved the memory speed AT ALL! It moves along with my FSB.

My BIOS reads (200 x 2) not the (150 x 2 x 4/3) formula you suggest. I don't even know where I'd get that 4/3 thing from. The BIOS is unfriendly to say the least.

I appreciate your help here Sukhoi, it sounds like you have the answers I need.

 

[Sukhoi]

You're already using a 4:3 ratio then (150 MHz x 4/3 = 200 MHz). The 2 x 200 MHz thing is just the DDR part. 4:3 is the highest ratio so you can't run your RAM any faster without raising the FSB.

I think you know this already, but (atleast with the F3 BIOS) if you push Ctrl-F1 while in the BIOS (could be Shift-F1, but I'm pretty sure it's Ctrl-F1) it will bring up another advanced options menu, plus add some options to the other menus.

 

[Squamish]

Does the "hidden" BIOS screen give any options for reserving an IRQ for the AGP card? I'm running Win98SE with a Visiontek GF3 Ti500 which requires IRQ 11 and a bunch of other devices are on that also.

 

[Sukhoi]

I'm not rebooting right now to find out , but that option sounds familiar. Next time I reboot I'll try to remember to take a look.

 

[Tummy]

I think that if you use the 200 setting in ga's bios, it's a 1:1 multiplier which is why you are only getting about 2200 average on your mem scores, Richdom. That's basically running ddr300, or 150*2=300 (2 from 200). What you want is the 266 setting, which will give you the 3:4 ratio and ddr400... and you should notice your ram scores get up to about 2900 or something. Regardless, your 3dmark scores are very good.

On my Epox 4g4a, 2.26B @ 2.89G, DDR 425, Ti440@ 295/635, I only get 12760 3dmarks.

hope this helps.

 

[Sukhoi]

Good point. I had noticed that those memory scores were low, but it didn't click.

 

[Richdom]

Maybe I'm using a crappy BIOS version. I don't have a 266 option for memory settings.

Here are the options in my BIOS with my current values in bold.

CPU Host Clock Control: ENABLED/Disabled
CPU Host Frequency(Mhz): 150mhz
Fixed PCI/AGP Frequency: 33/66 all the way up to 50/100
Host/DRAM clock ratio: Auto/1.5/2.0
Memory Frequency(mhz): 300 (generated value)
PCI/AGP Frequency(mhz): 33/66 (generated value)

So, you see I don't have a 266 that I can set my memory to. Sukhoi, I noticed you said you set your FSB down to 125mhz, would that help me?

Thx

 

[Sukhoi]

I have a P4 1.6A which is normally a 100 MHz FSB, so I'm still overclocking it 25%.

I know what your problem is, and sort of have an idea of how to fix it. The 8IEXP is picking up your processor as a default 133 MHz CPU. Because of this it isn't giving you the 4:3 (2.66) RAM ratio to pick from. I believe on the board there is a jumper that will set it to 100 MHz FSB mode. You want to enable that. Then the 8IEXP will think you have a 100 MHz FSB based processor like mine, and give you the 2.66 option.

 

[Richdom]

You know, I've heard that elsewhere and I looked and looked and can't find any such jumper. It sounds easy enough, but I'd sure love some explicit instruction on where this jumper is.

Thanks for your help!

 

[Sukhoi]

Dang, just looked in my manual, and I don't see the jumper listed anywhere.

You're going to kill me for saying this (once you see the length), but take a look through the big 8IEXP thread in this forum, and I believe there are directions on how to solve your problem. I could be wrong though (maybe I'm thinking of another thread or something).