New BIOS For Chaintech VNF4 Ultra Is Out!!!!

[MrControversial]

http://www.chaintechusa.com/tw/eng/Download/dl_desc.asp?DCSNo=4&PISNo=318

Please flash and run it through its paces. Can you get a better OC?

 

[MrControversial]

Drat! The voltage "bug" is still there. If you're not familiar with it, anything set below 1.6V Vcore will not register in the BIOS. You have to put it up to 1.6Vcore+ in order to up the voltage. I tested it by dropping the Vcore to 1.5V and it ended up at 1.4V. The only thing I noticed to it was the Fan speed control. I guess it controls the fan speed according to the system temperature. I don't have any chassis fans so I don't care about it. I'd like to see if overclocking improved with this BIOS. If anyone isn't lazy like me, give it a try.

 

[Silversierra]

The fan speed control, when enabled, slows/speeds up your cpu fan according to temp. My cpu fan completely stops sometime if it isn't working hard, at about 25-30C. Once the temp gets to a certain level, it turns on until it cools down. In heavy cpu intensive stuff, my fan went up to a reported 6000rpm, that seems really fast, could be a wrong reading.

 

[perdomot]

How did you flash the bios Mr C? Nothing on the Chaintech site to tell me how to do it in case I need to

 

[jae]

6000RPM.. is that safe for your chip? seems too fast to me

 

[GadgetBuilder]

Originally posted by: perdomot
How did you flash the bios Mr C? Nothing on the Chaintech site to tell me how to do it in case I need to

Visit the Chaintech site for the BIOS update:
http://www.chaintech.com.tw/tw/eng/product_spec.asp?MPSNo=13&PISNo=318

While there, visit the "Utility" page and download the Award Flash Utility


The description of how to flash is here:
http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=373815

 

[rivethead]

Actually, if you follow GadgetBuilder's link to the PCPER forums, you can find a thread with a link and instructions to use WinFlash.

I couldn't get the Award Flash Utility to work, but I had no problems with WinFlash.

Regarding this new bios......for me the jury is still out. Through the bios, my CPU and System temps used to read about 26-27 degrees C just after turning on the computer. Now with the new bios, my temps are at 30-31 degrees C just after turning on the computer. And that's with having the fan speed control disabled.

Any thoughts on why that might occur?

Also, and this is related to the last bios update, but does anyone else have three fan speeds now show up in the bios? I have a CPU, Case, and System fan speeds, but for some reason the System fan speed is always at 0 (even though I know the chipset fan is spinning).

I really need to get around to installing/learning/using Speedfan. Has anyone used Speedfan with the new bios fan control also enabled? Issues? Do they work together, or do you need to disable the bios fan speed control to properly use SpeedFan?

Ahh...the joys of tweaking a new system. This is fun.

Thanks in advance for comments and replies.

 

[Silversierra]

Originally posted by: jae
6000RPM.. is that safe for your chip? seems too fast to me

It was when it turned on from 0rpm, the quick startup probably screwed up the sensor temporarily, it only said 6000 for a few seconds max. Now it's at 900rpm.

 

[MrControversial]

Originally posted by: perdomot
How did you flash the bios Mr C? Nothing on the Chaintech site to tell me how to do it in case I need to

I downloaded a program called Winflash. I don't have a floppy drive so I use that to flash from Windows.

 

[MrControversial]

Originally posted by: rivethead
Regarding this new bios......for me the jury is still out. Through the bios, my CPU and System temps used to read about 26-27 degrees C just after turning on the computer. Now with the new bios, my temps are at 30-31 degrees C just after turning on the computer. And that's with having the fan speed control disabled.
[/i]

I went from around 34C to 38C. Maybe the BIOS adjusted the monitoring hardware?

Also, and this is related to the last bios update, but does anyone else have three fan speeds now show up in the bios? I have a CPU, Case, and System fan speeds, but for some reason the System fan speed is always at 0 (even though I know the chipset fan is spinning).

You have to read the manual to see what connecters are what. I think the chipset fan is the one closest to the chipset and the system fan is lower on the motherboard. I don't think the BIOS monitors the chipset fan speed.

I really need to get around to installing/learning/using Speedfan. Has anyone used Speedfan with the new bios fan control also enabled? Issues? Do they work together, or do you need to disable the bios fan speed control to properly use SpeedFan?

Speedfan is buggy with our board. It records it as an Nforce3 which is wrong and the temps are backwards and wrong. I just flatout uninstalled it until it's updated. I just use the Nvidia monitor that comes bundled.

 

[rivethead]

"I went from around 34C to 38C. Maybe the BIOS adjusted the monitoring hardware?"

Sounds like it, since you're temps moved up about the same amout as mine. I wish Chaintech would provide more details on what the BIOS updates are doing!


"Speedfan is buggy with our board. It records it as an Nforce3 which is wrong and the temps are backwards and wrong. I just flatout uninstalled it until it's updated. I just use the Nvidia monitor that comes bundled. "

Thanks for the heads up on that. You've likely saved me some time. I've played with nTune Monitor a little bit, but I haven't updated to the newest version of nTune. The one thing with nTune monitor I don't see is fan speeds...just temps and bus speeds. Am I missing seeing the fan speeds some place?

 

[MrControversial]

I'm using the latest Ntune from Chaintech. I tried using one from Nvidia and it mucked my system up.

 

[jae]

i know this is off topic but can i use windows xp 64bit with vnf4?

 

[Oceanic]

Im using 2.0 now and cant seem to get it to boot at more than 230 fsb, at 229 i get blue screen errors which may be my ddr400 giving out but im not sure

 

[GadgetBuilder]

Originally posted by: MrControversial

Speedfan is buggy with our board. It records it as an Nforce3 which is wrong and the temps are backwards and wrong. I just flatout uninstalled it until it's updated. I just use the Nvidia monitor that comes bundled.

I'm surprised to hear you're having problems with SpeedFan on the VNF4. SpeedFan is a little tricky to set up but has been working well with my VNF4. What version of SpeedFan are you running?

Where does it record the board as an Nforce3? This must be a feature I missed or something new - I'm running 4.20 with the original VNF4 BIOS... The temps from SpeedFan agree with those from BIOS.

One thing SpeedFan can do is add an offset to temperature to correct for any offset in the sensor -- might be helpful with the new BIOS.

 

[rivethead]

I seem to recall seeing a thread on how to set up Speedfan with the Chaintech over at the PCPers forums.

However, I can't seem to find it now.

GadgetBuilder: I know you post over there. Do you recall a thread like that and can you provide a link?

I know I'd be greatful as I would like to get Speedfan up and running on my system.

Thanks!

 

[GadgetBuilder]

I had posted info on SpeedFan setup for the VNF4 at PCRers but the threads are deleted after a while and it seems to be gone. The tricky part of setup is also described here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=29&threadid=1560184

The simplest way to set SpeedFan up for the VNF4 is to go to the SpeedFan site, click "Beta Area" in the upper right of the home page, then in the first section of the Beta page click on "this link" (it's easy to miss), and follow directions to select and download the setup file for the VNF4. Copy this file to the SpeedFan folder in Program Files, start SpeedFan, and most everything should be set up. You should be able to customize/adjust for your situation from there.

Alternatively, once you set the 8712F's PWM to Computer Controlled as described in the above thread you should be able to follow the SpeedFan Help and set it up from scratch without too much trouble.

If the above isn't clear, write back and I will post more complete directions.

 

[rivethead]

GadgetBuilder:

Thanks for the response. I am hoping to set up SpeedFan this weekend and play around with it.

On another topic, I saw over at the PCPers forums that you had attempted to install the latest NVIDIA drivers (from the NVIDIA website) for the nForce 4 Ultra board, but that you got a BSOD everytime you accessed the internet. I believe you then went back to the Chaintech-supplied drivers, but I never saw if you got any resolution to your problem.

Interestingly enough, I went through the same experience with the latest Chaintech-supplied NVIDIA drivers. When I went to the Chaintech website to get the latest BIOS, I notices that they had drivers on their site that were newer than mine, so I downloaded them and installed them.

As soon as I rebooted, I got the BSOD when my anti-virus software attempted to go out to the internet and check for updates. I got a really fast blue screen with a warning and/or report written in white text and then the system would reboot. The blue screen/white text happen so fast I couldn't read what the warning said. Anyway, it appears it has to do with the drivers for the NVIDIA Firewall. To fix the problem, I uninstalled all the drivers and reloaded the ones that came on the CD with my mobo. These work perfectly (so far).

Has anyone else had a similar problem with the newest NVIDIA drivers provided by Chaintech on their website? If so, were you able to correct the problems? How?

I'd feel more comfortable using the latest drivers, but they just appear too buggy right now.

Thanks!

 

[GadgetBuilder]

Rivethead,

The nVidia 6.39 and 6.53 releases cause a BSOD on my VNF4 only when the firewall is enabled. The original SMB/NIC/NAM from the CD works but has a couple of minor "issues" on my system so I am awaiting the next update from nVidia. I continue to use the CD drivers because the firewall is one of the major reasons I bought the NF4 board. I haven't loaded the nVidia IDE drivers because of frequent bad reports - the MS drivers work OK on my machine so I'd like to settle the NAM problem first.

It is interesting that you encountered a similar problem - have you verified that you can access the net if the firewall is Off?

I have been watching several forums (including nVidia's) for mentions of problems with the nVidia drivers and notice that the reports are peculiar in that the majority of users seem to have no problems with any of the drivers. However, a small percentage of users do experience problems. There seem to be several common, serious problems plus several less serious problems.

The largest number of complaints in nVidia's mobo forum seem to be from ASUS SLI owners; hard to say if this is because they are the largest fraction of NF4 systems or there is a hardware/BIOS/software issue peculiar to that board. (Recently, some other boards seem to be experiencing similar problems however.) An interesting observation: I haven't found complaints about the nVidia drivers on the AMD forums I've visited - so, it seems to be only a small fraction of users who encounter problems with the NF3/NF4 driver set (or possibly NF3/NF4 users are a small fraction of AMD owners).

The PCPers forum has a concentration of VNF4 users yet yours is the only other report of problems similar to mine that I have seen - the vast majority of VNF4 owners don't report problems with the nVidia drivers. My current hypothesis is that there is something unusual about my setup - perhaps a driver conflict or something about the order things are loaded at startup, etc. The only unusual hardware that comes to mind is the Kensington trackball and a Sony camera.

If you'd like to explore what might be common between our systems that affects the nVidia drivers adversely, contact me via my site (listed in my profile).

Also, there may be a problem retrieving the VNF4 configuration file from the SpeedFan site. Anyone who would like a copy of my SpeedFan configuration file can contact me via my profile.