The 90nm SOI Sempron s754 processor

[sangyup81]

yay! if you can get over 2600mhz with 1.55v, I'm really gonna be tempted to get a 2800+

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: DrMrLordX
I got my Sempron 2800+ and other parts in on Saturday. Everything's up and running . . . mostly. The DIMM that Mwave shipped to me was bad, so I'm RMAing it for a refund and getting two of these

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=20-146-541&depa=1

They should do better than the 1 gig Kingston value RAM I got from Mwave. Cheaper, too.

For the time being, I'm using my old PC2100 from my old machine. Blah, I say.

Ugh, I wouldn't have bought that memory. You can get better for cheaper on Newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=20-218-060&depa=0

That stuff is supposedly Winbond UTT. In the least, it's cheaper and probably better than the crucial stuff.

Let us know how the overclocking goes!

 

[DrMrLordX]

Avalon, main reason why I got the Crucial was that I know it's single-sided. No idea about the TWINMOS DIMMs you linked, but hey, they might be. Also, the price on the Crucial DIMMs jumped about $7 an hour after I bought them. Heehee.

EDIT: I took a look at TWINMOS' site, and all their tech specs on their various PC3200 DIMMS indicate that they're all double-sided(2 banks). Not what I wanted/needed. The product you linked looks good otherwise.

Whether or not I can hit 2.6 ghz on this 2800+ will likely be dependant on how high my board's HTT wants to go. My first goal will be 2.4 ghz(8x300).

 

[Avalon]

What's wrong with having double sided DIMMs? I know the manuals say you shouldn't use two at once, but I've had no issues on the Epox or DFI with two double sided DIMMs.

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: Avalon
What's wrong with having double sided DIMMs? I know the manuals say you shouldn't use two at once, but I've had no issues on the Epox or DFI with two double sided DIMMs.

Me either, actualy running 2 X 512 double sided Crucial pc3200 @ 250mhz 3-3-3-10 at 2.8v .

 

[sangyup81]

There's nothing wrong just as long as you aren't trying to run your memory at 300+

 

[DrMrLordX]

I was under the impression that two double-sided DIMMS in a Nforce 3 board would get you stuck at 2T timings or 133mhz/DDR266 and 1T timings.

Slaimus laid it out here:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=29&threadid=1530684&enterthread=y

If you can get multiple double-sided DIMMs running at 1T, more power to ya.

Learn somethin new every day.

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: DrMrLordX
I was under the impression that two double-sided DIMMS in a Nforce 3 board would get you stuck at 2T timings or 133mhz/DDR266 and 1T timings.

Slaimus laid it out here:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=29&threadid=1530684&enterthread=y

If you can get multiple double-sided DIMMs running at 1T, more power to ya.

Learn somethin new every day.

You never said anything about 1T, of course with 2 double sided sticks I have to use 2T.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Originally posted by: Budman
You never said anything about 1T, of course with 2 double sided sticks I have to use 2T.

Heehee, well, there you go.

On a side note, it would seem that I mystically, magically have a 10/19/2004 bios on my vnf3-250 that supports no vcore adjustment/VID of any sort. It also has no FID.

Clockgen won't open up the VID/FID panel, either.

This . . . could prove to be troublesome. Funny, it has settings for vdimm adjustment, chipset voltage adjustment, and even AGP voltage adjustment, just . . . no vcore. Wack.

EDIT: What BIOS revision did you use on your Chaintech vnf3-250 and 3000+ Sempron, Budman? I'm wondering if my BIOS is somehow masking FID/VID because the 2800+ doesn't support FID adjustment?

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: DrMrLordX

EDIT: What BIOS revision did you use on your Chaintech vnf3-250 and 3000+ Sempron, Budman? I'm wondering if my BIOS is somehow masking FID/VID because the 2800+ doesn't support FID adjustment?

Using the same bios 10/19 & it has all the adjustements,maybe try reflashing the bios then reset it?

Use winflash it's easy & you can fllash from inside windows.

If that dont work maybe try flashing to the 09/21 bios.

http://www.lejabeach.com/Chaintech/VNF3250/chvnf3250bios.html

 

[Avalon]

Is there a windows program that will show you the statistics of your memory such that you can view your current command rate, without having to reboot and go into BIOS?

 

[Leper Messiah]

I believe that CPU-ID says it under the memory tab, and sandra might say too.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Yeehaw, finally got my RAM from Newegg. It works. I'll post OCing info/results here, uh, once I get them.

 

[sangyup81]

=)

 

[DrMrLordX]

Okay, preliminary results are in:

This board(VNF3-250) overclocks/overvolts by default. Stock voltage is 1.42, 1.45 vcore is 1.49 vcore actual, etc. I'll make note of this.

RAM is set to 2:1 ratio(DDR200 @ HTT 200) as per Zebo's suggestions.

HTT 265: Max I could reach while using HT multiplier of 2x. Raising the multiplier to 3x enabled me to press onward.

HTT 290: Max I could reach at 1.42 vcore while still stable.

HTT 300: Required 1.475v vcore(1.52 actual) to be stable. I primed here for 18 hours straight with no warnings or errors.

HTT 310: This remains an unsolved puzzle. I bumped vcore all the way up to 1.525(1.56-1.59 actual, depending on which monitor program you believe), but it failed to stabilize well enough to run Prime95 torture test 1 for more than a few minutes before encountering a rounding error. Bumping chipset voltage up to 1.8v did not correct this problem. I've noticed that, at 310 HTT, my previously-stable voltages are now jittering around a lot. It could be the board is having problems with voltage regulation, or it could be the CPU just doesn't want to go this fast. I'm not really sure which. In any case, I've backed off from this setting, and will return to HTT 290 so I can run the chip at stock vcore.

Notes:

1). Bios misreports chip speed at boot past 2 ghz. CPU-Z is not fooled.

2). 10/19 BIOS for the vnf3-250 does not permit vcore adjustments for my Sempr0n 2800+. The 9/21 BIOS does.

3). As mentioned above, the system will not POST fully(goes into BIOS-induced "safe mode") past 265 HTT with a 2x HT multiplier. 3x is stable. Weird.

I will be playing with the RAM from here on out, but I doubt that is of much interest to anyone here, so that's about that. The final limiting factor is either the CPU itself, or the VNF3-250's voltage-regulation abilities. The mere fact that it posted at 310 HTT was impressive to me, and WinXP was stable. So was Super-Pi. Prime95, however, was not. Boo!

 

[sangyup81]

More vcore! I would really like to know your 1.55v results. I did 1.55v with stock hs/fan. Your cpu will be fine.

 

[Avalon]

A 2800+ with a Chaintech board?
That's not going to fly.

*Edit*
I'm sitting on my sister's computer (A64 2800+, Epox 8KDA3j, 512MB DS DIMM) and checking out sandra. It doesn't seem to specify what the command rate of your memory is. I'm looking in the mainboard tab where it gives your memory info. It says I'm using two banks, each bank being 2.5-3-3-3 2CMD. Now, that looks a bit odd to me (TRAS of 3?). I've got the memory set in the bios to 2.5-3-3-10 1T, and on bootup the BIOS even reports that I'm running 1T. Of course, there's also a nice black and white setting in the Epox bios called "1T/2T command rate", but in the DFI I'm not sure where the equivalent for that is. I think my system may be utilizing a 2T command rate, which would explain my lower framerate scores in HL2.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Originally posted by: Avalon
A 2800+ with a Chaintech board?
That's not going to fly.

Hey, it's at 2.4 ghz thus far, so it can at least hop around a bit and pretend to fly. You're right, though, in that it may crap out on me past 300 HTT. Voltages look stable across the board, and system temp is a mere 28C at this point(CPU load is 50C at vcore 1.475/1.52 actual, 8x300 HTT).

I'll find out soon enough.

 

[blckgrffn]

avalon, disable the nice logo screen on the DFI, and it will display your memory timings on the regular post screen.

Nat

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: blckgrffn
avalon, disable the nice logo screen on the DFI, and it will display your memory timings on the regular post screen.

Nat

I wondered if that would happen if I did that or not. Thanks Nat!

DrMrLordX: 2.4ghz is definitely awesome, no doubt about it. You'd just need a DFI board to go further with an 8 multiplier.

 

[sangyup81]

I'm gonna use 2.4ghz for my everyday setting. 1.5v and 52°C load.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Originally posted by: Avalon

DrMrLordX: 2.4ghz is definitely awesome, no doubt about it. You'd just need a DFI board to go further with an 8 multiplier.

Thanks. I would tend to agree with you about the DFI. 310 HTT would POST and load Windows okay, but my voltages are jumpin all over the place. Especially vcore. I saw it fluctuate between 1.55 and 1.59 during my final series of tests. Might also be the CPU causing problems, or even the PSU, but my +12v rail was fairly solid the whole time.

2.4 ghz is fine with me, especially on a $85 chip, and for that matter, so is 2.32 ghz. I guess I can't expect 2.7 ghz on my first OC, hmm? *)

Big thanks to you, Avalon, for sticking your neck out and trying one of these chips out before anyone else had done so on the forums. Also big thanks to Zebo, Duvie, Slaimus, Budman, Zap, and a host of other people for various infoz.

 

[Avalon]

Someone has to try the budget chips that no one cares about. I was getting tired of seeing all these winchester posts

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: DrMrLordX
Also big thanks to Zebo, Duvie, Slaimus, Budman, Zap, and a host of other people for various infoz.

I don't think I contributed much since I ended up with an A64 2800+, but you're welcome. My A64 is still not built yet because I've been busy lately, and now am in the Portland, OR area. PDXLAN 4.05, baby!!! Anyone here gonna be there? I drove here Wednesday (1044 miles, 17.5 hours), been hanging out since then in Beaverton.

 

[Avalon]

I finally ran the CS:S stress test, and re-ran the 16x12 tests for HL2. The results still don't make any sense to me. I've confirmed that I'm running my memory at 1T. Everything else checks out fine. Yet, once I move to 16x12 in a HL2 based game, my framerates drop like a rock. 49fps in CS:S with my barton at 2.3 vs 38.7fps with my sempron at 2.6? 3-5fps less with my sempron vs my barton in the five HL2 tests I ran? RTHDIBRL, 3dmark, and prime check out fine.

I even downclocked both my video card and processor, but that didn't do anything, so it's not heat. Do you think it's possible that the extra cache and dual channel of the barton is a big factor in HL2?

*Edit*
I checked out the CPU roundup from Anand again. It seems there is an 8% difference in HL2 between 1MB and 512KB L2 cache at 12x9. I'd suspect that it would be the same difference between 512KB and 256KB. Also, dual channel gave a benefit of 7-12%, so we can say 10% on average. Almost 20% benefit from dual channel and extra cache. Yet, Anand ran his benchmarks on much less stressful settings. I'm not sure what to make of it.

I want to say that at the lower resolutions, I don't need as much memory bandwidth, and thus the lack of cache and dual channel isn't hindering performance enough for the benefit in my clock speed to be overshadowed, but at the higher resolutions my video card and my system is begging my CPU for much more bandwidth than it can provide? That's the only thing that makes sense to me.