Weird, although minor, problem with an MSI 6309 Ver.1 Solved *Heads-Up for 6309 owners!*

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
Folks I've got an MSI 6309 that I've been running a Celeron II 633 O/C'd to 850 for several months with no glitches at all. Today I went to try out several Celeron 366 PPGAs and the doggone things wouldn't even boot, couldn't even get into the BIOS! So I put the 633 back in and went into the BIOS, reset FSB to 66, cpu multiplier to 5.5 and core voltage to auto. Still nothing, and that was trying four different 366s. Yep, you're thinking 4 bad cpus. Nope, I turned around and tried them in a rig with a late Asus P3V4X, limited FSB settings, and all four booted up fine and even with the limited selection of FSB settings was able to get them to 459Mhz. I was hoping to get a bit more with the better FSB selection that I've got on the MSI, but tried again and still nothing. Any ideas, BTW the MSI and 633 are running just fine again! Thanks in advance folks!;)

Folks, I finally got through to MSI tech support on the phone. This info pertains to anyone that owns an MSI 6309 Ver.1 - There is no mention about this at their website but, BIOS V1.7 DOES NOT support PPGA Celerons. For those folks that want the flexibility of being able to run PPGA Celerons (or just to test for DOA or O/C'ing of PPGAs) don't use BIOS V1.7. According to tech support BIOS V1.6 is good to go and supports PPGA Celerons and all FC-PGAs, celeron &PIIIs.
 

novice

Golden Member
Mar 9, 2000
1,169
0
0
Sounds pretty strange. I have 2 MSI-6309 boards, running a PIII 600E and a Celeron II 600, at 744 and 900 respectively. Is your board a later revision? I wonder if the later revisions only support the FCPGA coppermines? Perhaps they no longer support the older PPGA celerons? It seems I read somewhere about one of the Asus socket 370 boards that would not work with the older celeron processors, perhaps the 6309 has a similar problem?
Chuck
 

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
Chuck, the MoBo is a Ver.1 with the latest BIOS. Now if I remember correctly I ran the other 366 on it before I flashed the BIOS but then I was able to run a Celeron 500 on it today. I think after I send this to you the user's manual will have to come out. Thanks.

Rick

Rig that I tried it in - MSI 6309, Alpha PEP66, IBM 20.5GB HDD, Voodoo3 3000 AGP, Pioneer 10X DVD, Zip 250 SCSI w/Diamond Fireport 40 controller card.
 

Regalk

Golden Member
Feb 7, 2000
1,137
0
0
"couldn't even get into the BIOS! So I put the 633 back in and went into the BIOS, reset FSB to 66, cpu multiplier to 5.5 and core voltage to auto. Still nothing, and that was trying four different 366s"
So after the BIOS update it appears not to support the PPGAs - hmm - I better leave mine the way it is. Any reason why U flashed - was it broken??
 

Compnut

Member
Apr 30, 2000
49
0
0
My MSI 6309 has ganged jumpers that have to be changed to change from FC-PGA cpus to PPGA ones. The jumpers are installed for FC-PGA and removed for PPGA. My mob. is a version 3.2 with an ata-100 controler. The mob. is very slow, 15fps slower than a BM6 in Q3 timedemo 1. Installed the latest 4 in 1 drivers with no help. Does anyone know how to improve the performance or is the VIA chipset just slow?

566cel at 850mhz Nvida MX Video Western Digital 6gig 5400rpm hard drive
 

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
On my Ver.1 there are no jumpers to set it for PPGA or FC-PGA Celerons - it's all in the BIOS. And BTW Regalk, no it wasn't broken. I flashed the BIOS for the same reason that many, many other members of the forum do - looking for better performance. This problem has only occurred with the four 366s that I tried. It ran fine with a Celeron 500 PPGA on the very same day that I tried the 366s.
 

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
Oh great! Now the Celeron 500 PPGA won't boot either. Celeron IIs and FC-PGC PIIIs work just fine. Any ideas folks? I don't have a critical need to run PPGA Celerons on this MoBo, other than the fact that it has a better selection of FSBs for checking the O/C'ing potential of a CPU. Any help or reasons why it is doing this would be appreciated! Thanks folks!

My mistake folks! I didn't run the 500 in the MSI, I ran it in the Asus. Good thing my daughter was watching and remembered. Man was I ever teed-off!
 

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
Compnut, go to VIA's website and they've got the latest drivers, to include the AGP drivers. That might help.
 

2336

Elite Member
Feb 11, 2000
4,667
7
81
Folks, does anyone out there have any idea what is going on with my MoBo? Did I hose it up with the BIOS flash or is there another possible answer??? C'Mon folks, give me a hand here!