The Conroe865PE thread... for AGP users... stock and mod

[Completely Bonkers]

USB wireless headset H800 http://www.logitech.com/en-us/webcam-communications/internet-headsets-phones/wireless-headset-h800

 

[TRWOV]

So with that I would bypass the sound card?

 

[Completely Bonkers]

Yes. No sound card needed with that. That's what I run on my workstation. Use it for skype and gaming. Works well. It may not be "audiophile" aka $200+ soundcard, but I find it very practical, and the quality far better than cheaper wired headsets through a soundcard.

 

[rtwjunkie]

Yes. No sound card needed with that. That's what I run on my workstation. Use it for skype and gaming. Works well. It may not be "audiophile" aka $200+ soundcard, but I find it very practical, and the quality far better than cheaper wired headsets through a soundcard.

I agree! USB headsets using the onboard sound have very decent quality! I use them for playing ME3 multiplayer.

 

[rtwjunkie]

Get a "riser" extension to move the PCI slots (for the iRAM and the sound card) away so you have more space.

WARNING. iRAM is 1.5 slots with normal DDR. You have to use super-low-profile DDR to get the iRAM into 1 slot.

Would using one of those Gigabyte i-RAM disks make it easier for me to just stick with Windows XP 32bit for my Conroe865 re-build? I'm thinking that if I used it as my swap file, it would make the 3.8Gb limitation of the OS easier to deal with...making it "feel" like a 64-bit system with 8Gb of RAM. Or am I totally off-base here?

 

[TRWOV]

more or less. Since the pagefile would be sitting on the iRAM it'll effectively be like adding another 4GB of RAM to the system. Programs and such won't be able to address it, they'll still be limited to 3.8GB, but if the lack of RAM makes your system rely on the pagefile, access will be like 1000x faster. Don't expect miracles though, pagefile access is still pretty fast on modern SATA disks. It was more of an issue with the old PATA drives due to lack of NQC and other SATA enhancements.

Also, you don't need to stick with XP 32 on the Conroe865PE, W7 64bit works beautifully.

 

[Completely Bonkers]

Use half the iRAM memory for pagefile, and use the rest for your temps directory and internet cache. Will make your PC much more snappy. But along the lines of what TRWOV said, it will help memory and I/O bottlenecks, but wont really "speed up" the PC in normal use.

 

[rtwjunkie]

@TRWOV: W7 64bit...I'm drooling. I was for sure it would be limited, since last I used it was on XP. Thanks! I especially liked your explanation of the i-Ram and pagefile in ref to this mb. IIRC though, I wasn't able to boot off of either of the two SATA drives before, that the PATA was required for the boot/OS drive. Or am I mistaken?

@Completely Bonkers: All these years, and I am sad to say I didn't realize I could designate the location of the internet cache.

 

[TRWOV]

@TRWOV: W7 64bit...I'm drooling. I was for sure it would be limited, since last I used it was on XP. Thanks! I especially liked your explanation of the i-Ram and pagefile in ref to this mb. IIRC though, I wasn't able to boot off of either of the two SATA drives before, that the PATA was required for the boot/OS drive. Or am I mistaken?

Don't know about that. Mine boots up from SATA drives just fine. What bios are you using?

Another way to speed up your system would be SSD caching (like what Intel offers in Z68/Z77 motheboards). You can use this http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=245&area=en and you wouldn't be limited to 4GB. Although I don't know if it works at the file level (too much wear on the SSD) or block level, might want to query Silverstone on that.

If you go with that make sure to pickup a SSD with good garbage collection algorithms as TRIM wouldn't be enabled on the drive since it wouldn't be accesible to the OS. Samsung and Phison based SSD are pretty good for that.

 

[rtwjunkie]

Don't know about that. Mine boots up from SATA drives just fine. What bios are you using?

IIRC, I had 1.7 installed. I'm going to attempt to get it going this weekend and see what I can do with this mb again. Thanks for the advice!

 

[bigbigbuddy]

Stumped

Alrighty, as the title states, Stumped.

I've been keeping up with this forum topic for a while and once I finally have all my parts together (including the Conroe865pe Motherboard) nothing works 8D

Specs:

HIS Radeon HD 4670 AGP 8x
Core2 Quad Extreme QX6700
4x DDR400 Ram (Dual-Channel)

Now, at first I realized that I needed to update the BIOS, I got a hold of a Pentium 4 processor from a nearby FutureShop (they let me borrow it). Once I placed in the P4 and it ran I knew it wasn't the motherboard, so I updated the BIOS to 1.70 (successful), restarted it and everything looked completely fine. So I shut it off and placed in the QX6700, turned it on and........................ nothing NumLock won't show up, nothing on screen, just 2 spinning fans on the GPU and CPU.

I checked the FSB Jumper, yup it's set to 2+3. Place the P4 back in? Works like a charm.

Also overclocked the DRAM to 400 MHz (since it was running on 333, as said in the BIOS) with the P4, completely fine.

Downgraded the BIOS to 1.50, still nothing x-x

I just noticed that you guys posted 1.72 will try that right now.

Though I am really stumped =[ it shouldn't be the CPU because the person who sold it to me had it brand new and untouched, still in it's original packaging. If it is the CPU I will seriously cry because I've gone through so many auctions and people constantly dropping a deal for a higher buyer. I don't want to go through the trouble of buying another one just to find out that it isn't the CPU either

Help...?

 

[bigbigbuddy]

1.72 ... Fail

Still nothing even with the 1.72 update...

OH and as a notice, Dual Channel mode is supported in 1.72

EDIT:

Just noticed that the FSB Jumper has a little note beside it that says:

1-2 Normal
2-3 Test

Could it be that my Motherboard is an earlier version and that it doesn't support 1066MHz? Even though it's written in clear white text on the motherboard FSB1066, it could be a fluke x-x

EDIT2:

Got it running, after placing in the P4 I set the FSB to Manual and left it at 200. I than placed in the QX6700 and it ran perfectly, so now I'm guessing it doesn't want to support a proper 266MHz?

The Ram should support it as it's CL2.5 Ram. Also, the CPU is unlocked but it won't even let me change the multiplier in the BIOS (can only be changed with software?)

UGH shine some light?

EDIT3: Just noticed in the manual "Ratio CMOS Setting", any idea why it's not showing when it's supported by my Processor?

EDIT4: Excuse edit 3, changed the "Intel SpeedStep Technology" to Disabled and now I can change the Multiplier.

EDIT5: Got it to run on a 247Mhz FSB with a x13 Multiplier. So it's running at 3.2Ghz. I have quite the hefty cooler inside the thing so it should run flawlessly without any problems. Though I believe the problem lies around the RAM, possibly the RAM:CPU Ratio? (like in previous posts) Though it shouldn't be as this Ram is meant for overclocking >_> (CL2.5 DDR400 Ram with Heat Spreaders)

 

[rtwjunkie]

@bigbigbuddy, The board natively runs on an 800Mhz FSB. It actually has to be jumpered to go to a 1066 bus. I remember you can change all you want in BIOS, but unless the jumper is correct, it's a no-go. That's about all I can think of...or did I miss that? I think that's what you were referring to, but not sure.

Also, that's great news and a real good find on supporting dual-channel on the modified 1.72! Thanks!

 

[TRWOV]

Core 2 support requires CL2.5 RAM. Is your RAM CL3? EDIT: I see it's CL2.5 so NVM.

To move the multiplier you have to disable SpeedStep in the bios. EDIT: Again late to the party, I see you discovered yourself.

RAM will work at 3:2 with 1066FSB CPUs regardless of bios settings. You have to install a modified bios to run 1:1 or 5:4.

 

[bigbigbuddy]

@bigbigbuddy, The board natively runs on an 800Mhz FSB. It actually has to be jumpered to go to a 1066 bus. I remember you can change all you want in BIOS, but unless the jumper is correct, it's a no-go. That's about all I can think of...or did I miss that? I think that's what you were referring to, but not sure.

Also, that's great news and a real good find on supporting dual-channel on the modified 1.72! Thanks!

As I stated, I changed the Jumper to 1066 ;P
Also, no problem =]

Core 2 support requires CL2.5 RAM. Is your RAM CL3? EDIT: I see it's CL2.5 so NVM.

To move the multiplier you have to disable SpeedStep in the bios. EDIT: Again late to the party, I see you discovered yourself.

RAM will work at 3:2 with 1066FSB CPUs regardless of bios settings. You have to install a modified bios to run 1:1 or 5:4.

Isn't the 1.72 BIOS modified with that ratio? I do have a modified 1.50 BIOS, and I believe it has the ratio adjusted but someone in an earlier post mentioned that he ended up with some sort of problems.

And I've always been confused about the Ratios, is it 2 thirds of the FSB is transferred over towards the RAM?

Mathematical way of what I am interpreting:

2/3=0.66666667

0.66666667*266=177.333333

Is my RAM running at 177.3 MHz (354.7)? If so, I am so lost x-x as the RAM should be capable of withholding at least 200MHz (400).

EDIT: The BIOS that b1gt1m posted, I'm weary about it >_> but that still doesn't help with the fact that my RAM is refusing to work at proper speeds x-x

Spent a good 150$ on all 4, would have purchased some CL2.0 RAM but that's almost impossible to find, unless you want to spend around 300$+ for just 4 sticks. Still though, it should work at 177.3 =/

 

[TRWOV]

It's one of the downfalls of the Conroe865PE. In fact, that and the chipset RAM limitation (865 can only address 3519MB of RAM even with 64bit OS) is what prevents it from being the perfect AGP board but then there aren't any other AGP board that can work with such (old) high end CPU without caveats.


Yes, with the offical bios you're running your RAM at 177Mhz (run CPU-Z to confirm). The hacked 5:4 bios would allow you to run your RAM at 213Mhz which CL2.5 RAM shouldn't have any problems with. 1:1 would be more tricky as I can't think of any 1GB module that could rate CL2.5 at 266Ghz. You'd have to step down to 512MB modules to get CL2.5 @ 266Ghz so I think 5:4 is the best scenario for 4GB. The drawnback is that the 5:4 bios is based on a very old release (1.50).

 

[bigbigbuddy]

What are the official differences between 1.50 and later editions that the QX6700 could benefit from? I know they added Stepping codes, Microcodes, etc.. but if I won't be losing much of anything from downgrading to the modified 1.50 than I'll do it, as long as I can get a confirmation that it's reliable >_>

 

[TRWOV]

1.60 supposedly fixed an issue with SpeedStep. If you can live without that then you shouldn't worry as 1.50 supports the QX6700 just fine.

 

[TRWOV]

Testing with W8. So far two issues have come up:

1- although not a fault in the motheboard, AGP ATi bridged cards won't install properly using the Catalyst installer. The installer doesn't detect them and so it won't install the driver. You can, however, install the driver manually from the device manager. Point the driver search towards C:\AMD\Support and let W8 find the driver. CCC won't run either but you can use Trixx or Afterburner if you need to OC your card. APP and the video decoders install fine but I don't know how to test them.

2- Fast Startup doesn't seem to play nice with the board, at least not with the default settings. Maybe there's a bios setting somewhere that could make it work as intended.

Testing...

 

[bigbigbuddy]

Alright so I've been trying t install Windows XP Pro 64-bit and Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit and I've gone through several problems directed towards the graphics

I have the 12.4 Hotfix for 64 bit of both Windows and everytime I install in never gives me the option to install the drivers, CCC, or anything slightly important. All it shows is the Install Manager, .NET 2.0 for XP and HDMI Audio in 7.

I can manually install the INF, but would still like to have CCC. >_>

I also figured out that my CPU to RAM ratio is 1:1 as much as it could be good for pushing the RAM, it won't let me even hit 255 FSB without giving me BSODs or being completely unstable. Pushing DDR400 right to DDR510 is overkill in my opinion :shadedshu I only have it run to about 233MHz with the multiplier at 13x, running at 3.02GHz. Don't want the FSB to go much farther, and after running Memtest86+ for a good 3 hours, I resulted with 0 errors. I consider myself lucky after pushing the life out the RAM and having to pull up no errors.

Oh and since this motherboard only allows me to use about 3.4 GB of RAM, wouldn't it be much more reliable to just install a 32-bit windows? Yeah 64-bit applications could run faster, but I'm also thinking that the 64-bit Windows is what's encouraging the problems I have been having with my display drivers.

EDIT: I'm still running on BIOS 1.72.

EDIT2: Try manually installing the INF in Windows 7, gives me an error stating that I already have the latest drivers installed when in fact it's using the Windows standard VGA driver.

 

[TRWOV]

Alright so I've been trying t install Windows XP Pro 64-bit and Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit and I've gone through several problems directed towards the graphics

I have the 12.4 Hotfix for 64 bit of both Windows and everytime I install in never gives me the option to install the drivers, CCC, or anything slightly important. All it shows is the Install Manager, .NET 2.0 for XP and HDMI Audio in 7.

I can manually install the INF, but would still like to have CCC. >_>

EDIT2: Try manually installing the INF in Windows 7, gives me an error stating that I already have the latest drivers installed when in fact it's using the Windows standard VGA driver.

Are you sure it's the 12.4 AGP hotfix? There is a 12.4b hotfix in AMD site but that doesn't work for AGP cards. 12.6 Legacy supposedly has support for AGP cards but the DEV ID for the AGP cards isn't present in the INF so it doesn't detects them either. 12.4 AGP was the last working release.

12.4 AGP hotfix installs fine in W7 64bit. AMD no longer has 12.4 AGP in its servers but Sapphire does:
http://www.sapphiretech.com/presentation/downloads/?pid=275&psn=0006&lid=1&os=6

If you're indeed using 12.4b hotfix, W7 won't find a driver because the INF file doesn't point to the AGP card it in the first place. Download 12.4 AGP from Sapphire and try again.

I also figured out that my CPU to RAM ratio is 1:1 as much as it could be good for pushing the RAM, it won't let me even hit 255 FSB without giving me BSODs or being completely unstable. Pushing DDR400 right to DDR510 is overkill in my opinion :shadedshu I only have it run to about 233MHz with the multiplier at 13x, running at 3.02GHz. Don't want the FSB to go much farther, and after running Memtest86+ for a good 3 hours, I resulted with 0 errors. I consider myself lucky after pushing the life out the RAM and having to pull up no errors.

That's because you set the FSB at 200. Load the default bios values and re-start. It should pickup your QX6700 and set the FSB at 266. RAM wil run 3:2. Also, don't forget to set the FSB jumper to TEST.

Oh and since this motherboard only allows me to use about 3.4 GB of RAM, wouldn't it be much more reliable to just install a 32-bit windows? Yeah 64-bit applications could run faster, but I'm also thinking that the 64-bit Windows is what's encouraging the problems I have been having with my display drivers.

EDIT: I'm still running on BIOS 1.72.

I would recommend you to run with 1.70 first to pin down the real issue. !.70 was the last official bios from Asrock and supports your QX6700 with no problems, 1.72 offers no advantage with your setup.


As for the OS choice, I'm behindk W7 64 100%. It'll allow you to make the most of 865's limited memory mapping as the GPU RAM won't have to share registries with the OS RAM. W7 64 has worked flawlessly for me. I'm even using an "unsupported" CPU (QX6800) and it still runs fine.

XP is fine but has many drawbacks: no DX10, less accessible memory (due to GPU memory being mirrored in the system memory), no TRIM support (for SSDs) and no LAA support. XP64 solves some of that but has many other driver related issues.


W8 works almost as well as W7 but has some rugged edges.

 

[TRWOV]

more W8 testing...

I disabled Fast Startup but the boot times are extremely long for some reason (about a minute) Maybe it's the SATA 1 connection? W7 started in about the same time as in my main rig so I don't think is that.

Got my Physx card working but for some reason the physx properties reset after each bootup EDIT: fixed, ran as adminstrator.

 

[bigbigbuddy]

Wow, you my friend are a hero. I've downloaded so many display drivers from the AMD website, assuming the downloads were directed towards AGP and in fact I had drivers that weren't properly compatible.

I'm going to stick to the 1:1 Ratio for now, as I've found a decent clock that not only overclocks the CPU decently but pushes the RAM a bit, but not to the point of squeezing the life out of it. Also, I've had the jumper changed to TEST ever since I got it

I did some research on the RAM that you're using (Mushkin DDR Redline XP4000) and I want to ask, in your opinion is it possibly the best choice of RAM for a build like this? Since it's DDR500, I would assume my 1:1 Ratio could work perfectly with it if I want to increase the FSB. I have it running on 222 (DDR444) which is quite fine for the RAM currently in there, but with DDR500, I'm sure I could reach 266 (DDR532) no problem since my CPU fan towers over most of the RAM and shoots cool air down on it

 

[TRWOV]

Your RAM is fine. DDR500 modules are in fact DDR400 CL2 modules with SPD settings for DDR500 so you can get DDR500 out of DDR400 CL2 modules by loosening timmings. My Redlines do 3-3-2-8 @ 250Mhz but can do 2-3-2-5@200Mhz which is what most CL2 sticks are rated at. Set your timmings manually to 3-3-2-8 and I'm sure you could reach 266Mhz with no problems.

 

[bigbigbuddy]

Well my RAM has a CL Latency of 2.5, would that in fact matter at all? Also I changed the FSB to 215 and changed the multiplier to 14 so that I can get a 3GHz clock. Just pulled up L4D2 with Highest settings enabled and it runs like a dream so I'm gonna play a few levels

I'll change the settings to what you recommended in a bit, if I can get it running like that, than I'll have no troubles running my CPU to 3.4GHz