Well, the OCZ stuff belongs to me and the Dominator ram belongs to the [H]. If you have the money, the Dominator PC8888 memory is the better choice. They clock higher, and are close latency wise. They also seem to be more stable at default settings on the Striker Extreme. At least that was my experience.
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NVIDIA nForce 680i Solutions
- Thread starter FrgMstr
- Start date
Well, the OCZ stuff belongs to me and the Dominator ram belongs to the [H]. If you have the money, the Dominator PC8888 memory is the better choice. They clock higher, and are close latency wise. They also seem to be more stable at default settings on the Striker Extreme. At least that was my experience.
SomeoneElse
[H]ard|Gawd
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I was wondering if you guys had any ideas of what i should do.
I bought a whole new set-up about a week ago and after reading the updates on the 680i boards (eVGA) i have been a little reserved on if i should go ahead and work through the headaches or just switch to the intel chipsets.
I just bought:
Intel Core 2 Q6700,
EVGA NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
X-Fi sound card (i see there are compatiblity problems with these cards and the 680i chipset)
OCZ Platnium 2GB DDR2 800 ram
PNY GeForce 8800GTX 768MB PCI Express x16 Video Card
HITACHI Deskstar 7K160 160GB 7200 RPM IDE Ultra ATA133 Hard Drive
Would it be worth the change over ? If so anyone want to buy a brand new un-opened eVGA baord, and what is a good board to switch to with the intel chipset?
I won't be able to build this computer until Feb, being that im not in country right now.
Thanks guys
I bought a whole new set-up about a week ago and after reading the updates on the 680i boards (eVGA) i have been a little reserved on if i should go ahead and work through the headaches or just switch to the intel chipsets.
I just bought:
Intel Core 2 Q6700,
EVGA NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
X-Fi sound card (i see there are compatiblity problems with these cards and the 680i chipset)
OCZ Platnium 2GB DDR2 800 ram
PNY GeForce 8800GTX 768MB PCI Express x16 Video Card
HITACHI Deskstar 7K160 160GB 7200 RPM IDE Ultra ATA133 Hard Drive
Would it be worth the change over ? If so anyone want to buy a brand new un-opened eVGA baord, and what is a good board to switch to with the intel chipset?
I won't be able to build this computer until Feb, being that im not in country right now.
Thanks guys
SLI??? if yes then I'd recommend the ASUS P5N32-E SLI (680i board)
No SLI......cheap, Gigabyte GA-965P DS3......A little more feature rich, Gigabyte GA-965-P DQ6.....both will OC like a bandit......you can read reviews on the enthusiast. I have a DS3 and its a great board, I also have a P5n32-E SLI and I really like it alot as well.
mentok1982
Supreme [H]ardness
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- 4,372
I was gonna get an Evga but I might want to one day add an aftermarket air cooler and then
later I wanna watercool at least the CPU. I am hoping this just launched Gigabyte Quad
GA-N680SLI-DQ6 board will get some rave reviews so i can be sure I spend my money well.
http://www.gigabyte-usa.com/News/Company/News_List.aspx?NewsID=1323
I am gonna use a Q6600, 2GB Crucial Ballistx PC8000 DDR2, Auzentech Xplosion 7.1 DTS
soundcard and I want to start with one Evga 8800 GTX so I can have the option of stepping up
to the 8900 if it is launched in March.
later I wanna watercool at least the CPU. I am hoping this just launched Gigabyte Quad
GA-N680SLI-DQ6 board will get some rave reviews so i can be sure I spend my money well.
http://www.gigabyte-usa.com/News/Company/News_List.aspx?NewsID=1323
I am gonna use a Q6600, 2GB Crucial Ballistx PC8000 DDR2, Auzentech Xplosion 7.1 DTS
soundcard and I want to start with one Evga 8800 GTX so I can have the option of stepping up
to the 8900 if it is launched in March.
SomeoneElse
[H]ard|Gawd
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I take that as your telling me to switch boards then? All i really want to know is, Is it really worth the headaches to work with?
I can confirm that the P24 BIOS on the eVGA 680i solves the X-Fi/SLI sound issue.
The eVGA board is pretty good now. It's finally matured enough for me to start recommending them again. The Intel chipset boards are great, but if you want SLI, the 680i is really your only choice right now.
SomeoneElse
[H]ard|Gawd
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Thanks Dan_D Thats all i needed to know. I just wanted to hear if it was worth the fight or not. How well does ths board OC with the Quad core because i have heard there have been some problems with the two together?
Unfortunately I haven't had the opportunity to work with quad core CPUs as of yet. Hopefully the Q6600 becomes available at the $531 price tag soon. If it does, I'll get one fairly quickly.
AuroraProject
Gawd
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- Dec 13, 2004
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- 820
For what it's worth, there's a BETA BIOS out for the Striker Extreme with this list of fixes:
Striker Extreme beta BIOS 0802
1. Enhance memory compatibility
2. Fixed power Fan can't work after S3.
3. Set DDR2 Termination Max default Voltage to 1.25V (Memory Voltage is 2.5V)
4. Add patch to support Creative X-FI sound Card
5. Speed up S3 resume time.
6. Change CopyRight year from 2006 to 2007.
7. Fixed memory clock mode option may disappear when SLI ready memory is used.
Download links:
http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
http://dlsvr03.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
http://dlsvr02.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
Maybe this will be the one to fix the X-Fi problems? /hopes
Striker Extreme beta BIOS 0802
1. Enhance memory compatibility
2. Fixed power Fan can't work after S3.
3. Set DDR2 Termination Max default Voltage to 1.25V (Memory Voltage is 2.5V)
4. Add patch to support Creative X-FI sound Card
5. Speed up S3 resume time.
6. Change CopyRight year from 2006 to 2007.
7. Fixed memory clock mode option may disappear when SLI ready memory is used.
Download links:
http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
http://dlsvr03.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
http://dlsvr02.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/Stricker Extreme/SE0802.zip
Maybe this will be the one to fix the X-Fi problems? /hopes
The timings are really pretty good on it. 4,4,3,14. As far as performance is concerned it will clock up to 1000MHz (DDR2). The memory is only actually rated for 900MHz, but as I said, I've run it higher than that before.
The Corsair in contrast is a much more expensive set of modules. The Corsair memory has higher timings, but is capable of clocking much higher. With that said, the main reason I would pick the Corsair is for compatibility reasons. There are one or two boards that I've had to make some adjustments on to stabalize them with the OCZ ram.
As far as clockspeed, at 1:1 settings, the OCZ ram is rated for 454MHz (454x2 DDR2), but it may clock higher for you as it does me. Most motherboards will hit their max around that 454 mark, give or take. So it should be adequate for 1:1 use on most boards with most CPUs. I would go with the Corsair Dominator if you can afford it and plan on overclocking E6300 or E6400 CPUs. Mainly because you will need to ensure you can reach 500MHz+ FSB speeds for sure.
I built an eVGA 680i system here recently for a friend of mine and the data corruption issue hasn't been a problem. The board came with BIOS P23 and was flashed to P24. So far his RAID array is working perfectly. Machines going on two weeks old and is doing well.
Yup, they got it for the p5n32-e sli too.
P5N32-E SLI BETA BIOS Release version 0702
1. Enhance memory compatibility
2. Fixed power Fan can't work after S3.
3. Set DDR2 Termination Max default Votlage to 1.25V (Memory Voltage is 2.5V)
4. Add patch to support Creative X-FI sound Card
5. Speed up S3 resume time.
6. Change CopyRight year from 2006 to 2007.
http://dlsvr01.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/P5N32-E SLI/0702.zip
But these X-fi's... I'm just using a simple creative sound blaster audigy for 5.1 channels, and it sounds great. Does everything REALLY sound that much better on the X-fi's?
I mean, my speakers were $60 bucks so I tried, but I couldn't justify spending ~$100 on a sound card to myself. Can anyone justify it for me?
Glad to hear it, I ended up going with this MB and will be building soon. Hope the issues are resolved for the most part.
SpaceHonkey
Gawd
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- Jan 25, 2007
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- 983
I'm on the P24 BIOS and I just started seeing disk errors for the first time today - "The driver detected a controller error on \Device\Harddisk1\D."
Until the BIOS issues are corrected I wouldn't recommend anyone buy this board yet. Hopefully eVGA/NVIDIA can get these issues resolved - all of them!
I'm wondering if it's a hardware problem with the earlier boards. The newer ones I've seen seem to be fine.
w1retap
[H]F Junkie
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- Jul 17, 2006
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Well.. my buddy and I just rebuilt his e6300/8800gtx/850wPSU machine with a Evga 680i. wow... Its the most work I've ever done to just get a pc to boot.. or post for that matter. This 680i board is horrible from what I see. First it booted up just fine and we setup all the right boot orders and memory timings, then installed windows. Upon restart, it just hung on bios. Then we'd restart, and it would hang again.. Did some trouble shooing and took out a stick of ram and it booted fine. (2x 1GB Corsair DDR2-800) Put the other ram stick back in, and it wouldn't boot. Reset CMOS with both ram sticks in, it would boot. Then go into windows and it would work fine, then restart and it wouldn't boot again. Ran memtest, memory is fine, ran CPU tests, cpu is fine. I troubleshot everything I could think of, checked all connections, updated to latest bios, etc. It seems to not want to boot out of a cold boot. Well, we started on this at 7pm, now its 2am, so we gave up. More updates later on... =/
Make sure you are running the latest BIOS. Also you may need to increase your memory voltage to 2.1v. That seems to be what these boards want with most ram.
w1retap
[H]F Junkie
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Well, he just reverted to an older bios and it works fine now.. lol.
DeltaSniper203
Gawd
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so how does the eVga 680i OC? On my ASUS I can get to 3.4ghz pretty easy, can teh 680i break 400 FSB without issues? I'm thinking of picking one up tomorrow
Typically the eVGA 680i will whoop the P5W DH at overclocking. Typically you can do 450+ on the eVGA 680i board.
revenant
[H]F Squad Captain
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if you get the p5w dh with the 1.85 mch you can get to 450 usually.. with some extra cooling on the NB.
DeltaSniper203
Gawd
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actually my MCH is at 1.85 right now...and I'm stuck at 425
but thats some good news, glad to hear that the 680i is a good OCer
looks like I'm gonna get one tomorrow, will update how it turns out
but thats some good news, glad to hear that the 680i is a good OCer
looks like I'm gonna get one tomorrow, will update how it turns out
BinarySynapse
[H]F Junkie
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It definately matters. If you flash the wrong manufacturer's BIOS you'll most likely brick your board. Post a picture of it and maybe someone could help identify it for you.
lol, i like that "brick your board". Be carefule like he says, but you don't know which manufacture you purchased the board from?
I actually bought the board from my friend who works are nvidia. See pic below. Over the cpu socket, the cover says foxconn. I havent had a chance to get in touch with my friend, but will try to ask him once I can. Theres a white sticker near the dimm slot that says "NFORCE 608i SLI 0444706001419" above there theres "PCB: 180-7R093-0000-C00"
Im running an X6800 oc'd to 3.2 and my 680i reports it sitting idle at 60 C! its water cooled and the block is just barely warm. on full load (before it shuts down that is) it hits 80 to 85C. is this a misreading or is it real? ntune and the bios read these temps. any ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Colby
Colby
BinarySynapse
[H]F Junkie
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Looks to me like you got an nVidia reference board made by Foxconn. I'm sure it's the same board that eVGA is selling since they just bought Foxconn's board and stuck their label on it.
One reason for that is that Foxconn actually makes the CPU sockets and PCI slots, SATA ports and many other actual board components. This is true of motherboards Foxconn doesn't manufacture themselves.
BillR
Born Again Cynic
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- Feb 17, 2002
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Water-cooling these days covers a very wide variety of product, not all of them being well suited to a board like this.
That said, getting a water block into that tight area and keeping it aligned can be one real pain. How much strain is on your cooling tubes? Twice this week Ive seen the block actually pulled away from the CPU do to badly managed lines.
Make sure your water block and radiator can actually dissipate 300 watts plus, many cant even though the ad might say it can.
I run Folding At Home 24/7 (3.5 gig) on my EVGA with a Koolance Exos II with no issues EXCEPT I originally had too much strain on the hoses. My temps average 40c and below under full load.
If your CPU is reaching shut down temps you could easily do damage, so be careful.
Luck
thanks. my hoses are not tight at all and they are really free. im just guessing that its a faulty chip. i threw in an e6600 and it was completely normal and sitting 27C at idle. so im gonna order another x6800 tonight and find ouy if it is a faulty chip or a possible but not likely bad mobo.
AuroraProject
Gawd
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My X6800 overclocked to 3.8ghz idles at 40-42C and loads at 53C on a 680i with water cooling. I'd say something is wrong on your setup.
vanilla_guerilla
Supreme [H]ardness
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foxconn manufactures the evga, xfx, bfg, and possibly the biostar and maybe 1 or 2 more. all the reference boards are manufactured by foxconn. or were. since they have been so successful (sales) there maybe another manufacturer or 2 now. foxconn also manufactures a lot of the intel branded boards, like bx and bx2.
edit i guess you know this
above poster - you rma'd the mainboard and the cpu? did you try air-cooling it? sure sounds like your block wasnt making good contact or something else wrong with your wc setup.
Foxconn makes entire motherboards among other things. They also make alot of those connector components too. CPU sockets, sata ports, and other motherboard components are physically made by Foxconn as well.