XFX nForce 780i SLI @ [H]

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

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XFX nForce 780i SLI - XFX’s motherboard based on the newly introduced NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI chipset appears to have enough power to hold its own against the current batch of Intel chipset based boards. Can this DDR2 solution really stand against Intel’s DDR3 based onslaught?

The XFX nForce 780i SLI board is a well designed solution with solid performance. While in some benchmarks the board was not the top performer, it always managed to stay within respectable margins of the top boards as well as ahead of the AMD solutions.
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I'll be interesting to see the difference in oc between the Evga 780i SLI FTW Edition vs Reference design. Nice simple review.
 
Wow the difference in the LP Cave was shocking. I didn't expect Intel and DDR3 to lead like that.

It's true you probably won't feel it in regular gaming @ a decent res and I'm still a bit shocked.

I've been thinking about trying one of these boards and can't convince myself to take the next step. Maybe when the 9800s come.
 
Funny to see how fast the price dropped from ~$300 to $250.

Evga Price History

XFX Price History

Wish I could just pay the difference now (~$20) to upgrade my evga 680i to the 780i vs the $70 or whatever they originally wanted.

Any Tri-SLI reviews planned, or are you guys waiting for the 9 series first? :)
 
Well in reguards to overclocking...

I got my Q6600 G0 to run at 3.6 with only a slight increase to cpu voltage(1.45) the very first time.

The asus P5N32-E sli(680i) that I used to have I never could get to work period.

I am very pleased at the performance of my xfx board...
 
NiViK said:
Well in reguards to overclocking...

I got my Q6600 G0 to run at 3.6 with only a slight increase to cpu voltage(1.45) the very first time.

The asus P5N32-E sli(680i) that I used to have I never could get to work period.

I am very pleased at the performance of my xfx board...
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How about all the ESA-ntune stuff??? Does it work??? I tried it on my 680i board and found it to be a giant turd.
 
A bit confused on the conclusion page of the review. Both reviewers chimed in on stability, and Kyle pointed out the lack of solid state caps and 8 phase power regulators (all good points) but I did not see a [H] Award or rating. Guess the better question would be: You you guys recommend this board? Gold? Silver?
 
Can it go into S3 and resume and still have a working NIC? The Asus Striker 2 NICs fall over after resuming from S3. Can you bolt an aftermarket cool onto the thing, IE: is the back of the CPU clear of obstructions?
 
MrE said:
A bit confused on the conclusion page of the review. Both reviewers chimed in on stability, and Kyle pointed out the lack of solid state caps and 8 phase power regulators (all good points) but I did not see a [H] Award or rating. Guess the better question would be: You you guys recommend this board? Gold? Silver?
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I think we were very specific, but here it is again. Please read it then ask any questions.


The XFX nForce 780i 3-Way SLI Intel Motherboard seems to be a very solid choice of motherboard for those of you looking to use SLI configurations. NVIDIA of course still keeps SLI locked down to its motherboard chipsets only so your choices are very narrow when looking for an SLI motherboard. Simply put, we would still rather use Intel motherboard chipsets in our own systems, but we could warm up to an XFX motherboard if we had to have an SLI video card configuration. And at around $260 it sports a solid array of features for the price point.


Out of the four 780i motherboards we have had through our hands, the NVIDIA reference designed motherboards without a doubt have been the standouts. If I am going to do SLI (two or three cards on this board), either an XFX or EVGA 780i motherboard would find its way into my system. Worth mentioning is that this 780i motherboard also has support for NVIDIA Enthusiast System Architecture, better known as ESA, which has some very cool features you can build a system around.
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I read it, and re-read it. You seemed to say its great, but you'd prefer an Intel chipset based motherboard to which I agree with. I guess I'm just used to seeing a Gold, Silver, Bronze, award or an emphatic "stay away" like with the Ultra 750 PSU review. From what I gathered from the conclusion, its more on the scale of "Meh" or mediocre. May explain why Nvidia is working on 790i boards as the 780i only bring Tri-SLI to the plate over the 680i.
 
Burning_Sensation said:
Turd?
Is that a technical term?
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Why yes, I believe it is.
In my limited experience with the ESA software, it crashed my computer hard, somewhat like a frozen turd.
It may be that the ESA software doesnt like my 680i chipset?
But I see it as spit-polished ntune which is just a turd by anyother name.

I would like to see the review of the FTW version coming from EVGA. I think that board will be the 780i board to own.
 
I dunno, I've had this board for a little over a month now and I'm fully impressed. It seems to do better than my friend's early 680i EVGA boards on overclocking. I certainly do not see a wall at 450 (1800) FSB like the reviewers noted. I'm running at 500 right now, and have been for two weeks with a wolfdale e8400. (BTW 4.5ghz wolfdale core2 = teh fast) I did have to toss in a little spare core voltage to maintain stability (I never power this system down), though I think that is mainly because I'm probably at the top end limit of my PSU.

I do agree with the point that some applications are a tad slower for no apparent reason. windows media encoding usually misses its time estimate by a few minutes over. Not a huge deal in the scheme of a 2 hour encode, but still it is an odd note, and hopefully not an indicator of future performance issues.

Granted I am running Vista 64bit as well, which is also notoriously just a tad slower for no apparent reason. Though drivers are most often blamed. I'd go back to 32bit or even XP but with 4gb of system RAM and a 512mb video card I just don't feel like going back to the RAM management oddities I faced on XP pro with this setup. Plus Vista Ultimate x64 is very shiny...

All in all I love the board, and my experiences have been great.

Full System Specs:
Antec A900 case
Antec 650W Neopower
XFX 780i (@500 fsb)
4gb OCZ Vista Upgrade Kit
E8400 [email protected] 1.4825v
OCZ Vendetta w/AS5
8800GT 512mb (G92)
X-fi Fatal1ty Pro (though mostly useless as far as gaming on Vista the breakout box with XLR inputs is handy for micro-studio work)
D-Link B/G PCI WiFi Card
OS Drive: Seagate 320gb 7200.10 16gb (perp rec)
Storage Drive: Newegg Recertified Seagate 500gb 7200.11 32mb
BenQ burners: 52/32/52 CDRW, 16/12/16/48 DVDRW
Soon to be replaced Dell 1907FP 19" LCD (though I'm going to miss my 200fps average in CS:S at 12x10, lol)
 
If the 9800GT cards truly work in Tri SLi I just might have try this board, and a three way :p
 
warrior;
nice to hear you like the board.
As I have asked, but will again......do you use the ntune or the ESA stuff???
If so, does it work and do you think it is OK???
Have you had to update your BIOS???? If so how did you do it???
Do you use the BIOS directly to OC or do you do it all via the EAS or ntune or performance-thingy whatever nvidia calls it?

Believe me, I ask these questions because I have looked and can find no answers;( Ive read the respective evga and XFX board manuals )or my experiences with my 680i MB and the software have been poor.
Any help you can give me is much appreciated.:D
 
for overclocking, who cares about dual core? pretty much every chipset out there can get to 450 for a duallie, reviews should provide overclocking results with a quad core, as those are truly indicative of the quality of the board, chipset and bios.
 
magoo:

Nope, ntune/ESA both crash on vista 64bit for me so I'm pure bios, as I always have been. The idea of automagic tools was shattered for me on my old gigabyte nf4, where gigabytes tool was teh suck, and liked to crash my system half the time when applying my stable o/c post boot, so I went back to old school bios manipulation.

As far as updating the bios, nope, I'm using the bios that came on the board as I've had no issues with it yet. Granted I'm using basically all high quality parts so there should be no real issues out of the box, unless something else changes down the road. the 9xxx nvidia cards are starting to make me salivate...

Stabbin':
Metoo bro, metoo. Me loves my wolfdale.
 
I picked up an XFX 780i board this morning from my local Fry's. Once I get my processor and video card(s) squared away, I will be sure to leave some feedback on my experience...

Chances are I'm going 45nm, but not confirmed yet...

- Joey
 
I picked up the eVGA 780i board and a Q6600 (@$199) at my local Microcenter yesterday along with a 8800GT. With 4GB of Corsair ram and Vista Ultimate 64 bit I am running stable at 3.2Ghz with a noob overclock on stock voltage and the stock intel fan/heatsink. I think I could go higher, but this thing is hauling already! :)

I must say the board is laid out well and the performance of this combo compared to my old P4 prescott running at 3.5ghz with X1950pro agp is like night and day.

I'm planning on added another 8800GT once the prices fall a little bit with the release of the new 9 series. All in all, I think the 780i is a great design, but after looking at [H]'s testing, I'm curious as to the performance difference between this and the intel chipsets.
 
Sorry for not replying before now.

I loaded up the ntune beta and then uninstalled it after about 30 mins.

I didnt have any crashes...but it would not keep the OC settings for the vid cards and would always drop them to defaults.

I Have been running this board since Feb 4th now at 3.6 boinc 24/7 and not a single burp. i even lowered the cpu to 1.40 in bios...still no probs...

The only problem I have had is last week msupdate pushed an update to my pc. I had thought I had turned off auto updating, but I must not have. I believe it was an update to the nvidia raid drivers...after that for the next 2 day smy pc would randomly reboot...no bluescreen or anything...event viewer only said it detected an improper shutdown but didnt say why.

After rolling my pc back to the tay before the update its rock stable again.
 
Picked up another pair of 1GB Ballistix pc2-6400 for a total of 4GB. XP is only reporting 2.75GB for some reason. :(

Edit: CPU-Z is reporting it as being 4.096GB.. Wtf?
 
thats because XP is only a 32 bit operating system. If you get the 64bit version of XP or get vista 64bit then you are good to go.
 
Follow up on my prior post. I couldn't resist and had to try overclocking this thing higher, which it did without a problem. I upgraded my cooling to an Arctic Cooling F7pro and now am running 3.6ghz on my q6600/780i combo @ 1.4volts. temps are 40C idle 55C under load.

Last time I built a system was in 2003 based around an IC7-G. So, as out of practice as I am, if I can pull off a 1.2ghz overclock...well, I'll credit the hardware more than the user :) I'm having a great time!
 
travr1131 said:
Follow up on my prior post. I couldn't resist and had to try overclocking this thing higher, which it did without a problem. I upgraded my cooling to an Arctic Cooling F7pro and now am running 3.6ghz on my q6600/780i combo @ 1.4volts. temps are 40C idle 55C under load.

Last time I built a system was in 2003 based around an IC7-G. So, as out of practice as I am, if I can pull off a 1.2ghz overclock...well, I'll credit the hardware more than the user :) I'm having a great time!
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I'm in the same boat. My last rig was an Intel 875p based machine and that was probably around the 2003 time frame. If I try my hand at overclocking, I'm hoping to have the same results as you. I should be going with a Q6600 unless I opt for something cheaper (doubt it).

Are you stopping at 3.6GHz??

Good luck,
- Joey
 
PanzerKrieg13 said:
I'm in the same boat. My last rig was an Intel 875p based machine and that was probably around the 2003 time frame. If I try my hand at overclocking, I'm hoping to have the same results as you. I should be going with a Q6600 unless I opt for something cheaper (doubt it).

Are you stopping at 3.6GHz??

Good luck,
- Joey
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Yeah I am not going any further with my OC, haha, at least for now! I got lucky and got a G0 stepping from Microcenter, if you grab a Q6600 look for "SLACR" on the barcode thingy on the side of the processor box. I just checked yesterday and the Microcenter near me in Fairfax, VA has like 63 G0's in stock and they are still on special..$199.99!
 
There is a Microcenter about 90 miles from me. Quite a drive, but closer then the 380+ miles to the next one.
When I'm ready to pick up a CPU here soon, I might have to drive down there and check it out.

- Joey
 
PanzerKrieg13 said:
There is a Microcenter about 90 miles from me. Quite a drive, but closer then the 380+ miles to the next one.
When I'm ready to pick up a CPU here soon, I might have to drive down there and check it out.

- Joey
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With the price dropping on them:
Q6600 OEM
Q6600 Retail

You might be able to get them for that price online soon.
 
no [H] enthusiast editors choice gold award this time round.

you guys should really revoke the 680i one, just because of the number that have failed prematurly (unless your an 18 month kinda guy).
 
MrWizard6600 said:
no [H] enthusiast editors choice gold award this time round.

you guys should really revoke the 680i one, just because of the number that have failed prematurly (unless your an 18 month kinda guy).
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I think performance is one thing, while reliability (or quality) is another.

It's sad to see so many SLI motherboards die so damn quick, or at all. It's even more sad due to the fact that I've wanted to go SLI for years and now that I have a 780i motherboard (video cards coming soon), it's certainly not anything close to encouraging to hear about so many motherboards dying. Only time will tell for me.

- Joey
 
I have the eVGA version of the 780i board and it has been absolutely stable and reliable thus far. We'll see if it holds up as well as my old Abit IC7-G though (almost 5 years and still going) ; it will be another 3-4 years before I build a new system.
 
travr1131 said:
I have the eVGA version of the 780i board and it has been absolutely stable and reliable thus far. We'll see if it holds up as well as my old Abit IC7-G though (almost 5 years and still going) ; it will be another 3-4 years before I build a new system.
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cross your fingers, though at least with the EVGA boards thier replacement policies are top notch!
 
Yeah, I am a newguy. My past long term MB experience was a Abit IC7-G RaidMaxII. I bought a 680i, Abit IN9-32X Max,Nov.'07 and had nothing, but trouble. Bought a second video card, that I wasn't going to waste and went to the XFX 780i, which I have two posts on here in Intel Mobo's. But I have come across this PMM option in CPU Config. and it allows these two options, Native Mode with a BIOS text explanation, ACPI OS support (ex. Win XP SP2, Vista) and SMM with this notation, Legacy OS support (ex. Win2K). Since I am running XP, SMM seems to be the right choice, but I didn't find this in the written manual or a PDF download manual. Had a problem opening the Manual V.1 PDF from XFX web site, Acrobate reports damaged, corrupted, but other PDFs open fine. My question is, What is this PMM about and its options?

Setup:
Case: Thermaltake Amor VA8000SWA Full Tower, 2 120mm, 2 90 mm fans
PSU: Antec True Power Quattro 850
CPU: Intel QX6850, Core 2 Extreme, cooled by Zalman CNPS8700 LED
RAM: Kingston HyperX KHX6400D2LLK2/2GN, PC6400 800 SLI Ready, 4X1Gig.
Video Cards: 2 XFX GeForce 8800GTS 640Mb, PV-T80G-THE4
HD: Seagate Barracuda 500 Gb, SATA
Audio: Creative XFi Faita1ity Gamer
UPS: UPS APC XS 1500 with second battery
MB: XFX 780i, MB-N780-ISH9
Old MB: 680i Abit IN9-32X Max
 
XFX responded to me about the PMM option in the BIOS, here it is:

[CURTIS - 03/05/2008] The POST Memory Manager (PMM) Specification defines a method for allocating RAM buffers that do not collide with one another or the system BIOS. The PMM specification allocates buffers in both conventional (0-640 KB) and extended (1 MB and up) memory. The SMM BIOS is loaded into the SMM address space during Power On Self Test (POST) and is secured prior to booting the Operating System (OS). The SMM BIOS code contains instructions as to whether or not a connected device like a USB device should be made visible to the operating system of the computer. Native mode will automatically enable these features. Curtis
 
I got my first one was DOA and second one was great with 57 Celcius chipset temps. Best temp so far with 780i chipset. I have Striker Formula 2 but temps were 92 Celcius way to high. I did pencil mod to fix Vdroop and now within -.02 variance and +.02 for memory. All in all finally have a stable board. Too bad for Asus I had a stable Stiker Extreme board but 780i was terrible for heat.
 
Please see previous posts here. Last night after several hours of use, that day, this XFX 780i board suddenly restarted and went to a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD). All attempts to restart and recover the system ended in various BSODs. My attempts today for some six hours in attempting an XP install disc Repair failed and new OS installs failed with a BSOD. The system was put through an OS Repair the previous time of a sudden crash and I did new installs of all the drivers, including the motherboard drivers and software apparently corrupted. This is pretty much the same experience, as with the 680i, but it ran a couple to several days before falling apart. The 780i has run for over a week to almost two weeks before falling apart. It appears to me the NVidia 600 and 700 boards,don't work for me or my current configuration and this has been nothing short of a hellish nightmare. I think I could have bought an under $100.00 board that would work with some consistency and reliability, as opposed to the fiasco of dealing with these unusable motherboards from NVidia, Abit and XFX. I will be taking apart the system tomorrow, removing the second video card, XFi PCI sound card and moving to one RAM module, if needed to get the OS installed to allow for a backup. Also a new Intel chipset motherboard will be ordered to replace the 780i, which will be a big expensive paper weight or door stop, a purpose it is better suited for, than being an installed computer motherboard.
 
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