DFi NF4 expert - weird issue with RAM, need help/thoughts.

[MaxT]

Hi,

I've been running this setup for awhile, specs are in the signature. Everything worked fine even when overclocked. Eventually i flashed to the 12/7 BIOS and the system wasn't posting when overclocked. I was busy at the time and didn't have time to mess with it, so i left it at stock settings/speeds/voltages and it worked fine.

Now i started overclocking again, from scratch with the 12/7 BIOS, and the 1st thing i noticed, is when the system was pushed too far, and the cmos reset, it wouldn't post at all. I traced it down to my Ballisitx not getting enough juice at startup (wasn't like that with earlier BIOS versions). It was being detected, so the troubleshooting LEDs were working as they were supposed to, but the system wouldn't POST. I threw in some old crucial pc2100 ram and it started posting fine. When i gave the ram a bit more juice i threw back the ballistix and everything was positng fine.

Anyway, during all that testing, i encountered a weird issue i don't believe i had before. If i put any kind of RAM into either of the the DIMMs (same cahnnel) closest to the CPU socket, the ram doesn't get detected at all! Tried different voltages, and different ram, it just won't detect the RAM (at stock settings). If i have a stick in the other channel, and a stick in this problematic channel, then the board detects both sticks. But if i leave one stick in either DIMM of the channel closest to the CPU, the board doesn't detect it.

The system doesn't appear to be prime95 stable when in dual channel, even though it boots up. If i use both ballistix sticks in the other channel, so they work in a signle channel mode, everything works fine and stable.

I tried giving the cpu more voltage when the ram was in dual channel, didn't seem to help. The ram sticks have been individually tested and work great.

To me it looks like dual channel is dead. Is it one of the CPU controllers that might have gotten bad? Or is it something wrong with the motherboard?

I haven't tried flashing back to the old BIOS yet, i'd prefer to keep this new one if possible.

Has anyone had any similar experiences? Any thoughts on this?
Thanks guys.

PS: someone with a somewhat similar issue here: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=88117&highlight=expert but that thread died.

[cdelong]

DFI + Crucial= strange things

[naelq]

DFI + Crucial= strange things
any chance of getting a REAL post???! :stick:
this ain't the 1st spam-like post i've read from in the last 2 minutes!!!! :slapass: higher posts' count doesn't ALWAYS mean Wisdom!!

any chance of giving us, or at least me, some info regarding the DFI/Crucial thingy???

[Vex]

im having simular problems, granted mines only the Ultra-D and ive got the slower 3200 Ballistix ram...but ive finally got it stable..at stock but now when i try to change the ratio on the ram i canrt boot into windows. (setting the ratio so it makes the ram stock) are there any settings which are particulay effected by ratio'in ram?

[Pyr0]

there does seem to be a problem with some of the expert boards and dual channel

i had problems with my dual core cpu and ocz mem
http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=36672

there seem to be a couple of threads at dfi street complaining about lack of dual channel...
here's one:
http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=36255

[Fhqwhgads6680]

hmm.... That could be alot of things, I just start trying to narrow it down. This is what I would try, and I'd do it in this order and of course test for stability in each one:

1. Flash to different bios, one you know works(I.E. hte one you had before).
2. Try the ram in a different mobo with different cpu, make sure it runs fine.
3. Try the CPU in a different mobo, with the same ram you used in the expert.
4. Try a different cpu in the expert, with either the same or different ram or both.

I know that all assumes you have different mobo's and cpus. When I have problems like this i just start getting a hold of friends that have S939 setups to trace the problem. Also how far was the CPU OC'd and at what voltages? its obviously either the CPU memory controller or the board itself...but only testing can really tell which....Good luck man hopefully that helps, if you can do those things you should be able to come to a conclusion as to what the problem is...

[MaxT]

Thanx for the replies guys. Yeah, i was hoping it was a known issue, but i guess i'll have to do more testing. :( If it wasn't such a pain to take that TT Typhoon off and put it back on, i'd already test it. ;)

So far, in the single channel, away from the CPU, the system is 16 hours dual prime95 stable with two sticks of Ballistix. Works at 270FSB 1:1 right now, with 1T.

I'll post my finding probably at the end of eth week, since i don't have time to mess with it right now.

[hawtrawkr]

i havent noticed this on my expert board but ive been using my mushkin xp pc4000 2x1gb kit on it probably 90% of the time.

ill throw in my ballistix and see what happens when i get home tonight (im on the 12/7 too)

[MaxT]

Thanx, appreciate it. I just find it extremely weird that it won't detect a single stick in the channel closest to the cpu, but if i leave that stick in place and add one more stick to the other channel, it actually detects both.

[MaxT]

ok, going back to the old BIOS didn't help. same sympthoms remain. So i guess i will try switching the CPUs out at the end of the week. :slap:
as much as i'd like it to be the boards fault, 'cause i can rma it, i have this distinct feeling it is porbably a messed up memory controller (one of the two) on my opteron 165. Which is weird, 'cause i've been running stock speeds for the last month or so at stock voltages.

Oh well, i'll test it at the end of the week. ;)

[Diverge]

Try one stick in the furthest orange slot. I know this sounds weird, since you usually want to be in the slots closest to the cpu, but i could have sworn i read something about the rdx/expert saying to use the furthest slots for a single stick.

or i could have read something wrong... but think i read that. i read the internet too much at work heh.

[MaxT]

that is the point though, the channel away from the cpu works fine :) both orange and the yellow slots. It's the channel next to the CPU that doesn't work by itself. It only works when both channels have sticks in them (lets say in orange slots). But the system isn't stable then even at stock speeds.

Once i test it with my old 3700+ SD i'll know for sure if it is the board or a dead emory controller on the opty 165. :)

Btw, i starting messing with this when the system started bluescreening at me quite often. I just find it ironic that something died at stock speeds i've been running for about a month. :)

[knob]

I had some probs with this board too. Not to your extend. Mine wont let me install Windows which I found it extremely strange.

I thought the RAMs were faulty althought I just pulled it from another DFI machine i had running before.

I had it running in the yellow slots. Cant boot, cant install. But swap it to the orange slots, voila. Works like a charm.

Allowed me to do this

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y275/knobi/ff687ec0.jpg

[Diverge]

Btw, i starting messing with this when the system started bluescreening at me quite often. I just find it ironic that something died at stock speeds i've been running for about a month. :)

BSOD's and running Ballistix might mean their time has come to an end :( I dunno, i've had my share of bad luck with them... my 2nd set is on it way out. when the BSOD's come, you can try to bump up the vdimm some to gain back the stability. mine were stable at 2.6V for a while, but now require more. As time goes by i keep having to bump them up more and more to aviod BSOD's.

I'm not saying yours are dying, but it is something to rule out IMO, if you have some other ram to try. When i had my rdx and my first set of ballistix, i couldn't boot at all after cmos clear... but i could have sworn they booted if i threw a different stick in with the mix, heh. All my problems were related to the ballistix, they were dying and unstable. tried my buddies ballistix and all was good. sorta sounds like your problems.

[stone_cold_Jimi]

any chance of getting a REAL post???! :stick:
this ain't the 1st spam-like post i've read from in the last 2 minutes!!!! :slapass: higher posts' count doesn't ALWAYS mean Wisdom!!

any chance of giving us, or at least me, some info regarding the DFI/Crucial thingy???

Not that I provoked this but....

There's too much of it to repeat here. The two things don't get on. Many people find their Ballistix dying. My Ballistix killed a DFI Expert instead of the other way round. And all points in between. Hence, the search engine is the key to info.

[MaxT]

BSOD's and running Ballistix might mean their time has come to an end :( I dunno, i've had my share of bad luck with them... my 2nd set is on it way out. when the BSOD's come, you can try to bump up the vdimm some to gain back the stability. mine were stable at 2.6V for a while, but now require more. As time goes by i keep having to bump them up more and more to aviod BSOD's.

I'm not saying yours are dying, but it is something to rule out IMO, if you have some other ram to try. When i had my rdx and my first set of ballistix, i couldn't boot at all after cmos clear... but i could have sworn they booted if i threw a different stick in with the mix, heh. All my problems were related to the ballistix, they were dying and unstable. tried my buddies ballistix and all was good. sorta sounds like your problems.

Yeah, i read the posts. :) But like i said, they were individually tested, and work fine. They are working at 270 right now 21hour dual prime95 stable, but in the other (single) channel ;) It's either the motherboard or the CPU. I'll know at the end of the week for sure, but i have a feeling it's the CPU.

[MaxT]

so i finally found some time to mess with the system, and to my surprise, it did turn out to be the motherboard that's faulty. I am sort of glad it's he motherboard, since my Opty was an OEM without any warranty. So i guess i will try to RMA the board to DFI and get it fixed/exchanged.

I switched back to my old trusty a64 SD 3700+, and have the same exact issue, where anything in either DIMM of the channel closest to the CPU will not post. I have tried 3 different brands of RAM, including some old but trusty crucial PC2100 sticks, and the board kept beeping at anything in that channel.
So it's not a dead memory controller on the Opty as I originally thought.

Guess something in that NF4 chipset got owned? Or maybe some memory traces on the board have micro cracks in them? Weird, but it's definitely something with the Expert mobo.

RMA time. :banana:

[stone_cold_Jimi]

Guess something in that NF4 chipset got owned? Or maybe some memory traces on the board have micro cracks in them? Weird, but it's definitely something with the Expert mobo.


Pulling together all the Chinese whispers and half-said things (including stuff from DFI support), it seems that many rev AA0 Experts had problems; that the problems stemmed from the chipset; that something screwed up in memory handling; that Ballistix Z503 would bring out the problem faster than other RAM. I was "advised" not to use the Ballistix kit (nor the Seasonic 600W PSU for that matter) with the Expert.

I think that the Expert in particular, to achieve high performance, has been designed to a tight set of tolerances which often cannot be met by some of either its own components or those that are plugged into it. If you get a good one, great; if you get a poor one, don't even bother.

[BobyTT]

I had the same problem , and i just RMA my Expert. I was using it with Z503 kit for like a month with X2 4800+ and last week i got FX60 so i tryied to push a little bit my O/C then i had aboslutley the same problems as you , its start to restart , everytime when i got int to Windows i got BSOD after one day of testing with FX60 and Z503 diferent clocks and setings , i put my old 4800+ and i had the same issues , then i try with diferent memory , i had the same problems again , i tryied 4800+ & a brand new kit OCZ And i still had the same problems , so i had to RMA my Expert.... And my Z503 are like a two weeks old , FX is like a week old , Expert is like a 3-4 weeks old... X1900XTX is like a 2 weeks old... so that was a very strange thig for me , As i said i RMA the MOBO but i purchase a ASUS A8R32-MVP Deluxe.

[MaxT]

Thanx for the info guys, i'll give them a call on Monday.

[racinjimy]

Use the Orange slots, Yellow does not boot the board here well at all.

2 sticks of ram will not boot if you have cleared the CMOS...you must remove the stick closest to the CPU first....then boot up, enter the bios, you don't really need to do anything, just "save and exit". Once you see the post screen, power down and insert the second stick.

Infineon based ram (PC4000 Platinum EB 2GB, PC3200 Platinum 2GB, PC3200 Gold XTC 2GB) will need a change of Drive strength before 2 sticks will boot, so enter the bios....go to the DRAM configuration and change the DRAM Drive Strength to Level 09 or 10...then save and exit.


from bleedin edge OCZ support (http://www.bleedinedge.com/forum/showpost.php?p=145177&postcount=1)

[pcdoc1]

How 'bout the manual, it clearly states orange slots for dual channel....

[Super Nade]

I cannot, for the life of me get the 9x Multi to work, no matter what (Corsair v1.1 BH5). However, I'm stable@345 x 8 CPU and 347MHz DRAM. Go figure :rolleyes:

Using the 11/25 BIOS. Tried Big Toe's BIOS, I could not even POST. With the 9X multi, I either get a garbled Memtest screen or the display goes blank with one MoBo LED light still on. Sometimes, I suddenly lose DC. With any kind of TCCD, I cannot POST. No matter what. :rolleyes:

[|3ourne]

A few problems that I faced when I first set up my Expert and how I fixed them-

1) after the bios flash the system did not boot with 2gb ballistix. Took me a long time to figure this one out but finally I plugged in my old set of bh6 512 mb kit and then set the memory parameters for ballistix and the system booted up fine after switching the memory out.

2) the settings for ballistix on dfi Ultra-D and Expert are totally different. This goes for oc settings as well. I had to start from square one for ocing this board. One thing that I have noticed is Expert heavily undervolts Vdimm.
For eg. If I need 2.8V in bios for ultra-d to get to 280 mhz , I need 2.96V set in expert to get to same speeds error free. This is after modding the 12V and 3.3V rails on my ocz powerstream 520W .

3) Tref of 4708 and 3072 works the best for ballistix+opteron on this mobo for me. Also Trrd at 3 or 4 , and Max Async and read preamble at Auto.

4) Drive strengths of 5/2 or 7/2 work the best . Dram timings on Slow.

5) Opteron did not like th 166 mhz divider on this board. Also the stability changes everytime I boot up. One boot the system is stable at 285 mhz memclock , the other , it wont be stable even at 260. Weird but I am still working on getting a solution for this.

Overall , this board helps me clock my cpu better but its not doing much for my 2gb Ballistix. I am thinking of getting rid of them and getting some Samsung UCCC or Infenion IC based ram to see how they react. Hope this helps .

- |3ourne

[MaxT]

After some more testing, i found out that it was actually the RAM that was 'causing the issues. Looks like the ballistix went bad.

Everything works now with my old OCZ PC42000 RAM, in dual channel and stable. I am testing the ballistix in a different, intel based, PC.


As far as the board not booting up with anything by itself in the B channel (DIMMs 3 or 4. closest to the CPU), DFI confirms that is how it's supposed to be. They say you should populate the A channel (DIMMs 1 or 2) first. This is weird but i guess i can live with that.

[Diverge]

Try one stick in the furthest orange slot. I know this sounds weird, since you usually want to be in the slots closest to the cpu, but i could have sworn i read something about the rdx/expert saying to use the furthest slots for a single stick.

or i could have read something wrong... but think i read that. i read the internet too much at work heh.

@MaxT: told ya so :p:

(sucks about your ballistix - but it's inevitable)

[racinjimy]

As far as the board not booting up with anything by itself in the B channel (DIMMs 3 or 4. closest to the CPU), DFI confirms that is how it's supposed to be. They say you should populate the A channel (DIMMs 1 or 2) first. This is weird but i guess i can live with that.

I found that out the hard way as well, and I believe the OCZ guys most of the time

good luck with it, its always good to RMA the correct part, sometimes harder than it seems

Crucial may not have much of that micron stuff left........EOL and all

[MaxT]

@MaxT: told ya so :p:

(sucks about your ballistix - but it's inevitable)

:p: :toast:

I am still testing them in my old intel setup, they do a lot better, stable at stock, but error at higher FSBs. At least one stick does. I guess expert is a lot more sensetive to faulty RAM.
Too bad though, I never fed more than 2.78v into them. :/


What confused me even more was, when i was testing a single stick at a time, one of them was prime95 (large FFTs) stable for hours. I went to bed, i wake up, check the prime95 timer...9 hours - no errors. Then i move my mouse around, click a few things, and get a BSOD. :D So i started testing with memtest+ and it seems to work better.

[MaxT]

I found that out the hard way as well, and I believe the OCZ guys most of the time

good luck with it, its always good to RMA the correct part, sometimes harder than it seems

Crucial may not have much of that micron stuff left........EOL and all

Yeah, the DFI csr lady was very surprised that i called to cancel my RMA. :slap: :D

Crucial RMA department was not surprised at all though ;)


As far as Crucial having stock, seems like they are shipping (as replacements) a new revision of these sticks, with updated ICs (revision F or something like that). Apparently they run cooler, and hopefully last longer than 6 months ;)

[stone_cold_Jimi]

As far as Crucial having stock, seems like they are shipping (as replacements) a new revision of these sticks, with updated ICs (revision F or something like that). Apparently they run cooler, and hopefully last longer than 6 months ;)

:eek:

Whoa! Isn't rev F what Team Xtreem PC4000 uses?

[mouawad]

i'm on my third set of ballistix, got them about 3 weeks ago, and yes they have changed something in these modules because they definitely run cooler than the previous sets.

lets hope they are a bit more robust because we know they're great stuff when they work :toast:

[MaxT]

:eek:

Whoa! Isn't rev F what Team Xtreem PC4000 uses?

I haven't verified anything, so it might just be a rumor, but i read it at the dfi-street. there is a sticky there about ballisitx going bad in the nforce4 forum.