nForce 790i SLI/Ultra chipset mobos - Reviews/OC/Guides

Lets see another one post about the nf790i chipset problems and what nvidia answer to us......



Nvidia released a brief announcement admitting that its latest nForce 790i
chipset for Intel CPUs cause data corruption under overclocking conditions.

The problem was reported by many enthusiasts that tried to overclock a 790i-based system
by changing the processor system bus (PSB) as well as the memory clock speeds.
Reports indicated that this procedure could lead to data corruption on hard disk drives.

"Nvidia has received reports of data corruption when using certain high speed memory and overclocking
the front side bus," Nvidia admitted. "Our engineers are currently investigating
this issue and as soon as we have more information, we will provide an update," the company said.

Apparently, Nvidia is preparing a new BIOS update to fix the problems related to the most
expensive chipset around.

Consumers had also experienced similar issues in the past caused by the Nvidia nForce 4 based
motherboards.

Nvidia's 790i platform is designed for current and next-generation Intel CPUs,
including those that support a 1600MHz frontside bus (FSB). It supports DDR3 memory,
PCI Express Gen 2.0, and the new Enthusiast System Architecture (ESA) communications protocol
for the real-time monitoring and control of PC components. The nForce 790i Ultra SLI MCP
is also certified to run 2-Way, 3-Way, and Quad SLI GPU configurations.



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EVGA 790i Ultra
QX9770 4.05 ghz - 1.42v
2GB shellshock DDR 3 1800 mhz 7 6 6 21 1T - 2.0v
2XGeForce 9800GTX SLI
SoundBlaster X-Fi elite pro
3x150gb wd Raptors Raid-0
2x1TB Seagate Raid
Tagan 950 watt
Watercooling

I got another S2E and no corruptions problems anymore. But I can't get any stable oc on this thing. I've played around w/ all voltages and all I get is fail on Prime in less then 1 min and BSOD, every single time for the past 4 days no matter what fsb set. My Q6600 did 400x9 or 450x8 on P35, X38 and 780i before without a sweat but this is ridiculous. And to keep it worse, after reading this forum carefully for the past 2 weeks, I'll probably get random freeze if I finally get it running.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by golfjam

I got another S2E and no corruptions problems anymore. But I can't get any stable oc on this thing. I've played around w/ all voltages and all I get is fail on Prime in less then 1 min and BSOD, every single time for the past 4 days no matter what fsb set. My Q6600 did 400x9 or 450x8 on P35, X38 and 780i before without a sweat but this is ridiculous. And to keep it worse, after reading this forum carefully for the past 2 weeks, I'll probably get random freeze if I finally get it running.

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Same thing here on my board. I had Q6600 no problems at 1800/FSB @ 1.48v and now with my new QX9650 I can do anything after 1 minute into windows it resets... Same BIOS the whole time as well (0511). One thing I noticed is when I put in the CPU Vcore at 1.41250v it shows up on CPUZ at 1.5V and same on EVEREST. So I am thinking I may have a bad CPU mount... Planning on remounting.. :mad:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lu(ky

Same thing here on my board. I had Q6600 no problems at 1800/FSB @ 1.48v and now with my new QX9650 I can do anything after 1 minute into windows it resets... Same BIOS the whole time as well (0511). One thing I noticed is when I put in the CPU Vcore at 1.41250v it shows up on CPUZ at 1.5V and same on EVEREST. So I am thinking I may have a bad CPU mount... Planning on remounting.. :mad:

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I remounted my CPU already and same thing. In my case, vcore @ 1.48, cpuz shows @ 1.456 and Everest @ 1.53. So far I have a very expensive email machine w/ SLI enabled.

Did the remounting fix your problems or didn't help the voltage problem?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by golfjam

So far I have a very expensive email machine w/ SLI enabled.

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:lol: :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Big Myke

Did the remounting fix your problems or didn't help the voltage problem?

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Same thing. I just installed my brand new E8400 to make sure it's not the CPU. It's even worse, my OCZ memory can't keep up and when it does I get BSOD. I'm pretty sure it's the mobo since a lot of people are very happy w/ this ram. I give up, DFI X48 here I come!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by golfjam

Same thing. I just installed my brand new E8400 to make sure it's not the CPU. It's even worse, my OCZ memory can't keep up and when it does I get BSOD. I'm pretty sure it's the mobo since a lot of people are very happy w/ this ram. I give up, DFI X48 here I come!!!

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Agreed....

What ever settings I put now with my new QX9650 nothing but blue screens over and over after I enter windows after 1-minute. RMA Monday if this BIOS 0601 does not fix my problem with this board... :shakes:

And after remount still very off in CPU Vcore settings... I put 1.4v this time still reads 1.5v in CPUZ/EVEREST

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Lu(ky

Agreed....

What ever settings I put now with my new QX9650 nothing but blue screens over and over after I enter windows after 1-minute. RMA Monday if this BIOS 0601 does not fix my problem with this board... :shakes:

And after remount still very off in CPU Vcore settings... I put 1.4v this time still reads 1.5v in CPUZ/EVEREST

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My first one did nothing but corrupt Windows and replacement gave me nothing but BSOD's. I'll RMA again but my 3rd one will be on Ebay.

I get my S2E with X3350 yesterday :D

So far so good, hadn't time to play with it too much yet.

As i switched from NF4 board i'll need some time to adapt but i'll post some screenies :)

I got my S2E Mine is running like a champ running X3360 at 3995. RAID 0.. with OCZ 1600EB Ram. I think Ram setting have alot to do with getting this board stable.. I had a few issues until I got ram right.. I RAN OCCT for 12hrs and 3dmark 06 for 6hr Rock Solid!

Anyone know the fix for Distored Audio when Scrolling Website? Appears When ever I have HD Access or like scrolling in the forums I get Distored Audio.. Very wierd. when I dont Overclock I dont have the issues I ve tried the onboard audio and SB X-FI Both PCI-E Cards..

any Ideas?

Check your SATA/PATA controllers channels modes, probably your HDD has fallen-down to PIO mode.

forgot to mention I am running RAID 0 with (2) Seagate 1TB 7200.11 drives
I also tried running the default drivers and the nvidia drivers for raid

Quote:

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Originally Posted by X2beach

I got my S2E Mine is running like a champ running X3360 at 3995. RAID 0.. with OCZ 1600EB Ram. I think Ram setting have alot to do with getting this board stable.. I had a few issues until I got ram right.. I RAN OCCT for 12hrs and 3dmark 06 for 6hr Rock Solid!

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I have the same ram and showed no errors on memtest running 7-6-6-24 2T. 1T got 1000+ errors in 2 sec. But then again I don't think is the memory, it's the mobo itself.

I have plenty of issues running my RAM at stock settings (CellShocks @ 1800 8-7-6-21 2T) on my s2e.
Sure I can pass memtest86+ for multiple hours; but when I load windows, play games and start actually using my PC, I get lockups. The system will freeze at peak activity with combined stress on CPU/RAM and HDD.
Going from 1T to 2T helped a lot and made the lockups much less frequent. Basically I can now prime for 8+hours with no freezing. But if I run Crysis benchmark tool with hundreds of runs (2 loops each), I will end up with a lockup [99% of the time when the level is being loaded].

If I disable P1/P2, everything is fine. So yeah it is really a matter of getting the ram work @1800 with certified timings and P1/P2 enabled.

well, so its rock stable with p1 nd p2 disabled?
then its def the chipset, some can run p1 nd p2 enabled at high speeds, some cant... if thats really the problem then nvidia should bin the chipsets properly and sell the 790ultra as p1 p2 at high speeds stable and the 790 non ultra as p1 p2 fail at high speeds...

isnt that what nvidia initially said they would do?
so is everybody here only having corruption issues with p1 and p2 enabled?
or also with p1 and p2 disabled?

x2beach, did you ever have any problems running that ocz 1600 EB at stock? like lockups and restarts etc? im having problems getting my S2E to run stable even at stock settings and auto volts, it keeps locking up in games and during stress tests, ive tested a QX6700 & Q9450, and 7600GT & 9800GX2 and now ive tested a set of 1600EB OCZ ram 2x2gb & 1333 ocz ram 2x1gb and it locks up everytime.

tell me what volts/timings are you using for your ram? ive just manually changed the ram divider to 5:8 in the bios to see if the 1:2 divider is what is causing the problem

(i just received my motherboard back today as i RMA'd it since i couldn't figure out what was causing the problem and didnt have a second set of memory to test at the time and the store said they found no faults with the board)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by andymg350

x2beach, did you ever have any problems running that ocz 1600 EB at stock? like lockups and restarts etc? im having problems getting my S2E to run stable even at stock settings and auto volts, it keeps locking up in games and during stress tests, ive tested a QX6700 & Q9450, and 7600GT & 9800GX2 and now ive tested a set of 1600EB OCZ ram 2x2gb & 1333 ocz ram 2x1gb and it locks up everytime.

tell me what volts/timings are you using for your ram? ive just manually changed the ram divider to 5:8 in the bios to see if the 1:2 divider is what is causing the problem

(i just received my motherboard back today as i RMA'd it since i couldn't figure out what was causing the problem and didnt have a second set of memory to test at the time and the store said they found no faults with the board)

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Unfortunately you are not the only one with problems with this combination of motherboard and memory:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...17#post2950817
http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/fo...ad.php?t=37380

Hope this gives you some inspiration to solving the issues. I still doubt the RAM as such are faulty, the combination is just bad or the motherboard sucks/is faulty.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by saaya

well, so its rock stable with p1 nd p2 disabled?
then its def the chipset, some can run p1 nd p2 enabled at high speeds, some cant... if thats really the problem then nvidia should bin the chipsets properly and sell the 790ultra as p1 p2 at high speeds stable and the 790 non ultra as p1 p2 fail at high speeds...

isnt that what nvidia initially said they would do?
so is everybody here only having corruption issues with p1 and p2 enabled?
or also with p1 and p2 disabled?

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Indeed rock stability has to be redifined for this board:
10+hours prime95 and memtest86, plus multiple hours of gaming (ideally loop on a benchmark like crysis or 3dmark06) and run sfc /scannow every now and then.

My board is rock stable with P1/P2 set to auto (=disabled), but then bandwidth is so poor.
When they are enabled I have to raise NB to 1.7V, loosen the ram timings a lot and it's almost there but still not stable.
And I just run at fsb 450 linked and synched, CPU only @3.6GHz. Maybe others are lucky with other boards revision (mine is b1) or different ram.

thanks for those links holmer they help a little, after i made that last post i decided to test a theory i had and i changed the ram divider in bios manually to linked 5:8 which downclocked the memory to 1066 instead of the stock 1:2 divider at 1333 and ive been playing cod4 for the last 40minutes without any lockups whereas before when i was using 1:2 divider it was crashing after about 20 mins or so. perhaps it is the motherboard that is causing the problems im going to try leaving it to prime and see if it locks up.

andymg350, Here is what I changed from AUTO in the bios for RAM

bump the Voltage to 1.9

P1: Auto
P2: Auto
tCL: 8
tRCD: 8
tRP: 8
tRAS: 24
Command clock: 2T


PM me if you need more help.. My ram is stable at those setting

No corruption, Air Cooling (waiting for WC parts), memory voltage is 2.0V, core voltage is 1.392V:
http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=353203

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MateoTTR

Indeed rock stability has to be redifined for this board:
10+hours prime95 and memtest86, plus multiple hours of gaming (ideally loop on a benchmark like crysis or 3dmark06) and run sfc /scannow every now and then.

My board is rock stable with P1/P2 set to auto (=disabled), but then bandwidth is so poor.
When they are enabled I have to raise NB to 1.7V, loosen the ram timings a lot and it's almost there but still not stable.
And I just run at fsb 450 linked and synched, CPU only @3.6GHz. Maybe others are lucky with other boards revision (mine is b1) or different ram.

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I also found out the same. P1 and P2 @ Auto is very stable. As soon as enable them, I am getting random lockups when priming or just even browsing.
Fortunately, so far I just had corruption just once. Maybe because I don't try to push this board too much as I am on air.I have a Revision B1 also. I have a very capable QX9650(week 39) which can do 4GHZ @1.344, so I am running @ 445FSB. The bandwidth sucks big time with P1/P2 on auto.

guys how much bandwith do u lost same settings just linked or unlinked on everest?