AM2 Phenom support

I've been running a Phenom 9500 in my Crosshair mobo for a couple of weeks now. Bought my 9500 CAAB1 AA 0744MPMW for 1390 NOK (approximatly 261 USD or 178 EUR)

There are a few threads here about Phenom and AM2+ boards that are great, and a lot of phenomenal wisdom can be learned there. (KTE and Brother Esaus threads to mention some of them)

However, not all of the functions of AM2+ boards apply for AM2 boards with the Phenom, and therefore running Phenom at AM2 boards is a bit different.

Therefore I would like to make a thread for AM2 Phenom owners to share experiences that don't apply for the AM2+ boards. It is advisable to check out your board manufacturers support sites to see if your board support Phenom.

First, a list of known facts about running Phenom at AM2 boards.

1.The boards must be able to handle the Phenoms power consumption. Most high end AM2 boards pwms can handle the amount of amperes/watts the Phenom's are drawing. If your board can't handle a 125W Athlon, it probably won't handle a 95W Phenom either.

2.The boards BIOS' needs to support Phenom. It is advisable to check out your board manufacturers support sites to see if your board support Phenom, BIOS wise and PWM wise.

3.You will not benefit from HT 3.0 and split power planes. You will not be able to feed your cores and your north bridge different voltage.

4. You will not be able to change your nb multiplier, it will run at stock *9 multi, and therefore hamper your overclock unless you have a Black Edition cpu where the nb multi is unlocked. If you do have a BE and want to change your nb multi, you will have to do this with a msr editor as no BIOS allows to do this yet.

NOTE:These boards/bioses officially support Phenom. However, official and actual support are two quite different things, therefore I've decided to mark the boards tested and confirmed by users that they actually support Phenom. The tested boards ar bolded

ABIT:

-A-N68SV
-AN52V
-AN68SD

ASROCK:

ALiveDual-eSATA2
ALiveN570SLI-eSATA2
ALiveNF5-eSATA2+ R3.0
ALiveNF5SLI-1394
ALiveNF5-VSTA
ALiveNF5-VSTA R2.0
ALiveNF6G-GLAN
ALiveNF6G-VSTA
ALiveNF6P-VSTA
ALiveNF7G-HD720p
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R1.0
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R3.0
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R5.0
ALiveXFire-eSATA2 R3.0
AM2NF3-VSTA
ALiveNF7G-FullHD R1.0
ALiveNF7G-HDready

ASUS:

-Crosshair: BIOS 0904/0905Beta(*)(PS: SLI disabled)
-M2N32 SLI Deluxe: BIOS 1701
-M2A-VM /HDMI, BIOS 1501 (Recommended upgrade to 1603 only if having problems with 1501)
-M2R32-MVP - BIOS 1009
-M2A-MVP - BIOS 0509
-M2A-VM - BIOS 1501 (Recommended upgrade to 1603 only if having problems with 1501)
-M2N-SLI Deluxe - BIOS 1302
-M2N32 WS Professional - BIOS 1703
-M2N32-SLI Deluxe/Wifi - BIOS 1503
-M2N32-SLI Premium Vista Edition - BIOS 0801beta
-M2N-E - BIOS 1202

BIOSTAR:

TF570 SLI A2+ - BIOS N57LAB06.BST
TF560 A2+ - BIOS N56BAB03.BST
TF520 A2+ - BIOS N52BAB03.BST

DFI:

-LANPARTY UT NF590 SLI-M2R/G

ECS:

-NFORCE6M-A V3.0
-GeForce6100PM-M2 V2.0

EPOX:

FOXCONN:

-520A
-560A
-A6VMX
-A6VMX-K

GIGABYTE:

-GA-M52S-S3P(rev 2.0) - BIOS FC
-GA-M52L-S3 - BIOS F4
-GA-M56S-S3 - BIOS F3
-GA-M57SLI-DS4(rev 2.0) - BIOS FG (may cause stability issues in Windows at this time)
-GA-M57SLI-S4(rev 1.0 + 1.1) - BIOS FE
-GA-M57SLI-S4(rev 2.0) - BIOS F12
-GA-M61SME-S2(rev 2.0) - BIOS F7
-Gigabyte GA-M68SM-S2L v1.0 - BIOS F4 (2008/01/23)
-GA-MA69G0S3H - BIOS F5
-GA-MA69GM-S2H -BIOS F4

JETWAY:

-Jetway M2A693PLUS-VP
-Jetway M2A694-GDG
-Jetway M2A694-GDP
-Jetway M2A694-GHG

MSI:

-K9NGM4-F V.2
-K9N SLI-F V.2
-K9AG Neo2 - BIOS A7368AMS.209
-K9AG Neo2-Digital - BIOS A7368AMS.209
-K9AGM3-F - BIOS A7367AMS.G01
-K9AGM3-FD - BIOS A7367AMS.G01
-K9AGM3-FIH - BIOS A7367AMS.206
-K9AGM4-L - BIOS A7373AMS.204
-K9AGM4-F - BIOS A7373AMS.204
-K9N Neo V3 - BIOS A7369NMS.30B
-K9N Neo V2 - BIOS A7369NMS.30B
-K9NGM3-FIH - BIOS A7349NMS.H07
-K9NGM3-FD - BIOS A7349NMS.U01
-K9NGM3-FD(TPM) - BIOS A7349NMS.W01
-K9NGM3-FD V2 - BIOS A7349NMS.S06


Disabling TLB Patch with MSR editor (see STICKY for disabling patch) is documented to work for board/BIOSES marked with *

Tools for msr edititing:

WPCREDIT (32bit only)
BAREDIT (32/64bit)
RWEVERYTHING (32/64bit)

(Please feel free to correct me if my information is wrong, I want this to be as correct as possible of course. Would appreciate if people would help me update this thread with important information too. :))

Everyone but TROLLS are welcome to post questions/answers in this thread, it would be nice if they were somewhat on topic though.

List of Phenom supported mobos, AM2/AM2+, courtsey of KTE:

LINK: http://techreport.com/discussions.x/14288

My personal experiences with Phenom on Crosshair:

BIOS 0904 = Stay away, only works if defaults are loaded. Nothing can be changed, if you do, your system will freeze before BIOS logo is half loaded..

BIOS 0905Beta = A little better, Have not tested oc'ing much yet, voltage control seems nonexistent at least for the RAM (cpu too it seems) Will have to test more :)

Memory timings is unchangeable it seems, cpu-z reads 5 5 4 18 2t at stock 800MHz (with Ballistix)

I'm running Vista Ultimate X64, not the most stable platform if you are to believe others experiences ocing on AM2/AM2+ boards.

I'm running it under water, and it keeps pretty cool. About 30 degrees celcius at idle (Cpuid HWmonitor reports about 15 degrees too low temps i believe, seems like temps in bios is more correct), and about 43 degrees under load. (I'm not too sure these temps are right, as I have not measured it with external sensors yet).

I've run it at 2409MHz 4 hours prime stable at stock vcore, but I'm having problems with random bsods like most other Phenom owners.

The board does have vdroop up to 0,05v under load. You know, Asus... This could have something to do with random bsods.

http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/2...stopvc3.th.jpg http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/2...oursen9.th.jpg http://img256.imageshack.us/img256/7...nom1uy0.th.jpg http://img172.imageshack.us/img172/3...nom1ch0.th.jpg

The mem bench is with the TLB patch on, bios 0904.

Result in winrar 3.71 bench, tlb patch included: 1054 KB/s @2200MHz, mem@800Mhz 5 5 4 18 2t

EDIT: SLI support is disabled with these bioses, not a problem of mine though.

The Asus M2A-VM /HDMI m-atx boards can be added to your compatible list, needs a recent bios... 1504 maybe? I'd go and check the Asus site but it's painfully slow.
Quite a nice option for a m-atx quad core system.

Thanks, I'll check, but as you say, it's a horribly slow site. (I'm always using the global site as the national Asus sites are even worse) The M2A-VM is on the list. You tested the TLB patch fix?

Good idea. :)

I know of many boards which are supposed to be supported but there is no point in listing them as supported unless they have been confirmed as working and to what degree with Phenom.

There's a quite a list of confirmed Phenom AM2 boards at the NCIX retail web site forums. They've all been verified. Some of these AM2+ but I'll leave it to you guys to decipher, most of them that are have the little "+" sign. I've reposted the list below, however you can view the original thread here

This posting was made by Linus who also posts in the WC cooling section here at XS.

Quote:

---

Okay Everyone,

There's been a great deal of confusion surrounding board support and Phenom, so we're going to try to clear things up in the coming days to make sure that everyone knows what they need to have for their new Phenom X4 CPU.

The list below contains the board model followed by the PCB revision in parentheses (no PCB revision listed if all PCBs are okay), then with the required BIOS version.

If you have any information that is missing from this thread, or if you want to request that I look up another board and find out the BIOS revision, just post. I will try to update this every 1-2 days. We'll also try to produce a more palatable version of it.

Regards,

Linus

****IT SHOULD BE NOTED THAT EVEN THOUGH THESE BOARDS WILL WORK WITH PHENOM, YOUR CHIP WILL DEFAULT TO HYPERTRANSPORT 1.0 SPEC instead of 3.0.****

My own (limited) testing with this issue on the Asus M2N32-SLI deluxe revealed that the performance difference is negligable, but only Cinebench and some games were tested, so I'm sure there are some applications that would benefit from the extra HT3.0 bandwidth.


ASUS - all PCB revisions should work fine

M2R32-MVP - BIOS 1009
Crosshair - BIOS 0904 (0904/05 BIOS reported to be somewhat flaky)
M2A-MVP - BIOS 0509
M2A-VM - BIOS 1501 (Recommended upgrade to 1603 only if having problems with 1501)
M2A-VM HDMI - BIOS 1501 (Recommended upgrade to 1603 only if having problems with 1501)
M2N-SLI Deluxe - BIOS 1302
M2N32 WS Professional - BIOS 1703
M2N32-SLI Deluxe/Wifi - BIOS 1503
M2N32-SLI Premium Vista Edition - BIOS 702
M2N-E - BIOS 1202
M2N-SLI - BIOS 401
M3A - BIOS 301
M3A32-MVP Deluxe - BIOS 401

GIGABYTE

GA-M52S-S3P(rev 2.0) - BIOS FC
GA-M52L-S3 - BIOS F4
GA-M56S-S3 - BIOS F3
GA-M57SLI-DS4(rev 2.0) - BIOS FG (may cause stability issues in Windows at this time)
GA-M57SLI-S4(rev 1.0 + 1.1) - BIOS FE
GA-M57SLI-S4(rev 2.0) - BIOS F12
GA-M61SME-S2(rev 2.0) - BIOS F7
GA-MA69G0S3H - BIOS F5
GA-MA770-DS3 - BIOS F2
GA-MA790X-DS4 - BIOS F1
GA-790FX-DS5 - BIOS F1
GA-MA790FX-DQ6 - BIOS F1
GA-MA69GM-S2H(rev 1.0) - BIOS F4


MSI

K9A2 CF - BIOS A7388AMS.110
K9A2 Platinum - BIOS A7376AMS.100
K9AG Neo2 - BIOS A7368AMS.209
K9AG Neo2-Digital - BIOS A7368AMS.209
K9AGM3-F - BIOS A7367AMS.G01
K9AGM3-FD - BIOS A7367AMS.G01
K9AGM3-FIH - BIOS A7367AMS.206
K9AGM4-L - BIOS A7373AMS.204
K9AGM4-F - BIOS A7373AMS.204
K9N Neo V3 - BIOS A7369NMS.30B
K9N Neo V2 - BIOS A7369NMS.30B
K9NGM3-FIH - BIOS A7349NMS.H07
K9NGM3-FD - BIOS A7349NMS.U01
K9NGM3-FD(TPM) - BIOS A7349NMS.W01
K9NGM3-FD V2 - BIOS A7349NMS.S06

---

Thanks, importing them now. LOL the m2n sli 0401 bios supporting Phenom? It's a quite old bios iirc.

Ugly n Grey that is exactly what my last post said I wouldn't post. This is old news that's been thrown around many places online for a long time without any confirmation, they are only going off manufacturer confirmation and lists as to what is supported and we already know not to trust that. Those are the boards that are supposed to work with Phenom with those listed BIOSes, nearly all of those AM2 boards do not have users or user examples where people have testing them and can verify if they actually work, run fine, and to what extent with Phenom (i.e. do they get the Clock Interrupt BSoD which many on AM2 boards get? That fails the term "working"). Only a few of those like the ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe boards are known to work with a recent BIOS. Back then no one AM2 board worked with AM2+ CPU at all, that's a non-verified list. :yepp:

I can even list more, but there is no point in gathering up motherboard lists that are supposed to work as most don't and no way did they work back in December when those lists were aggregated.

Those boards were all posted by a trusted member of the forums who did his research.
In other words he checked the listing for each BIOS individually.

Ugly n Grey I think you're mistaken because he didn't test them nor verify them as you can see by the posts straight after. He added all links where the motherboard MFG claimed to support Phenom. As per his own words on Dec 26, 2007 03:12 PM:

Quote:

---

I'm focusing here on boards that are officially supported. Tom's basically pulled a bunch of boards out of their closet that do not officially support Phenom, and told us what we already know about them.

---

It's a list of boards that are supposed to work with the claimed BIOS version. Sure this is helpful too, but please make it clear what it is as it'll be misleading to readers.
The grim reality is half of those didn't even run with those BIOSes listed, at least until mid-January. There are many examples around of that here and on every forum. Personally I know of the ASUS 590i SLI boards, they did not function with that BIOS in December at all, not until as of very late. I've been troubleshooting Phenoms since November and know well enough what did work and since when. AM2 support and compatibility has been poor.

And BIOS 1.00 for MSI RD790 had hordes of issues too including reboot loops. Official v1.1 or Beta vP0H is the one that should be listed there.

So let's get this clear, you want to go through and test every board and that's fine. It's not like I edited the OP's post to include those boards or BIOS, I thought it might be a decent place to start as a reference :shrug:... so what do you want?

Well, if you want to list boards which officially are supposed to support Phenom, then that's cool too. The only thing I was noting is that many AM2 boards actually still don't work properly with a Phenom (as in stable at stock configurations) even though they claim to, and we have no user feedback on many of them either apart from the manufacturers word so it would cause users undue trouble if we stated they were working fine. :)

Please append to the beginning of the list that "these motherboards/BIOSes officially support Phenom CPU's" or something to that effect just to make things clear for all.

If you want to add boards, then Abit, ECS and Foxconn has some too. Off the top of my head and some notes (100% sure, but untested by any user AFAIK)

Abit:
AX78
A-N68SV
AN52V
AN68SD

ECS:
NFORCE6M-A V3.0
GeForce6100PM-M2 V2.0
A770M-A (AM2+ MB)

Foxconn:
520A
560A
A6VMX
A6VMX-K

MSI:
K9NGM4-F V.2
K9N SLI-F V.2

I haven't seen any mention of K9AGM3-FIH being officially supported yet by MSI.

You basically use the latest BIOS there is as none of the AM2 boards don't need another BIOS for AM2+ CPU's yet - they still have many issues for which you'll need new BIOSes. That goes for many of the aforementioned boards on the list, at least 3 BIOSes there I can see do not work stable or even at all with Phenom (newer BIOSes do though).

I'm agreeing with you on this issue, KTE. Supposed support is not good enough. I'll leave all the boards on the list for now, but I've bolded those boards actually supporting Phenom. The boards have to support Phenom at default settings. As I said in mye earlier post, the m2n sli bios 0401 is very old and I'd be suprised if that board works with Phenom at all. Ain't nVidia 500 just a rebranded nforce 4 chipset iirc?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LIKMARK

I'm agreeing with you on this issue, KTE. Supposed support is not good enough. I'll leave all the boards on the list for now, but I've bolded those boards actually supporting Phenom. The boards have to support Phenom at default settings.

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Great idea. :up:

I don't want to hear users trying an old BIOS which has poor to no AM2+ support and then saying "my Phenom is bust, AMD is selling dodgy Phenoms, the 3rd core doesn't work even at stock!" which is exactly what users on AM2 boards with poor BIOSes and Phenom are saying after using a BIOS which the MB MFG said supports Phenom (but it didn't). ASUS nForce 500 chipset boards are the hotties here. ;)

Quote:

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As I said in mye earlier post, the m2n sli bios 0401 is very old and I'd be suprised if that board works with Phenom at all. Ain't nVidia 500 just a rebranded nforce 4 chipset iirc?

---

No way it works. Even 1203 which came out at least about a year after doesn't. 1302 is the one supposed to support AM2+ but it's old, as of November, so I highly doubt it runs them properly with many updates yet, which I doubt ASUS will bother with (it's focusing on 700i/P48/X48/X38 mostly).

I know the M2N32-SLI Deluxe BIOS which is supposed to support Phenom does not support it (mainly the root cause for the fudged 3rd core belief). I'm not sure of any BIOS which yet fully does (i.e. the system reads system details properly and the BIOS changes do change after bootup). The BIOS which does support all 3 Phenoms in retail is 1603 but 1701 is better and very recently released.

The nForce 500 C51XE 90nm and MCP55PXE 140nm both by TSMC are different to the nF4 AFAIK, as IIRC nF4 didn't support RAID 5 whereas the nForce 500 chipset did. I'm not sure, I was away from computers/online involvement from around late Feb. 2006 onwards to now, so skipped much. :)

Tested bios 0905 beta some more on my crosshair today, and I can confirm there is no voltage control whatsoever. It is appliable in the BIOS, but no change is made.

Max bootup is htt 227, but bsod comes at once there is some load on the cores. Irql less or equal or second core did not interrupt bladi bla... probably not enough juice to cores/nb I believe.
Max semi stable htt speed is 223 with 2450MHz on the cores.

KTE: Do you think I will be able to change nb multi via wpcredit (as you can do with AM2+ boards) for AM2 boards or is it locked to cpu multi? I'm not sure I understand it correctly about this. I know split power planes is disabled with AM2 boards, but does this apply for nb multi too?.

Also I remember reading something about nb running slower on AM2 boards (1,6GHz), or did this just apply for the barcelonas running on dual socket bords?

Max HT I get on AM2+ board without NB multi/voltage control is also 225HT (stable). Above this will be unstable (due to NB volts per speed - we've tested other BIOSes and it does 250 HT max stable boot and 2.6GHz max NB speed).

You might be able to change the NB multi although I am doubting it due to support for separate PLL's. Try it, it doesn't take long. Just check the register first to see if values are consistent with AM2+ boards (should be).

NB should be 1.8GHz on AM2 boards AFAIK. Ones I've seen were 1.8GHz. New Phenoms will all be 2GHz (as these werr supposed to be originally).

Hmm, I'll test it out, It would be lovley if it worked, otherwise no 2,5Ghz for me..

Multiple pll's as in one pll for cores and one for nb (or one pll for each core plus one pll for nb (I'm assuming the first option..)? The values for tlb patch were the same as on the AM2+ boards, so the values for nb multi probably are too.

Probably me remembering wrong about nb speeds (or it was one of many rumors before Phenom launch)

Edit: BTW, I can change multi for each core with AOD hack posted here, that should count in favor of being able to change nb multi I'm thinking (.. or desperatley hoping/wanting :))

Well, using the list I posted I started searching other forums for threads where users have had/had not had success with the product listed. My interest is old stock boards we can slap quads into at stock speeds for folding as I anticipate the price of low end quads will fall drastically by summer so this is of great interest.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LIKMARK

Multiple pll's as in one pll for cores and one for nb (or one pll for each core plus one pll for nb (I'm assuming the first option..)?

---

A separate PLL for all individually components. ;)

Quote:

---

Edit: BTW, I can change multi for each core with AOD hack posted here, that should count in favor of being able to change nb multi I'm thinking (.. or desperatley hoping/wanting :))

---

Give it a try, couldn't be easier.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Ugly n Grey

Well, using the list I posted I started searching other forums for threads where users have had/had not had success with the product listed. My interest is old stock boards we can slap quads into at stock speeds for folding as I anticipate the price of low end quads will fall drastically by summer so this is of great interest.

---

I agree, they should be. They already are pretty cheap here.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KTE

Give it a try, couldn't be easier.

---

Gave it a try, and are a bit at loss for what to do. Cant use wpcredit as it won't work under vista x64. I'm trying to use rweverything instead, and can find the right HEX, but i can't find the BIN(ary?).

Anyone know what to do from here? Pics:

LIKMARK, add these to the 1st post please. They officially support Phenom FX and Phenom (no user test of these that I know of though).

Asrock ALiveNF7G-HD720p
Asrock ALiveNF6P-VSTA
Gigabyte GA-M68SM-S2L v1.0 - BIOS F4 (2008/01/23)
Jetway M2A693PLUS-VP
Jetway M2A694-GDG
Jetway M2A694-GDP
Jetway M2A694-GHG

Quote:

---

Gave it a try, and are a bit at loss for what to do. Cant use wpcredit as it won't work under vista x64. I'm trying to use rweverything instead, and can find the right HEX, but i can't find the BIN(ary?).

---

Felix built a nifty tool. Use this, it's smaller and handier for the job: http://www.tweakers.fr/baredit.html

I haven't used RWE for this task so I can't advise on its functioning. Install Bar_Edit, restart and then you can use it.

You have the right register there (D4) and you're after modifying the binary data of that register in this box =>

Attachment 72964

For reference:
00001b = NB Multiplier 5x
00110b = NB Multiplier 6x
00011b = NB Multiplier 7x
00100b = NB Multiplier 8x
00101b = NB Multiplier 9x
00111b = NB Multiplier 10x

Edit binary>press Write>Reboot>Check to see it's changed. ;)

Hm..

I don't like this. Seems like TLB patch fix and NB multi change via msr editors don't work. Tested a few configurations, with horrible results. There is clearly something wrong with my system now. Earlier tests with WinRAR bench gave 1095KB/s, tlb patch enabled. Now I don't even make 300kb/s. Changing NB speeds does nothing to latency test, ie nothing is changed even if Cpu-z reads nb speed changes "on the fly":


NB @1600MHz, TLB Patch enabled------------->NB @1600MHz, TLB Patch fix
http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/6...0tlbxk9.th.jpg______________________http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/7...bfixsd5.th.jpg

NB @1800MHz, TLB Patch enabled------------->NB @1800MHz, TLB Patch fix
http://img149.imageshack.us/img149/9...ktlbtt1.th.jpg______________________http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/7...bfixmy5.th.jpg

NB @2200MHz, TLB Patch enabled------------->NB @2200MHz, TLB Patch fix
http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/7...0tlbuj4.th.jpg______________________http://img179.imageshack.us/img179/1...bfixam7.th.jpg

NB @2200MHz, TLB Patch fix, Rebooted
http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/1...boottz5.th.jpg

As you see there is no change in the values of either latency test or WinRAR bench.

That's still running the NB patch in all instances, thats why. ;)

RWEverything patch method doesn't work on my system.

Can you try this please after booting up and see if it works: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...postcount=1215

Make sure you have the RDMSR values I had before changing them. Then re-run the above tests only for NB 1400 compared with NB 1800.

9500/9600 doesn't clock higher than 9x NB multi. ;)

Alright, I know CrystalCPUID method works as I tested it first, didn't do any benches though. Were hoping rweverything method worked as CrystalCPUID method is somewhat.. impractical.. At work now, but I'll certainly test it tonight. So the TLBpatch overrides NB speed changes too? I can find all the right RDMSR values, so theoretically all changes should be applicable IMO.

I don't have the tools to check but when I tested L3 cache with the TLB patch, the L3 cache was not picked up and inaccessible. As if it or a major portion of it had been completely bypassed or.. disabled. :shrug:

Thus, NB speed should make a good deal of difference. Just run EVEREST L3 cache bench at 1400 vs. 1800 and see the difference. ;)

LIKMARK... can you give me cpu-z dump
If after reboot the NB clock does not stick... that mean your NB speed is locked... ;)

Lol. I can do 7GHz NB too...
http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/6...7032sw7.th.jpg

Cpuz dump is with tlb patch fix with CrystalCPUID and reboot, still no effect on Winrar bench, and "on the fly" nb multi change with BAR-EDIT(no boot).

You think there could be any way to unlock NB multi?

You have to reboot for the change Likmark. ;)

9500/9600 >9x NB = no way.
9500/9600 <9x NB = yep.

Can you check if AOD shows that change without rebooting too?

EDIT: wait, when did you apply the MSR value change, before or after the reboot?
It should be after. As I said, don't try higher than 9x you're wasting your time as the NB isn't changing from stock at all. Physically it won't regardless of what the register value reads so your performance is just like that of 1800. Just try 7x and 9x and compare performance and you'll see.

I know, I know, when I reboot, it's back to stock speed. IE my nb multi is locked to 9x. That's kinda sad but expected.
AOD shows 7GHz NB too, i'll test rebooting one last time just to check.
http://img266.imageshack.us/img266/2047/aodjd7.th.jpg

Edit: Yes, it resets itself at reboot.

Hmm.. that's the same issue as mine. Although I haven't touched my MSR's and they go higher than that, far higher, and mine were automatic bootup values (BIOS has no option to oc NB). The NB is still at only 9x in my instance though, pretty obvious if you look at performance and I already tested real NB multi change, it needs a lot of volts and the performance gets much better in everything. Plus I already know from many tests real NB speed at 2.4GHz starts getting difficult and 2.6GHz NB (real) is the absolute limit for air on mine even with 0C ambient and 1.58V.

Seems like the registers in Phenoms are basically changing on the fly but the actual speed isn't so software which reads those register values is also reporting wrong values for CPU/NB/HT/RAM. :(

Oh I totally forgot. You're on an AM2 board which are known to give these problems (8GHz CPU). But I'm on a AM2+ which isn't usually known giving these problems apart from Polygons. Try changing CPU multi too, I bet software shows it changed all the way to >7 or so GHz. ;)

I think the only thing i really can change in my bios is the ht ref clock. I believe this because my system bsods if I push it above 227mhz. I can change cpu multi in AOD, downwards only, naturally, but it should bsod if I put it too low I believe.
EDIT: Or not.

Anyone seen where to do a vcoremod on the Crosshair?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LIKMARK

I think the only thing i really can change in my bios is the ht ref clock. I believe this because my system bsods if I push it above 227mhz. I can change cpu multi in AOD, downwards only, naturally, but it should bsod if I put it too low I believe.
EDIT: Or not.

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Depends how low really. Should be able to go down to 800MHz max at least with a BE and 1100MHz at least with a 95/96.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LIKMARK

Anyone seen where to do a vcoremod on the Crosshair?

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The Crosshair is physically the same board as the P965 Commando, apart from the CPU socket differences and luxury extra's. Check the mods for that, they may very well apply. You can easily find and do a mod yourself though, here's one starter guide: http://www.aoaforums.com/forum/hardw...mod-guide.html

Very easy really just depends if you have the tools and time to waste... or if you have nothing else to do. :p

What are you after though and why?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by KTE

Depends how low really. Should be able to go down to 800MHz max at least with a BE and 1100MHz at least with a 95/96.

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Tried down to 1000MHz, all stable(only changing multi).

Quote:

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Originally Posted by KTE

The Crosshair is physically the same board as the P965 Commando, apart from the CPU socket differences and luxury extra's. Check the mods for that, they may very well apply. You can easily find and do a mod yourself though, here's one starter guide: http://www.aoaforums.com/forum/hardw...mod-guide.html

Very easy really just depends if you have the tools and time to waste... or if you have nothing else to do. :p

What are you after though and why?

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Bought the tools some time ago, just need some potentiometers and resistors.. No, I don't have time for it really (my wife tells me, not happy about amount of time spent in front of the computer..). I'm quite lazy, hence my question :D

I'm quite sure making good Phenom BIOS'es for Crosshair ain't on top of Asus' list these days, so I might do the voltage regulation manually as there is no voltage regulation control in the current BIOS.

I'm gonna check the commando mods, sure some Intel guys did this a couple of years ago..

Thanks for the link btw :)

I still don't understand one thing though..

Are you trying to access more CPU voltage? If so, your board won't be the limit there hardware wise, it's your BIOS.
But if you're after lessening Vdroop and Vdrop then yep, you'd need to mod them physically after finding the FB pin.

Change VCore and CPU VID like this in Windows, try it (it's real-time): http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...&postcount=554

Well, I thought to do both things actually, but as you say accessing more vcore is (of course) bios limited..

I'll test doing it realtime in windows.

Sorry, 9500 won't allow more than 1.25VID (VID locked, which means no more voltage than what BIOS allows). :(

Check this post out and add this link/pic to the first post please: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...postcount=1448

It's very valuable, AMD/MB MFGs are hearing us. Actually, thank Sami for initiating this, MB MFGs can be very hard to work with. :)

Second post updated. :)

Check the link out in my linked post, and it'd be useful to post that as it contains the description of the fields in the table (they're TLB Fix enable/disable through the BIOS fields, whether AMD tested it to work or MB MFG, or both). :)

LIKMARK: Add these to the first post please, all AM2 which officially fully support Phenom X4 CPUs. :)

ASRock:

ALiveDual-eSATA2
ALiveN570SLI-eSATA2
ALiveNF5-eSATA2+ R3.0
ALiveNF5SLI-1394
ALiveNF5-VSTA
ALiveNF5-VSTA R2.0
ALiveNF6G-GLAN
ALiveNF6G-VSTA
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R1.0
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R3.0
ALiveNF7G-HD720p R5.0
ALiveXFire-eSATA2 R3.0
AM2NF3-VSTA
ALiveNF7G-FullHD R1.0
ALiveNF7G-HDready

Even a 480X in there ;)

new crosshair bios here

any chance that the MSI K9A platinum will support a phenom 9x50?

not yet: http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?f...&cat3_no=#menu
I don't know if they are updating bioses for Phenom on that board

My buddies ECS A770M just died with a 9850.

Yes. If it's a board with less than five pwms the board have to have quality pwms (and probably good cooling) to handle a 9850.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LIKMARK

Yes. If it's a board with less than five pwms the board have to have quality pwms (and probably good cooling) to handle a 9850.

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He added cooling but I just thought I'd post so you could note.

Thanks for the heads up, I recon it was the mosfets that popped?

VRMs are rated for the amperage, frequency and efficiency they work at under specified ambient temperatures. The motherboard PCB heat capacity is a large limiting factor for their performance, being limited to 105C quite often - at max the components themselves have to stay below 125C to perform within the accepted amperage and temperatures. Their biggest impedance as with any IC is temperature.

I'm not aware of the VRMs used on many of these MBs but a typical 3-phase has maximum efficiency at 50A whilst a typical 4-phase PWM has a maximum efficency at 60A at 250-400kHz at 25C ambients with 200 LFM air flow. After that the power loss increases rapidly and hence the efficiency and heat of the IC and PCB both increase in the negative way. The 6-phase VRMs on the other hand only start to become highly efficient from 60-70A output but their efficiency decline, hence power leakage is much slower and gradual. It's the typical problem found in SMPS really.

If you have a good enough LFM over the PWMs, more than the conventional 200 LFM found in desktop systems, they will increase in efficiency, power delivery and lifetime - 3-phase circuitry won't do too badly as long as the current is not out of spec for the components or of the inductors being used.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LIKMARK

not yet: http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?f...&cat3_no=#menu
I don't know if they are updating bioses for Phenom on that board

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they need to its one of the top end AM2 boards from them it would be stupid not to...

As I said in Abit AX78 thread I have reverted back to my Crosshair to test the latest bios. One of the reasons for changing to a AM2+ board was enhanced Phenom support, wich -at least with the AX78- didn't happen. The Abit board does not support cpu-nb fid changes, unganged mode or 1066MHz memclk mode with current bioses at least.. Memtweaking on the Abit AX78 board was very scarce indeed.

As Quintero warned here, the mem settings are not exacty "spot on" with 1103 bios either :D However, voltage control is present with Phenom, and accurate as far as I can see from superficial testing.

1066 memclk support is better in this bios than in AX78 bios though. It booted, but rebooted upon loading OS, this made me think timings were not applied right. I booted with bios settings 1066 / cl 5 5 5 15 2t /loose subtimings @2,1v. The result was these timings: 3 4 3 8 2t!! Yes, this should not be possible with 1066memclk mode I know. To get cl 5 5 5 15 2t real I had to apply these timings in bios : 7 9 13 32 2t (or something like that, can't remember exctly). It boots and loads into windows at least :).

Anyways, this probably is a "Phenom bios" as the two (three) previous bioses (0904/ 0905beta, now removed from Asus site/ 1001)

More results to come :)