Official GIGABYTE X38-DQ6/X38T-DQ6 Info/BIOS Thread

[Zenoth]

Anyone else having sound issues with BIOS F9C and X-Fi cards? I tried the latest Creative WHQL driver and the Beta driver that was released a few days ago, but both of them don't seem to work "completely". I mean I do have some sounds, but other sounds especially in Windows are missing such as the little sound samples during the Windows welcome screen or when I close Windows, or the little beeping sounds when I close a program in the Task Bar, all those sounds are gone. And when I tried to adjust the main volume via the Windows Sounds options my Motherboard beeps instead of getting any real OS sounds, as if my card wasn't plugged or as if I had no audio drivers at all.

In games I have most of the sounds but they often don't get balanced between both speakers, and there's lots of sounds going on top of each others (I.E playing at the same time) or lots of crackling. I cannot recall ever having those issues before with BIOS F8C. I think I'll try flashing back to the official BIOS F8 and see if it fixes my problem. But I'd still be curious to know if I'm the only one in this situation. Any other X-Fi owners experiencing similar problems with the latest Beta BIOS'ses?

[Buggalugs]

Anyone else having sound issues with BIOS F9C and X-Fi cards? I tried the latest Creative WHQL driver and the Beta driver that was released a few days ago, but both of them don't seem to work "completely". I mean I do have some sounds, but other sounds especially in Windows are missing such as the little sound samples during the Windows welcome screen or when I close Windows, or the little beeping sounds when I close a program in the Task Bar, all those sounds are gone. And when I tried to adjust the main volume via the Windows Sounds options my Motherboard beeps instead of getting any real OS sounds, as if my card wasn't plugged or as if I had no audio drivers at all.

In games I have most of the sounds but they often don't get balanced between both speakers, and there's lots of sounds going on top of each others (I.E playing at the same time) or lots of crackling. I cannot recall ever having those issues before with BIOS F8C. I think I'll try flashing back to the official BIOS F8 and see if it fixes my problem. But I'd still be curious to know if I'm the only one in this situation. Any other X-Fi owners experiencing similar problems with the latest Beta BIOS'ses?

Yes my friend, the F9c screwed my sound (Xfi) too, but it would just drop out completely and i had no sound at all. I had to reboot to get the sound back and that would last for 5-10 minutes until it dropped out again. As well as that Windows components would crash, running apps would crash sometimes the whole fricken system crashed to a blue screen. It was impossible to use for me, i ve gone back to the previous F9b that doesnt have these problems.

It sure fixed the latency thing but i couldnt use the system without problems.

I cant wait to see if the P45 boards have this problem, we should know in a week or two.

[Zenoth]

Ok so you're saying that F9b fixed your issues?

Because I am currently trying F8 (final) and I'm still experiencing the same sound problems. The last BIOS I used was F8c and I believe with that one I had no problems. I think I'll have to try F9b, and if that fails I'll try F8c again... the thing is I don't like to flash the BIOS too much, I think that if I see @BIOS Utility fail only once or if the power cuts out (for God knows what reasons, just because I'm doing something important) while I'm flashing my heart would stop for a few seconds. If it ever happens I won't be able to post back here since I don't have any back-up PC's, Desktop or Portable. Even if the flashing utility is good I think it's always a risky business, but, at least, the GA-X38-DQ6 do have a back-up BIOS in case one fails.

[Zenoth]

Alright, I tried F9b, but I still had the same issues, nothing fixed. But F9b wasn't even allowing me to over-clock the FSB, each time I tried to enable the manual adjustment of it then it immediately grayed out itself, I couldn't change it at all. Right now I'm back with F9c, I don't feel comfortable going back with the F8 series simple because I do get some performance boots on the Memory with F9c.

I think I'll deal with my sounds issues for now until maybe F9 final is out or even waiting for the F10 series if it'll ever happen, the thing is I do get sounds in games and such, but there's just some problems some times and most of my Windows sounds are gone, but I guess it could be worse, I don't get any BSODs or anything critical. There's also the possibility that the next final Creative audio drivers will fix it, maybe it's not related to the BIOS at all.

EDIT: Ok, I tried F8c, finally, and to my surprise I still get the damn issue. I really thought that it was a BIOS-related issue. Now, all I can think of are two things:

1) My X-Fi is slowly dying on me, and I bought it only five months ago.
2) My Windows Install somehow got screwed up and I need to reformat and install anew, perhaps caused by the change from SP2 to SP3, without knowing it for sure.

I hope it's just Windows 'cause I don't have the money to buy another X-Fi, thanks God for the integrated Audio in the this motherboard because I might well end up having to use it for months to come if the problems ends up being my X-Fi dying on me.

[Buggalugs]

Maybe you could try reinsalling the sound card, or removing it and trying the onboard to see if it still happens. I would try reinstalling the drivers first.

With the bios you might need to press ctrl+f1 again to unlock the settings for overclocking. Try the F9a it is on the Gigbyte Site. If you dont already,you should return to bios defaults before you flash and load bios defaults after, then set for your config.

You should get a floppy drive if you do alot of tweaking/flashing, theyre only 15 bucks and more reliable.

[Richard Dower]

http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/...&GetDown=false

Realtek 889A, version 1.95.

[Buggalugs]

Theres a new DirectX too for the gamers.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...displaylang=en

[Zenoth]

Maybe you could try reinsalling the sound card, or removing it and trying the onboard to see if it still happens. I would try reinstalling the drivers first.

With the bios you might need to press ctrl+f1 again to unlock the settings for overclocking. Try the F9a it is on the Gigbyte Site. If you dont already,you should return to bios defaults before you flash and load bios defaults after, then set for your config.

You should get a floppy drive if you do alot of tweaking/flashing, theyre only 15 bucks and more reliable.

I tried physically removing and re-installing the card, no go. And of course I un-installed and re-installed the drivers dozens of times, no go. I tried BIOS F8c, F8 Final, F9b and F9c, no go. It has to be either the OS or the sound card itself, I see nothing else.

Maybe that my Northbridge over-voltage damaged the sound card? Is that possible?

[Buggalugs]

I dont think so. Maybe try a OS repair or something.

[rhansme]

I have the GA-X38-DQ6 with an Xfi card, and I am using F9c. I have not experienced any of the problems that a couple of you are using. Make sure that after you flash to a new bios that you reset the card to default settings and then re-enter the bios and re-set all of your settings to any overclocked values, etc... and save. Then re-boot. Make sure that the on-board audio is set to disabled.

[Zenoth]

It's ok now guys, I've completely reformatted, it's fixed now, it was indeed something wrong with the OS and not the BIOS nor the audio card, thanks God for that.

[csewell]

I tried the F9C BIOS and my latency got worse than ever.

On top of that, the CPU temperature sensor started measuring double the actual temp. I wondered why my CPU fan was constantly running at top speed, then noticed my CPU temp was 80C!

[ChrissTi]

I've told you a few times it's not a mobo problem for the latency, it's an application or a device that needs to be single on an IRQ and it shares it with other device ...

[Buggalugs]

I've told you a few times it's not a mobo problem for the latency, it's an application or a device that needs to be single on an IRQ and it shares it with other device ...

Well why are Gigabyte releasing bios fixes.?? and why dont people with Asus boards have the same problem with the same applications/devices.?? We shouldnt have to set things to different IRQs, most of us have the same common hardware and it works fine on a Asus board.

[Richard Dower]

Driver Package R1.95
Realtek HD Audio Driver support all of Realtek HD Audio Codec in Vista/WinXP/Win2000/Win2003 .
1. Vista WHQL Supporting: ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC260, ALC262,ALC267, ALC268, ALC269, ALC272
2. Windows 2000/XP WHQL Supporting: ALC880, ALC882, ALC883, ALC885, ALC888, ALC889, ALC861VC, ALC861VD, ALC660, ALC662, ALC663, ALC260, ALC262, ALC267,ALC268, ALC269, ALC272
3. HDMI Device WHQL Support: ATI HDMI Devices
4. OS Supporting: Microsoft WindowsXP, Widnows2000, Vista x86/x64
5. Pack with Microsoft High Definition Audio UAAV1.0a(5013)
6. Add/Fix
1.) Driver :
1. Customizations.
2. Fix encryption stream issue for ALC889.
3. Fix DRM issue.

[Buggalugs]

The P45 boards from Gigabyte dont have the latency issues according to this:

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=190360

[rhansme]

I would like to see how the DPC latency works on a P45 with Vista 64. My XP2 OS works just fine, but when I go to Vista that is when the spikes get bad enough to receive a warning message from the DPC pgm.

http://www.west-tech.com/DPC%20Laten...-DQ6%20F9c.jpg (XP Pro Link) iTunes,Orthos,Picassa,Ham Radio Pgm, all running during tests.

http://www.west-tech.com/Vista%2064%...%20Latency.jpg (Vista 64)

[ChrissTi]

Well why are Gigabyte releasing bios fixes.?? and why dont people with Asus boards have the same problem with the same applications/devices.?? We shouldnt have to set things to different IRQs, most of us have the same common hardware and it works fine on a Asus board.

Why are you so sure that ASUS don't have such problems ? I changed my ASUS MB because of this ... My X-Fi even on WIN XP wasn't working ok ... I was having glitches and blue screens ...
Now with X38-DQ6 on vista and works OK, and I've tested it on win XP, and on dcplat I have latency under 15 microseconds ...

For me, all that changing of bioses, didn't made any difference, it's just breaking my CPU stability for overclocking, had to go down the CPU freq on 9c.
I worked for 4 years in a computer store at the service departament, and I think I have an ideea of what I'm talking about. There were entire transportships of ASUS mobos broken, or malfunctioning.
If i'm telling you that norton or symantec products made the computer systems work slower than normal, and some computer hardware to malfunction or not working at all. you wouldn't believe me.
And I bet that you have a program or something there that is breaking your system, and you keep installing it and you don't know what is wrong with your system. But wht should I bother.
I think that gigabyte is trying, to fix an unexisting problem, and in the meantime they are, breaking the mobo stability.

BTW there is a beta driver for X-Fi, and they are still trying to fix 4GB memo problem ... They are fixing it for a few moths, so ... your latency problems can be from that sound card driver. I'm not if front of that system to see what's going on.

[Buggalugs]

Chrissti, i dont doubt your experience with computers or your experience with the latency issue, but the fact is many many people have reported this issue. You know as well as anyone that no 2 boards/cpus/ram/soundcards are exactly the same. People can get different results with the same hardware.

I'm guessing you are one of the lucky ones, and thats the thing with this problem, everyone has different experiences. Some people like you dont have a problem. Some people had a problem but the new bios fixes it. Some people had a problem and the new bios makes it worse. Some people see no change.

I'm not sure if you read my earlier posts but i said i have treied the board with bare minimum fresh install, ie onboard sound ,no drivers or anything installed.

I dont recall any major faults or latency problems with Asus at least in the last 5 years. Which boards are you talking about? hmmm they had a problem with soundmax onboard with P5B P965 chipset if thats what you mean.

Chrissti this has been a well known issue with Gigabyte in the audio/sound scene for over a year(even longer). They are the first guys that noticed it and there are some very big threads about it on sites like Cakewalk, Cubase and other sound software sites. I only knew about it a couple of months ago but its hard to deny an issue exists after reading many reports about it. Also I dont think Gigabyte would admit to problem that isnt caused by them.

I dont know exactly what youre saying about Norton but i agree it sucks. I used Norton once on the very first computer i owned and i quickly learned its more trouble than its worth so i agree with you there.

Anyway we can agree to disagree, i'm still interested in your opinion. Computers is a bit of a gamble, sometimes you win sometimes you lose but I still like Gigabyte and the DQ6 overall except for this issue. I would have liked for you to try and help me fix it a few weeks ago but at this stage i am already planning to get another board anyway. Their P45 boards look good so i might get one of those or a P5E. I dont think i'm doing crossfire anytime soon so i might just get the P45 until Nahelem comes out. Nahalem will be the must have upgrade do u agree?

[ChrissTi]

I dont recall any major faults or latency problems with Asus at least in the last 5 years. Which boards are you talking about? hmmm they had a problem with soundmax onboard with P5B P965 chipset if thats what you mean.

Anyway we can agree to disagree, i'm still interested in your opinion. Computers is a bit of a gamble, sometimes you win sometimes you lose but I still like Gigabyte and the DQ6 overall except for this issue. I would have liked for you to try and help me fix it a few weeks ago but at this stage i am already planning to get another board anyway. Their P45 boards look good so i might get one of those or a P5E. I dont think i'm doing crossfire anytime soon so i might just get the P45 until Nahelem comes out. Nahalem will be the must have upgrade do u agree?

First of all I never used on board sound card from any mobo. You should read the forums from ASUS site, and I think that you got lucky with that mobo...
I use Sonar, Cubase on Vista x64 is a little buggy.

Before my computer was based on AMD because before Intel's Dual Core Duo, AMD was better performer.
I will never use crossfire because bad graphic drivers support for linux from AMD/ATI. Nvidia performs 3,4 times or more better in linux, because their GPU is not splited in two like on ATI. So I'll rather buy an 9800x2. but I'm not so sure, because for the games I'm playing, what I have is enough for now.
For the CPU I will not hurry to buy it, I'll wait for the benches and the prices, and for AMD's future CPU's.
It's not worth it to hurry, and spend so much money, and after half a year or a year to see the the prices droped by half ...

[Dr.Spankenstein]

Would anyone have an idea as to why my S/PDIF optical out isn't working? There isn't even a red light eminating from the port PLUS when I open the Master Volume panel, the volume slider for S/PDIF is greyed out.



Same with the Realtek Audio Manager.



There are no other audio devices installed and I have uninstalled the old drivers and loaded the latest from Realtek (1.95). I have also uninstalled the ATI Function Driver for High Definition Audio driver for my HD 3870s but they reinstalled themselves when I booted again. Could these be interfering with the Realtek drivers?

The Azalia coded is set to "AUTO" in the BIOS as well.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Buggalugs]

Dr Spank, the ATI drivers should be ok. Have you looked at the Windows Audio settings like in Vista where you can select which device to use and run the test thing.There is a guide somewhere about installing Realtek Audio becasue sometimes the windows built in drivers insatll themselves and conflict with Realtek. From memory you need to uninstall all audio drivers, reboot, then windows will auto load some audio drivers then you need to go into Device manager and uninstall the audio device and then install Realtek. Something like that but there is a guide somewhere on the net.

[ckirkby3]

Everyone...version F9D! For the X38-DQ6

http://rapidshare.com/files/122102957/X38DQ6.F9D.html

Also version F3B for the EX38-DQ6

http://rapidshare.com/files/122103262/EX38DQ6.F3B.html

These are the newest betas to fix the latency issues. I hope they help.

[tmatrix]

Ooooo! Thanks Chirkby3! I'll try this when I get back home. F9a and F9c were kinda helpful but the latency problem was still kinda noticeable, at least to me. Speaking of which, can someone please repost a link to where to download the DPC program to check my latency?

I've been posting in the thread at http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...179965&page=16 about my experience with degradation. When my E8400 processor was still "young and strong" before the misguided VTT abuse I put it through, manual GTL settings made a huge difference with stability at higher OC's at about 4GHz and above, even though it's widely said the normal setting is good enough for Core 2 duos in general. Does anyone know of a conversion table and/or formula Gigabyte mobo users can implement as a guide?

[ckirkby3]

http://www.thesycon.de/dpclat/dpclat.exe