X48 Rampage Formula Preview.

[Vivi]

Wow got this board today. really really awesome baord, i cant say il ever go with any other brand

i achieved this with little effort



Im sure i can go higher but i dont want to rape my NB yet

What you guys use to monitor NB temps in windows?

Rampage Formula Ftw!

[Abducted]

Hi guys! i didn't have time to read the full thread, so i hope this hasn't already been posted.

Recently got my new system with a Rampage Formula up and running.
One of the first things i noticed was how hot the NB got, so i removed the heatsinks and applied some Arctic Ceramique. That didn't help much at all. But the heatsink also didn't feel warm at all. With the NB at over 60c (at stock voltage under load) the heatsink should atleast feel hot if the heat is transferred the way it should. But when i felt the base of the heatsink (that lighter copper color base plate) i burned my finger.
So apparently the heat wasn't transferred from that base plate to the heatsink and heatpipes.
So i removed the heatsink to have a closer look and this is pretty much what you'll see then: (This pic is from the Maximus Formula thread. Apparently it's much harder for them to remove the heatsink, but with the Rampage ASUS just used some of that silicon stuff they also use for the heatsinks at the power area)


You can see the heatpipe and when you look from the side you can also see the heatpipe going to the SB. But i couldn't really see where it made contact with the baseplate and when you looked under the baseplate via the 'hole' from the middle heatpipe i didn't see where it made contact either. So i took a small screwdriver and popped that base plate right off. (it pretty much came off when i pushed the screwdriver between the base plate and the heatsink, i didn't even have to rotate or force it)
And here is what i saw (only have picture of the base plate, i got soo excited i put the heatsink back on the board without making a picture of it. )
Click for full screen


The red areas are the parts where the glue actually made contact with either the heatsink or the heatpipe. The part on the left made contact with the heatpipe going to the SB. The 'long' part in the middle is what made contact with the middle heatpipe (the part that made contact is just +/-1.5mm in width.) and the parts to the right made contact with the heatsink.
I think the total 'contact surface' was less then 1 square CM (for the metric people among us ) AND that 'contact' was through some simple glue!!!

Those edges surrounding the baseplate aren't a problem since the baseplate is larger then the NB heatspreader, so the NB will fit perfectly between those edges.
Now i used quite a bit of arctic ceramique to fill the space around the heatpipe and the heatsink and also put some arctic ceramique on the heatsink and NB to make sure there was enough on there to fill the gaps and i put the heatsink back on the mainboard.

Right away i could feel the heatsink getting MUCH warmer then before, but since i put quite a bit of thermal paste between the NB and heatsink i wanted the heatsink to get really toasty fso the paste could settle. So i put a piece of paper between the NB heatsink and the CPU cooler to prevent airflow from the CPU cooler to NB heatsink.
I increased the NB voltage and stressed it for a while. The NB temp didn't even go over 55c with the piece of paper preventing airflow and now the heatsink acctually felt really hot to the touch like it should.

The end result, i went from 62C to 40C! while running Prime95 on 4 cores
That sounds too good to be true, but considering the lack of contact which means the NB was hardly cooled, it makes sence

The only downside to this mod is that my SB gets hotter now. The heat from the NB chip is transferred via the heatpipe to the SB heatsink and that actually heats up the SB now! So it might be better to cut the heatpipe close to the NB heatsink so that no heat is transferred from the NB to the SB but the SB still has the surface of it's heatpipe to cool.

[FrOzE]

Something i wanna ask abt... the Intel Matrix Manager is for RAID HDD only? Or can i use it for normal setup?

Secondly, i would like to ask... if i were to do a RAID 0 for my HDD 1 & 2 (OS), can i still have secondary HDD non-raid (for Storage)? Everything on the mobo.....

[RealTelstar]

Something i wanna ask abt... the Intel Matrix Manager is for RAID HDD only? Or can i use it for normal setup?

The first. It's not needed for "ide" setup.

[Sync0r]

Hey, just got the board the other day.

Few concerns... Say I were to alter a voltage setting in the bios then save and exit, I'm finding that it will turn off then start again but will hang on cpu init or en setup. If I turn the pc off and leave it for say 2-5 mins then try to boot its all fine and it runs at the voltage I set earlier fine.

Same thing happens if I try to clear cmos, I have to wait 2-5 mins before being able to boot.

Anyone else getting this?

Spec - E6600, OCZ Reaper HPC 4096Mb (2x2048Mb) PC2-8500, 8800gtx, 2x750gb samsung F1 Raid0

[kik]

The fan for the heatpipes is only necessary if you're using water. The temps for my NB and SB under load is 48C-49C for the NB and 44C for the SB. I replaced the TIM with Arctic Ceramique and it dropped my temps by 4C-6C for both As far as voltages. Right now, the NB is at 1.23V and the SB is at 1.05 and the SB2 is at 1.50V.


I don't think it'll hurt if you do.

If you use stock CPU cooler or similar, the air flow from the optional fan disturb the air flow from the CPU cooler and vice versa.

If you use a TRUE, Tuniq or similar cooler there is okey to use it, no air flow interference.

I did use it as it gave additional cooling and brought down the heat on my NB. I don´t remember how much lower it was.

I run my NB between 1,41 and 1,71, depending on how hard I push my memory and to get me the lowest possible tRD and right now I´m on water on my NB and it´s never above ~35C even if I push 1,71 throu it.

I'm using a Tuniq Tower and I noticed that I can't even fit the fan because of the cooler. I'm hitting 70c+ on the NB and I'm only using 1.35v. My ram (Corsair PC8500 2*2GB) can't run at the default speed, maybe it's because of the high temperatures?

Here's a pic of my setup: http://www.onionen.se/pub/kik/IMG_7249.JPG

[scottath]

Dodgey 2x 40mm fans together and cable tie them to the heatsink

Example on my board:

[Abducted]

I'm using a Tuniq Tower and I noticed that I can't even fit the fan because of the cooler. I'm hitting 70c+ on the NB and I'm only using 1.35v. My ram (Corsair PC8500 2*2GB) can't run at the default speed, maybe it's because of the high temperatures?

Here's a pic of my setup: http://www.onionen.se/pub/kik/IMG_7249.JPG

Did you read the post i posted a little earlier on this page? Might be helpfull for you. If your chipset if 70c and your NB heatsink is making good contact you should almost burn your fingers on the heatsink, if that is not the case you probably have the same problem i did. ASUS did a really crappy job mounting that base plate since a lot of people have NB temp problems. (without mods)

[kik]

Did you read the post i posted a little earlier on this page? Might be helpfull for you. If your chipset if 70c and your NB heatsink is making good contact you should almost burn your fingers on the heatsink, if that is not the case you probably have the same problem i did. ASUS did a really crappy job mounting that base plate since a lot of people have NB temp problems. (without mods)

Yeah, I saw that post.
I will try to re-seat the cooler if I have the time.

[bigslappy]

Just got this board set up on the test bed & as soon as power-up, I hit DEL to enter the set-up , then it runs all thru the post & at the end it says in bios that "USB overcurrent detected sys will shut down in 15 seconds . I removed all the cards ,drives,every thing i could think of & still get this message on POST . soo then i took out the VisionTek 3870OC & swapped it with my 3870 same brand still the same thing each time i was getting a RED LED on the board near the PCI slots took all the VID card off & it don't go RED LED but can't see anything due to NO CARD .... Now i Just moved the Vid card over to the other PCI 2.0 card slot & Boom I'm up & running

ANY i dea what's up ? should i RMA the MoBo ?

seems like that slot is Shot to Sh*t

[Abducted]

Yeah, I saw that post.
I will try to re-seat the cooler if I have the time.

Well it's not just re-seat, that had hardly any effect on my temps anyway.
It's taking out the base plate that did the job for me. Of course, that probably voids the warranty, but it's the only way i could get my NB properly cooled with the stock cooler. So it should actually prolong my warranty


BigSlappy: it sure sounds like a bad mobo to me. Maybe you can try removing the board from the case and try running it outside the case. Maybe something is short circuiting inside the case. It's a long shot of course...

[OVERK|LL]

Why not , the max formula is. Do you have a motherboard or gfx card that is not?

My Maximus Formula is made in Taiwan.

[bigslappy]

[QUOTE=Abducted


BigSlappy: it sure sounds like a bad mobo to me. Maybe you can try removing the board from the case and try running it outside the case. Maybe something is short circuiting inside the case. It's a long shot of course... [/QUOTE]

The MoBo is on a test bed thank God ! that would have been a trouble shooting every thing in a case !

Yeah every thing works with the Vid card on the #2 PCI slot but it was shorting out on the #1 slot the error said "over volting the USB" but i had disconnected all USB's & i was still getting a red led .. till i took the card out of that slot even did that with 2 different boards same thing , but place said cards in slot#2 BINGO up & running what i did was load the O/S & set-up my raid0 hhd's , upgraded the ATI software, loaded the Intel drivers off the cd & the CPU runs FAST 3.2 stock ! temps were fine as the CPU was water cooled & i had a fan in the CPU / Fan outlet soo that was not a problem .. Even the Poster works great ! but I'm gonna RMA the board back to Asus buy another in the mean time & just build another sys with the RMA & sell that system or just sell my P5E & keep both Rampage Formula's
the board is really nice with all the on board LED's And the BIOS looks very Cool lots of options

[Eurasianman]

I'm using a Tuniq Tower and I noticed that I can't even fit the fan because of the cooler. I'm hitting 70c+ on the NB and I'm only using 1.35v. My ram (Corsair PC8500 2*2GB) can't run at the default speed, maybe it's because of the high temperatures?

Here's a pic of my setup: http://www.onionen.se/pub/kik/IMG_7249.JPG

I'm sure one of the others posted a solution, but I just wanted to vouch as well that I ended up replacing the thermal material that was used on the NB and SB and my temps dropped about 5C (this is considering under load). I'm not sure what the idle temps are since my computer is never idle (F@H SMP FTW!).

By the way, compressed air is your friend. Looks like you could use some nice dusting

[kik]

I'm sure one of the others posted a solution, but I just wanted to vouch as well that I ended up replacing the thermal material that was used on the NB and SB and my temps dropped about 5C (this is considering under load). I'm not sure what the idle temps are since my computer is never idle (F@H SMP FTW!).

By the way, compressed air is your friend. Looks like you could use some nice dusting

Nice to know a solution but I don't think I will rip everything out of my case just to do that. It's pretty full now as you saw on the picture.

And fyi, the dust is gone now.

[Clump]

My Maximus Formula SE died last week; no boot at all. I could not find another Maximus, so (reluctantly) replaced it with a Rampage Formula. I really expected to have to start over from scratch. I first booted into safe mode, then rebooted straight into Vista without so much as a hiccup. Currently running at stock speeds, OC is coming.

Maximus is RMA to Asus. It will be interesting to see what comes back.

[_Stelios_]

Max 3d and 32m fsb stable with this motherboard (585x8)




and..... 600fsb spi1m benchable



max i could achive was ~610 but i don't have the cpu-z validation
Northbridge on air (~50C) and cpu on watercooling

I cant' wait to freeze this baby.. I love this board

[bigslappy]

WOOT! got my MoBo from NewEgg today, this one booted right up>>> NO problemO>>> runs Nice !
Got a newer Verision board also !
DDb Woot !

... the 1st MoBo is Gonna hit the Asus RMA bin as soon as I get the RMA # from them ....

[DaLiu]

Got a newer Verision board also !

What u mean by newer version?

[Vivi]

setlios that is pretty awesome, im sure my mobo can do that aswel.

wanted to know, what where your settings please?

like NB volts
gtl NB
gtl Cpu

and all the settings you found important

and where did you get taht vers. of setfsb, i cant seem to find it

tHANKS

[Chri$ch]

@ _Stelios_

which memory timings and performance level you had @ 600FSB SuperPi 1M?

[_Stelios_]

setlios that is pretty awesome, im sure my mobo can do that aswel.

wanted to know, what where your settings please?

like NB volts
gtl NB
gtl Cpu

and all the settings you found important

and where did you get taht vers. of setfsb, i cant seem to find it

tHANKS

These are the main voltage settings used:
vNB 1.8
vpll 1.6
vfsb 1.5
vsb 1.13
cpu gtl x0.67
nb gtl x0.67

setfsb It was inside my benching folder

@ _Stelios_

which memory timings and performance level you had @ 600FSB SuperPi 1M?

5-5-5-15 and if I remember right PL was 10

[DaLiu]

I just received my board yesterday, i took down the radiator from NB and SB and changed the thermal but i made a little mistake, check the picture and please tell me if you believe i damage the board, tonight im gonna try to install the board.

[scottath]

Hopefully it will be fine - why not use your finger to push the pins out?

[DaLiu]

Hopefully it will be fine - why not use your finger to push the pins out?

I tried but didnt work, stupid me!

Anybody can suggest me some voltage setting for 450 fsb with Q9450 on Rampage Formula?