**Official ABIT IX38 QuadGT Review/Overclock/Guide Thread**

[Supershanks]

Crucial Ballistix are quite popular atm, small wonder considering ther current cost/performance ratio

Exactly, you know it makes sense

Be interesting to see how you get on

cheers

[Funkers]

hi all.

My first post.

Not been into the high performance PC scene for a while. I'm currently running an Athlon 3400+ clawhammer with a nivvy 6200 with 1meg ram. I've just ordered a complete new set of PC bits which includes the Abit ix38 and q6600 g0 so hopefully when i've put it all together will be able to post on here and glean some of youe expierience.

looks like a good forum.

Mike

[AMDfreak]

hi all.

My first post.

Noob alert! Seriously, welcome. I have learned alot here. Let us know how your build goes. I've got my IX38 on the way, but no clue when I'll have time to build....

[GAR]

how is this board coming along.

[nordien]

how is this board coming along.

No issues here, it clocks very well. Only real issue is the high PWM temps when overclocking a Q6600 G0.

But the results are very good.

[Supershanks]

No issues here either, abit has created some own goals:-
1) Box is to big & mobo moves about 2cm in tyransit.
2) No Fan retention clips despite being shown in mobo.
& a few more niggles see The Good & The Bad

Build & package quality isn't as good imo as the Gigabyte X38 DQ6 but even with a relatively immature bios it's clocking well, mostly beating the gigabyte.
It's my 1st Abit board for some time, must admit i'm getting to be a bit of a junkie using prime & the guru ocing panel to fine tune overclocks

Can see it being a decent alternative to the ip35-Pro

[Ace-a-Rue]

i have a retail QX9650 on order...hope to have it soon for my IP35 Pro board...the Pro board is as good and possibly better than the IX38 QuadGT...our newest beta release makes the Pro substantially better and it will work with the QX9650.

[nordien]

People, sold my E6600 and got a Q6600 today. Its a L724B418 G0.

@ the moment im doing :
9 * 400 = 3600 mhz
DDR1000 @ 4-4-4-15 2.4v



I like the PWM temps so far about 70 Degrees Celcius......No issues whatsoever with the Q6600. Only 1.4v for 3.6 ghz

[Aldy402]

does this board suffer from the dreaded abit double boot issue?

[nordien]

does this board suffer from the dreaded abit double boot issue?

No not at all. It seems Abit has learned from the past but is still learning today........

[Ademcg]

does this board suffer from the dreaded abit double boot issue?

Actually mine suffers from something similar.

if it is left off for a few hours, with or without the Power plugged in, it will do the following when power button pressed:

All fans spin for few seconds, powers down, no post
All fans spin for a few seconds, powers down, no post
followed by all fans spin for ever if left, but no post.

The only way to clear it is to fully clear the CMOS (changing the jumper, removing the battery, and 24Pin power cable for a few minutes).

It is really, really annoying.

[Ace-a-Rue]

Actually mine suffers from something similar.

if it is left off for a few hours, with or without the Power plugged in, it will do the following when power button pressed:

All fans spin for few seconds, powers down, no post
All fans spin for a few seconds, powers down, no post
followed by all fans spin for ever if left, but no post.

The only way to clear it is to fully clear the CMOS (changing the jumper, removing the battery, and 24Pin power cable for a few minutes).

It is really, really annoying.

does that happen only when overclocking or at default speed?

have you upgraded to the latest beta bios?

[Ademcg]

does that happen only when overclocking or at default speed?

have you upgraded to the latest beta bios?

All at stock and running latest 12_B bios yes

[Ace-a-Rue]

sounds to me as a defective board (bios)

[jcool]

does this board suffer from the dreaded abit double boot issue?

The what?
Never heard of that, and I've been/I am using AW9D-Max, AB9 QuadGT, lots of IP35 pro and IX38 soon

[vpw]

Actually mine suffers from something similar.

if it is left off for a few hours, with or without the Power plugged in, it will do the following when power button pressed:

All fans spin for few seconds, powers down, no post
All fans spin for a few seconds, powers down, no post
followed by all fans spin for ever if left, but no post.

The only way to clear it is to fully clear the CMOS (changing the jumper, removing the battery, and 24Pin power cable for a few minutes).

It is really, really annoying.

Happened to me once yesterday during installation, but thats abt it, after that it ran nicely for 3 hrs or so, until I switched it off.
Gonna flash the bios on my board, 3870 today, probably not gonna try the BETA bios unless people here can give recommendations?
I'm currently only running E6320, gonna wait for the penryns to arrive.

[nordien]

After some good advice from Supershanks

Finally got the 8 * 450 running with very low vcore (imo)



Looks like the pwm temps are with reasonable boundries.

3dm06 is impressive, almost 14000 with a single GTX @ 625/1500/1000

[Ademcg]

sounds to me as a defective board (bios)

Well, it did it with the shipping bios and now the beta bios...if it still does it with my new PSU then its sooo outa here for a full refund...the 12th November I took delivery and to be honest its been all pain since.

[Ademcg]

Quick update....the Corsair has saved the day...no more graphics problems, no more double boot no post issues and Vista is nice and stable.

It would appear that Clunk may have stumbled on something afterall, the Enermax Galaxy 1KW he was using for the Asus Extreme was incompatable and now my 850 W Galaxy...something to be aware of perhaps.

Now to overclock

[Supershanks]

That's great news Ademcg., welcome back from Limbo land

Yep Issue was originnally with the maximus , but looks like we can add another board.

[Funkers]

You have got me worried now.

My Abit ix38 comes tommorow and the power supply i've ordered is the Enermax inifiniti 720w. Hpefully i wont have issues with this after all these probs popping up with the Galaxy model

[nordien]

After a day of tweaking i've found that 8*450 is stable with the follwing settings

CPU 3.6 ghz
8 * 450
DDR1080 1:1.20 @ 4-5-4-15 @ 2.4vdimm
vore 1.40 with 0.5 offset
vmch 1.60v
vich 1.10v
vichio 1.55v
GTL REF 0&1 68%
GTL REF 0&3 67%

The last two where the most important to get Small FTT in prime stable. The PWM temps are getting hot about 90 C under full load.

I think the board is capable of much higher clocks but it needs a very good bios. In my experience the only way the achieve a good 12 final bios is to give Abit input. I've mailed Abit EU serveral times and they forward the issues to Taiwan. So people take some screens and mail them!

I placed two WD 320 AAKS drives in RAID0. Seems to work quite good. 130 mb/s sequential read, buffered read 300 mb/s. Games seem to load very quick and a windows boot is like a breeze. So the RAID chipset seems to work.

[Supershanks]

laughed at this. Got asked to put up the manual so i browsed the cd. Found an extra Manual:Lol: There you go Ace, can't have the board, but you can read about it

[Ace-a-Rue]

laughed at this. Got asked to put up the manual so i browsed the cd. Found an extra Manual:Lol: There you go Ace, can't have the board, but you can read about it

i cannot connect to that link.

are you doing better now on the overclock?

[Supershanks]

Retested links seem ok, Clunk's took a while opening but did. Links on the manual page open pdf files.

Yep been busy last couple of days, but ocing is fine, have found same restrictions as nordien re strap 1.25 isn't stable had to run @8x450 1.20 which i did last week.

Had got 8x465 15hr prime stable which was last i did post# 238