Gigabyte MA790FX DQ6

[Lightman]

Priceless find(bios) in a priceless post

Thanks Lightman,you lightened up our day

A question:i know you just started messing with your precious chip ,but any news about HTT limit(~245MHz) from Japan BIOS ?

You welcome!

So far I'm looking for a gold setting, but it's hard .... I tried 240HTT with no issue, unfortunately I can't get my CPU stable above 2.55GHz

Having fun Lightman? I´m liking F3A aswell! here is a little teaser! Prime on my baby...

Oh, lots of fun!! Reboots every couple of minutes . I'm playing with L3 cache speed and how it affects performance. It will be busy and interesting weekend - so many BIOS options to go through

Very nice CPU What stepping and batch??

PS. TO ALL:
I will post set of results probably later tonight. If you have special wishes, fell free to post requests

[BadNizze]

How do you change L3 speed? Ht-link? running Ht-link @ 1400mhz in bios 250*7 Anyting higher whont boot... Try lowering youre Ht link if you have stability issues. F2 bios i more stabil then F3A for my, could run prime for 5h last night with 1,36v know it fails after 50min with more vcore. Lightman have you found any program that meshures CPU temp corect? everest says 104C.... Coretemp reboots\hangs my system...

Stepping: CAAZB AA 0743 DPDW
Batch: H0191

[KTE]

You guys have better boards and BIOSs You have at least 10 issues less than I do on the MSI board.

BadNizze: what are your P95 temps afer 15 minutes. Any EVEREST screenshot at that?
Also what NB, RAM and HT volts are you using?

Thanks.

[Boschwanza]

PS. TO ALL:
I will post set of results probably later tonight. If you have special wishes, fell free to post requests

Effects of higher NB Speeds would be very nice to see, since i have seen a 2.7 GHz Phenom 2.2 Ghz NB Speed beats a Phenom ES @ 2.9 GHz @ 2GHz NB in 3DMark06 CPU Score.

Thanks alot bud.

[Lightman]

How do you change L3 speed? Ht-link? running Ht-link @ 1400mhz in bios 250*7 Anyting higher whont boot... Try lowering youre Ht link if you have stability issues. F2 bios i more stabil then F3A for my, could run prime for 5h last night with 1,36v know it fails after 50min with more vcore. Lightman have you found any program that meshures CPU temp corect? everest says 104C.... Coretemp reboots\hangs my system...

Stepping: CAAZB AA 0743 DPDW
Batch: H0191

I can't boot anything higher than 240HTT and even that is not stable! Your stepping looks interesting, I will try to swap my Phenom after new year. For now it's enough .
Haven't tried anything to measure core temps. Not an issue for my low clocked CPU

Effects of higher NB Speeds would be very nice to see, since i have seen a 2.7 GHz Phenom 2.2 Ghz NB Speed beats a Phenom ES @ 2.9 GHz @ 2GHz NB in 3DMark06 CPU Score.

Thanks alot bud.

OK!
Here are first tests:





For SuperPi almost no effect, but for Cinema R10 we can see some nice gains, especially in OpenGL test and multi-core rendering
Next will be 3DMark06 and 01....

[mAJORD]

lightman!

Were you able to change your NB speed?

[KTE]

Thanks mate.

Lightman: My tests at 2420, single channel RAM at 4-4-4-4 same speed with 32-bit CB10 were far lower ... because my HT was 1GHz lower?

My NB speed was the same speed as yours.

[accord99]

Thanks mate.

Lightman: My tests at 2420, single channel RAM at 4-4-4-4 same speed with 32-bit CB10 were far lower ... because my HT was 1GHz lower?

It's because you ran the 32-bit version.

[Boschwanza]

The MultiSpeedup seems awefull, we have seen something like 4.09x on 64 BIT OS in the past. Running some stuff in the background?

[accord99]

The MultiSpeedup seems awefull, we have seen something like 4.09x on 64 BIT OS in the past. Running some stuff in the background?

That was caused by Phenom's strangely low score in a single thread.

[Boschwanza]

I agree with you, but multispeedup should be at least something between 3.7 and 3.9. trough phenoms native design. Phenom works like a Dualcore with 4 cores instead of 2.

http://techreport.com/r.x/phenom/cine-render.gif look

3.87 for the Phenom 9600 and
3.81 for simulated Phenom 9900

[KTE]

It's because you ran the 32-bit version.

+700CB and +2300CB just from 32-bit to 64-bit?

AFAIK it would normally be lower.

Lightman: looking forward to your posts bro. I'm counting on one of you to hit plus 3-3.2GHz. I'd like to see some benches at those speeds.

[bingo13]

Good news!!

New BIOS F3A which enables CPU multiplier available on Japan Gigabyte website!!

Enjoy!!

We are working on a BIOS release after this with the NB multiplier being available. Also, F3A addresses DDR2-1066 compatibility,corrects a few ratio problems with F2 final, and increases VCore range. However, 2GB module compatibility is still not where it needs to be currently.

[Aussie FX]

Can someone link to the F3A bios please.

I couldn't find it.

[Lightman]

The MultiSpeedup seems awefull, we have seen something like 4.09x on 64 BIT OS in the past. Running some stuff in the background?

I was wondering same.... It might be that reviewers had a BIOS without L3 hotfix and 5-10% performance penalty?? I'm also confused, but as you can see multi-core efficiency is growing with NB and memory speed. It's also growing with HTT speed.

lightman!

Were you able to change your NB speed?

I'm just playing with HTT/multi ratios. But my board and/or Phenom doesn't like HTT above 230MHz. I can boot even @240 but it's not that stable. Still playing with this BIOS.

PS. If you flashed F3A it is best to CLEAR CMOS after that. I find that some of hidden BIOS settings from F2 was still affecting my OC stability. After CLEAR CMOS it was easier to reach 240

+700CB and +2300CB just from 32-bit to 64-bit?

AFAIK it would normally be lower.

Lightman: looking forward to your posts bro. I'm counting on one of you to hit plus 3-3.2GHz. I'd like to see some benches at those speeds.

Yes! That's why I'm x64 only for work! It can make huge difference .

I also hope to get 3GHz+!! Maybe not with this exact chip but for sure I will !

We are working on a BIOS release after this with the NB multiplier being available. Also, F3A addresses DDR2-1066 compatibility,corrects a few ratio problems with F2 final, and increases VCore range. However, 2GB module compatibility is still not where it needs to be currently.

Thanks for info! If you need a beta tester them you got one .
BTW do you have any information why with Phenom anything above 230HTT isn't stable?? Is this Phenom issue or will it be sorted with BIOS revisions??
Once again thanks for you info!

Can someone link to the F3A bios please.

I couldn't find it.

Install Gigabyte @BIOS form DVD and then click Find BIOS From Gigabyte --> Update New BIOS --> select USA or Japan and done!!

[Aussie FX]

Doh!
Why didn't I think of that, I was trying to decipher Japanese .

Thanks Lightman.

[Lightman]

I'm slowly getting to conclusion that my CPU is unstable above 2.5GHz no matter of settings. For sure this has something to do with HTT frequency because if I lower it, I can boot up to 233MHz HTT with 11x multi (boot, not stable). With lowered multi I can do 240MHz HTT but that's it! Not a single MHz more so far ...

While I was playing with every possible BIOS setting looking for stability I did some more testing as well!

In Cinema4D R10 you can gain up to 200+ points in multi CPU test simply adjusting HTT multi. I had 9650 points at 2510MHz with HTT x6 (lowest in OverDrive) and as you can see on SS belove 9876 points with HTT x9 . Wish higher HTT multis would work but even if I set 2.6GHz link in BIOS it's still 1.8GHz in Windows.



Here we see how windows is distributing single threaded task among differently clocked cores..


And final result


That's how it looks with all cores clocked same...


My highest all 4 core stable setting (It was a long journey from 2450MHz )

more coming soon ...

[JS1234]

Anyone tried the automatic overclock feature with AMD Overdrive?

[KTE]

If you run a single threaded application set affinity to one core because windows will throw it about on many cores randomly and it can mess everything up. For instance, SPi will throw 25%/75% on Core 0 and 75%/25% on Core 4 alternatingly.

Lightman: I'm aware of 64-bit difference, we use them a work regular but the difference shouldn't be this much for me since I run a high NB/HT speed too. We've seen kyosens/stephens tests before this on K10h too on both for comparisons. My scores are looking lower than expected.

[Lightman]

If you run a single threaded application set affinity to one core because windows will throw it about on many cores randomly and it can mess everything up. For instance, SPi will throw 25%/75% on Core 0 and 75%/25% on Core 4 alternatingly.

Lightman: I'm aware of 64-bit difference, we use them a work regular but the difference shouldn't be this much for me since I run a high NB/HT speed too. We've seen kyosens/stephens tests before this on K10h too on both for comparisons. My scores are looking lower than expected.

I've played with affinity as well

Regarding multi core efficiency I've tested all possible Cinema versions with same effect. Multi speed up between 3x and 3.6x! On the other hand I'm getting pretty nice single core scores


It is looking good compared to K8 (Cinebench 2003 x64)

Now we just need proper 3GHz+ Phenoms from AMD

Update:

3D scores with ONE HD3870 825/2440 enabled (no CF)


All cores @2479MHz


One core @2599MHz other @2479MHz no affinity set


3DMark06

[Aussie FX]

BEWARE.
Be careful when getting bios F3A.
I have just lost my motherboard trying to flash this using windows based @bios.
The bios actually flashed ok but it wouldn't restart. After leaving it overnight I forced a restart this morning and the board is now completely dead.
So much for Gigabytes dualbios thing
I'm not too happy about this as you can imagine, so I will take it up with the retailer on monday.

According to the book the only reason this should happen is if the incorrect bios is applied. The Japanese site and @bios both said it was for the 790FX, so I'm not sure what has happened.

Anyway just be careful if you are going down the same route I took.

[yuckup]

sorry to hear your 790 based mobo also has died i RMA'ed my msi k9a2-cf-f (ms-7388) mobo on friday it worked (i use this term losely) for about 8 hours i had a phenom 9600 in it for whatever reason fsb wanted to be 209.? so cpu was running at 2404~2405 mhz should have replacement mobo on tuesday so i guess i will find out if it was a issue with IMC or mobo causing OC

[Lightman]

BEWARE.
Be careful when getting bios F3A.
I have just lost my motherboard trying to flash this using windows based @bios.
The bios actually flashed ok but it wouldn't restart. After leaving it overnight I forced a restart this morning and the board is now completely dead.
So much for Gigabytes dualbios thing
I'm not too happy about this as you can imagine, so I will take it up with the retailer on monday.

According to the book the only reason this should happen is if the incorrect bios is applied. The Japanese site and @bios both said it was for the 790FX, so I'm not sure what has happened.

Anyway just be careful if you are going down the same route I took.

Sorry to hear that

I was using @BIOS many times (at least 10) and it worked fine. This board was recovering BIOSes after failed OC several times as well...

Once I even corrupted both F3A BIOS images and board reverted automatically to F2i
When board after reset is not POSTing leave it for at least 1 minute because it is trying then to find good BIOS setting or complete copy and it's attempting to re-flash itself! If you reset or switch it off it may cause permanent BIOS damage...

[speedlimiter]

Same here, board is dead with F3A.

It runs fine for two days with that BIOS. Yesterday i want to turn on the PC -> BlackScreen, fans @ 100%

After a few restarts it says "Recovering from backup-BIOS" -> Restart -> PC hangs @ CPU/RAM detection, Clear CMOS doesn't help. So, back to the shop

Until the mobo is repaired, i will try the asus M3A32-MVP.

It's not the first time GB has an official broken BIOS. Think of the F6 for the P35-DQ6

[Aussie FX]

Same here, board is dead with F3A.

It runs fine for two days with that BIOS. Yesterday i want to turn on the PC -> BlackScreen, fans @ 100%

After a few restarts it says "Recovering from backup-BIOS" -> Restart -> PC hangs @ CPU/RAM detection, Clear CMOS doesn't help. So, back to the shop

Until the mobo is repaired, i will try the asus M3A32-MVP.

It's not the first time GB has an official broken BIOS. Think of the F6 for the P35-DQ6

I've had an RMA accepted so I think there is something weird going on.

With mine it just never restarted after it had flashed, the flash was successful but when it tried to restart it was just dead.
I left it for two days with the battery out and tried to restart it again today, with no luck, just a dead screen.
So much for the dual bios thing.....

The shop I bought it from told me that there is another revision of the board out now and I might have selected the wrong revision, but I don't think I did.
Apparently that can be critical, if you do select the wrong bios it will kill the board immediately, so take care with that.