M3A overclocking

[CRFX]

I've settled on 2750 @ 1.5v which tops off at 75 with all cores loaded. A bit high I know, been debating water if that would get me any more speed out of it.
Oddly I can't get any more than 1800 HT/NB stable no matter what I set the NB volts at.

[SocketMan]

ftp://ftp.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socketAM2/M3A/0702.zip

[Jakalwarrior]

any changes in the new one? Im still on the 401 because it clocks better than 501 and 601 for me.

[SocketMan]

I haven't tried the 5000+ BE in it ,only Phenom

*Added ECC field/section (probably the only setting that is visible for both AM2 and AM2+ CPU's)
************************************************** ****
*WinRar performance got "fixed"- use to be (for me) about 300kbs
Now about 1500kbs
************************************************** ****
*Huge increase in Everest CPU benchmarks
************************************************** ****
**The Bad:

Ganged/Unganged setting-gone
************************************************** ****
I am guessing the BIOS got released in order to support the upcoming phenoms
B3's.
Thats about it for the "major" things

[Jakalwarrior]

Think I will avoid testing it then. Trying out new bios then flashing back to 401 each time is gonna land me with a corrupted bios one of these days.

[dball3]

is there any work around for ganged/unganged with the new bios?

[SocketMan]

is there any work around for ganged/unganged with the new bios?

Not that I know
I thought at first Asus made it like their 790fx board,where you can set to
"unganged" @DDR800, but not 1066.That is not the case as the setting is still
"missing". Using 3 sticks of RAM might set it to "unganged" but apparently having
3 sticks is not as "stable" as 2 or 4.
I do have mine in the 3,4 slots cause of the cooler and maybe with 4 sticks the
"unganged" setting will "reappear", but I doubt it.

[dball3]

I have 4 sticks in mine, and unganged is not there at 1066. I'm just going to assume that it won't be there at 800 either. I'm not in the mood to open her up at the moment, I was just messin around with service pack 1. Finally got that straightened out. Then i decided to turn the atheros l1 back on in the new bios, and that seems to be working fine. So i'll wait a couple of days to mess with the ram.

[donitsi]

I noticed one 'funny' thing with 0702 bios: when i set tRas to 12 = no boot, when i set it to 15 --> 13 and when i set it to 14 --> 12 at least according to cpu-z and everest ultimate edition

[SocketMan]

Yea it seems the board just ignores what you set in the BIOS
It changes the memory timings at will, little *****

[dball3]

I'm having problems just running at 5-5-5-15 since 0702, and i think it has something to do with unganged and ganged setting. When i was unganged my memory was fine, now that it's ganged I set it manually to 5-5-5-15 and i get hard locks with sandra memory bench, so i'm running at 6-7-7-16 auto clocks on the board. I think i'll be flashing back and starting over.

[SocketMan]

Serial ATA 3Gb/s RAID
This motherboard supports next-generation SATA hard drives based on the new SATA 3Gb/s storage specification. The onboard NVIDIA nForce® 560 SLI™ MCP allows RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 0+1 configurations for four SATA connectors.
http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1...34&modelmenu=1

Thats from M3a description page, what a joke
I downloaded the QVL for the supported DDR1066 chips, guess what?
Not a single one
Yet right on the top of the page it states DDR1066 support.

The M32A-32MVP is even better:
DDR2-1066 support is only for some AM+ CPU's please refer to asus.com

Good thing I still have my s939, just gonna use that, grrrrrr

[thigobr]

Hi. I have 3 questions:
1) Does M3A supoorts Q-FAN for CPU and Case Fans?
2) Does M3A supports 125W Phenoms/X2?
3) If I change multiplier on a X2 5000+ BE still C'n'Q working?

[informal]

Hi. I have 3 questions:
1) Does M3A supoorts Q-FAN for CPU and Case Fans?
2) Does M3A supports 125W Phenoms/X2?
3) If I change multiplier on a X2 5000+ BE still C'n'Q working?

1)Yes it does.
2)Yes it does.
3)Yes ,CnQ will work with 5000BE in that way(it should work even if you OC old fashion way,with HTT).

[Jakalwarrior]

Anyone try these newest bios and see if they clock well with X2s?

[SocketMan]

Anyone try these newest bios and see if they clock well with X2s?

Yes and don't know.
Had the 7.02 and 8.02 with the Phenom in it,but went back to 0601.
Then took the phenom out and put the X2 in (still at 0601)
They've added ECC support in 702/802 which should work for x2 and x4, but took out some RAM settings(some timings and unganged option ),added TLB on/off switch for X4-B2.
When you guys flash from windows and it doesn't give you an option to use an
older bios, then go to options in Flash menu and select "BIOS DOWNGRADE"
enable (check mark)

[Jakalwarrior]

all the flashing scares me though lol, and every time I try a new bios = two flashes. 1 to the new bios, 1 to get back to 401 so I dont have to lose 200 or 300mhz of my overclock.

[dball3]

bios 803 is up, unganged and ganged setting is back,tlb switch doesn't seem to do anything from bios, unless its a vista sp1 problem. it seems like a good release so far, i was able to get my ram timings back to where they should be. ftp://ftp.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socketAM2/M3A/0803.zip

[justapost]

Thx dball, flashed the 803 bios and plugged the 9850BE in the M3A.

So far so good.


As long as CPU and NB voltage stay below ~1.375V, one 4pin 12V rail is enought.
But at 1.425/1.4V for example this rail pulls >19A and the system powers of quickly.
So 2.8/2.2GHz is no issue with this board at 1.325/1.3V and temps stay below 60°C here also. Beyond that 18A are reached quick.
Max FSB i reached was 270MHz, 275MHz did not post.

EDIT: Now if i select tRAS 5 in the bios i get 3. 6 leads to 4

Comparison B2 vs. B3

Sapphire 790FX/B2


Full B3 results

[SocketMan]

Thx for the news!

Any improvement with AOD ?
Have my X2 in it and 2 folding clients running atm, have to wait till I can flash

[justapost]

Received the Xigmatek HDT-S-1283 here is a rough comparison with the Big Typhoon 120 with the 9850BE at 2.8/2.2GHZ 1.325/1.3V

Big Typhoon 120:

Idle: CPU 42°C / Core 41°C
Load: CPU 62°C / Core 57°C

Xigmatek HDT-S-1283

Idle: CPU 40°C / Core 40°C
Load: CPU 54°C / 51°C

Used the thermal compound coming with the cooler for the xigmatec and had AS5 on the BigTyphoon, will try Xigmatec with AS5 later.

Tried AOD:


AOD allows CPU/NB VID and CPU multi manipulation on the Clock/Voltage page. The Auto Clock stuff is still greyed out, guess due to missing ref HT manipulation.

The third core seems to be the weakes, so i disabled three and four.

Core one and two prime since one hour at 3.0/2.2GHz 1.325V/1.2875V with only 41°C core temps.

Update 3.0GHz/2.2GHz/533MHz (CPU/NB/MEM):
1.325/1.2875/2.05V prime95 failed after 80mins at core 1
1.3375/1.2875/2.05V prime95 failed after 130mins at core 2
1.35/1.3/2.1V prime95 ran stable for ~6hrs and did not yet freeze idling.

Must say this downcore feature is neat, too bad the bios does not allow saving different profiles i'd go 2x3.0/2.2GHz and 4x2.8/2.2GHz then.

BTW: Just received an 4850e (2.5GHz, 45W, dual core).

[justapost]

Switched to the 4850e

System:
CPU: 4850e
MBD: Asus M3A
MEM: 2x1GB CB Tracers 6400
HD: 1xWD 5000YS RE2 500GB
DVD: LG GSA-H55L
GFX: Sapphire HD2600XT 256MB/DDR2
HSF: Xigmatek HDT-S1283
FAN: 1xSilenx Ixtrema 72cfm
PSU: GBT Odi
OS: WinXP 32bit SP3rc3

Stock:



vcore(cpuz)/cpu temp/power consumption
Idle: 1.232V, 27°, 45W DC
Load: 1.248V, 40°C, 90W DC

12V1 rail suck ~3A running prime95 means ~36W power conumed by the cpu.

EDIT: System powered off while i wrote this running prime95.
Firefox restored the session with all my typings.

[justapost]

Figured out the lowest stable vcore for 2.5GHz

Prime95 results:
1,15V failed after ~30mins (poweroff)
1,25V OK (3:33)
1,20V OK (7:45)
1,175V OK (2:47)

Screenshot:


Power Consumption:
idle: 43W DC
load: 84W DC

[justapost]

Max bootable ref HT is 405MHz here.

Screenshot


However it freezes or powers off soon after starting prime95. Tried different Clock Skew and RFC settings with no luck.

Testing 400MHz stability right now, seems good to go.

EDIT: Found a glitch in 803 bios. If i set tRAS to 15 it ends up as 13. Settings get applied two clocks behind.

[informal]

Thanks for your input justapost .
What's the max. stable clock you achieved with 9850 with 4 cores enabled and with what Vcore/FIDs?
Also,was it stable in everyday usage,ie. not crashing in idle state?