Gigabyte MA790FX DQ6

[Daveburt714]

Hehehe

You making fun of me man...

Guess I was a little disgruntled that night....
Anyway, I got my K9A2 back today, a day early even! Thanks UPS and MSI...

I'm gonna pull the chip in a few minutes and put the 96BE back in the DS5 so I can do some testing with the K9A2 and the 9850....

I'm sure it's gonna hit 3.5 stable!!!

I'll let ya folks know my results, and hopefully at least give you a clue as to how many of my problems (if any) were related to the DS5 itself...

[Daveburt714]

Ok Folks... It's like 3 hours, and 6 beers later..

Maybe it's because I was weened on the K9A2 w/Phenom, but this board just feels SO MUCH BETTER... Granted this is an early evaluation, and I'm not sure where it's going to end up, but I can tell you that it makes alot more sense than the DS5 ever did with the 9850!!

Marginally better on the CPU clock (2.8 seemed stable) and substantialy better on the NB clock, 2400 seems doable! I couldn't even get Stock 2000 on the DS5...

I'm using the 1.4 Bios, that came installed on my RMA'd board... The one wierd thing is that reguardless of what I set my Mem V's at it cranks them up to 2.16v's, higher than I would like, but if your running a DS5 turning up Mem V's might help stability...

Oh well, it's frikin late, guess I need to go to bed... Early evaluation though is that DS5 Bios definetly has problems!

[Aussie FX]

Ok Folks... It's like 3 hours, and 6 beers later..

Marginally better on the CPU clock (2.8 seemed stable)

Dave, you should have had 12 beers then you might have got to 3.5.

I'm sure it's gonna hit 3.5 stable!!!

You need a DQ6 for that.

[dyeager]

Back to the Gigabyte MA790FX-DS5, the Phenom x4 9850, and 1066 RAM for a moment. I have had my system for almost a month. Yet to get any real use out of it.

It passed diagnostics but the PC was not stable from day 1. Ready boost was immediately jettisoned. Power supply was temporarily exchanged with a larger unit from another pc -- no difference. Found the 1066 settings in the bios too limiting for anything other than automatic with unganged 4 modules, which was subpar compared to the memory specs (memory vendor gave up – now there is a notation on some memory sites that 1066 memory support is limited to one channel – shouldn’t unganged get around this?). Processor died a slow death over 2 weeks, finally registering error on diagnostic tests – exchanged . Have also had some other crazy problems. Now I have it so it only crashes every couple of days. I have to remove the battery to get it to restart after it freezes. Gigabyte had me test it with a “supported” processor. I will likely exchange the motherboard and reload the OS.

I have done some tests with overclocking the CPU and graphics, but I must get it stable first. I think most of the difficulties in this thread are due to multiple issues, which definitely includes the bios.
*** I was told by gigabyte earlier today that a bios update to support phenom 9850 could be released in a week or two.

>>> What 1066 memory do people have working in a stable system using 4 modules? Is anyone getting full memory spec speeds?

P.S.: My failed processor was not overvolted. It did run 10 degrees Celsius hotter than the replacement. My system temps are in the 30’s.

[G0ldBr1ck]

>>> What 1066 memory do people have working in a stable system using 4 modules? Is anyone getting full memory spec speeds?

I finely got around to pulling out my crappy G.Skill 2x2g ram and puting in 4 sticks of CORSAIR Dominator DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) and this solved all my problems with the ram finely. No stability problems at all at 1120Mhz 5.5.5.15 22 2t. Im so very happy at last! Now I just hope i can get a refund on the G.Skill ram. I havent tryed to OC the dominator's anymore at all yet. this was just the first settings i booted with and havent messed with it sence.

seems to be the perfect ram for the phenom and DQ6. I would assume the DS5 as well.

[Fulgore0rb]

...Now I have it so it only crashes every couple of days. I have to remove the battery to get it to restart after it freezes. Gigabyte had me test it with a “supported” processor. I will likely exchange the motherboard and reload the OS.

Funny, I asked gigabyte support about if they had plans to add 9850 support and they said "The 9850 shouldn't be an issue with the latest BIOS [F5]"

... I would assume the DS5 as well.

HAHA you'd be surprised- I bet this thing has a self-destruct built into it.


On another note: I have two different half-way 'decent' dialogs going with Gigabyte support (decent meaning they actually seem to be comprehending more than 10% of what I say and respond in something higher than pidgin english- which is rather sad since they require the question to be in english in the first place).

Dialog 1: Phenom support is flawed- and I can proove it with a 64bit application that runs fine with a non-phenom but freezes a Phenom everytime on the DS5. -They insist I use a non-phenom on my board before they investigate. Honestly WE are doing every bit of troubleshooting for these guys....

Dialog 2: Maximum tRC setting in the BIOS is 42 @1066... And I HAVE TO PROOVE IT WITH A SCREENSHOT before they acknowledge my request to increase the supported rating... WTF do these guys really not know anything about their own BIOS?!?

I think that certainly finalizes it- This is DEFINATELY the first and LAST Gigabyte motherboard I'll ever own... 'Tech support' shouldn't be this ignorant and stuborn to provide tech support.