Official MSI P7N Diamond (780i) Discussion/Review/Overclock/Guide/BIOS Thread

[craigbru]

Hey guys, I'll admit I haven't read all 40 pages of this thread so far... but I've read most. So, I apologize in advance if something like this has already been posted and I missed it.

Anyway, I have a couple of pics of a 40mm fan that I've added to the Circu-Pipe. It's simple, clean, and out of the way. I just thought I'd share it with you all in case you needed to drop a quick couple of degrees.

[loonym]

Nicely done Craig!

[XavierMaxx]

Thx man so Im setting them right? cause with this bios and the 1.2B1 I get this cold boot issue does the P07 use the old method for fsb term and gtl ref?

Your CPU GTL setting is right, your FSB Term/Voltage setting is wrong. As such the CPU GTL voltage itself is wrong since they are tied together.

The P07 I believe is based on the 1.1b6, which would be prior to the number switches in 1.1b8, so it should use the old method.

[AaronYuri]

XavierMaxx,

The performance BIOS releases are different from the betas/official releases. They are independent BIOS designs.

[craigbru]

Nicely done Craig!

Thanks!

[Fiskbit]

How exactly does the performance BIOS differ from the beta BIOS? And is it worth using?

[AaronYuri]

Fiskbit,

The tip is in the name, "performance".

The actual differences... I'm not sure.

[Fiskbit]

Yes, I understand what the name implies, but if it's supposed to better performance, I don't understand why it'd be a special BIOS rather than just making the main BIOS a performance BIOS. Surely there must be some drawback or they wouldn't be giving the option of a non-performance one.

[AaronYuri]

Instability/damaged hardware could be the result of using the performance BIOS releases. It's stuff in the BIOS we can't change. I guess only an MSI BIOS engineer could.

[Fiskbit]

My computer is still having random reboots. I'm continuing tests and still have to remove RAM one stick at a time, but here's what I've done so far:

-Prime95 for 15 hours on 4 cores. No errors.
-MemTest86+ overnight twice. No errors.
-Messed with BIOS settings. No improvement. Sometimes made things worse even when it probably shouldn't have.
-Tested the PSU with a multimeter. Outputs are steady and within 3%.
-Removed one GPU. Still reboots.
-Replaced with the other GPU. Still Reboots.

I'm currently running without the sound card installed and with only 1 GPU. After the next crash, I'll remove one stick of RAM, and finally the other. I don't have any other power supply to run in this computer, though I'm pretty convinced the power supply is doing its job. Are there any other tests I can run before RMA'ing the board?

Also, I was removing my sound card and noticed that the PCI-e Expander name plate had fallen off of the board. I suspect it probably got hot enough to counter the glue. Has this happened to anyone else? I swear I remember reading about this regarding other MSI products, but I can't remember for sure. Not sure if it's normal behavior or not. All temperatures in SpeedFan are good, and my case's 250mm fans should be covering the entire motherboard in fresh cool air from my room.

[panheimer]

hello again!
fiskbit, i'm very sad you still have random reboots issue. also my msi plates over heatsink has fallen, so i've removed all three of them, just to be sure they don't damage anything. i've read about someone else has got the same issue in the msi official forum.
have you ever tought it may be a software problem? maybe it's SP3 that gives you trouble, or something got wrong with registry or system files. So maybe a fresh win installation may solve your problems.
or you may try a linux livecd for some days so you can leave untouched your xp installation.
if even trying this your reboots continues, think it's time to rma something - mobo or PSU?

[loonym]

Yes, I understand what the name implies, but if it's supposed to better performance, I don't understand why it'd be a special BIOS rather than just making the main BIOS a performance BIOS. Surely there must be some drawback or they wouldn't be giving the option of a non-performance one.

Honestly I could never see much difference. I do think each release has been somewhat better than the previous although I really can't do much with beta 1.22. As far as the random reboots go this has been something that has plagued certain boards while others are unaffected. Cold boot, while not as common seems to pop up too for some. I've never had this issue but I've seen it plenty here and at msi forum. This leads me to believe that there might be some kind of random defect (bad trace, resistor, mosfet, or other power regulation?) that's causing it straight from assembly. Perhaps a reinstall could get you some relief but I get the feeling the problem is more than that.

[Fiskbit]

That's definitely what I'm leaning toward at this point. The sound card test is an interesting one because that's the only piece of hardware that most users of this board share, so it could very well be related to the reboots. I really hope so, anyway; it's a low quality card and one I'll be replacing at some point, anyway. I'd have already replaced it if my PCI slot weren't blocked (so far, that PCI slot is my main gripe about this board. I wish it had a second one or had the current one placed elsewhere).

panheimer: I definitely think my motherboard is at fault, so my PSU isn't going anywhere. I'm pretty satisfied with the multimeter readings I took from it, and while I know that's not necessarily the whole story, I find it rather convincing considering I've also had a lockup rather than simply a reboot and my motherboard seems to be rather strict with regard to settings changes.

I was a little worried about the plate, myself, and decided to check it for continuity to make sure it couldn't short anything. Luckily, didn't show as continuous, so I find it causing harm that way rather slim. It's also light enough that I doubt it could harm anything when falling down. The only worry I'd have would be one of those things getting lodged in a heatsink or fan, but I doubt that could happen considering their location.

I feel like if the reboots were exclusively a software problem, I'd be getting a blue screen of death. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but blue screens occur when things go awry due to, say, a driver or something like that, which allowed me to diagnose and fix my SATA/RAID driver problem when I installed this board. A full system reboot, on the other hand, would be caused by hardware error. Maybe this isn't always the case, though?

I'm not too keen on reinstalling Windows, especially when so many others have problems similar to mine; that's another sign that has me thinking it's the board. If it's a strong possibility, then I might do it, but I've already done so much work on this install of Windows that I'd hate to lose it.

[panheimer]

some times ago (last year) i've cleaned my system with ccleaner, and some days after it started random rebooting at distance of 2-3 days and sometimes after a week. i've spent three months triyng every piece of hardware installed on it but they were all ok. i've got a hint when my 2nd rig got the same issue after using again the same release of ccleaner. so i've restored an image i've done before and everything worked fine again - so i've learned that it's always good to have a recent image stored and to take care when cleaning registry...
anyway, i'm trying to say that it's difficult but random reboots may also be caused by software problems, and if you create an image of your actual installation you won't loose anything. it takes only 10-20 minutes to create an image and another 5 when you decide to restore it.

on the other hand, reading about so many people affected with stability issues at even stock or near stock settings, it's more likely the board is faulty.

[loonym]

on the other hand, reading about so many people affected with stability issues at even stock or near stock settings, it's more likely the board is faulty.

I realized quickly that running stock settings on the P7N Diamond gets me nowhere fast. Anyone trying to do that is setting themselves up for frustration. I've long had the belief that anyone interested in running only stock settings has no business building a custom pc anyway. They should be buying hp or acer

[Fiskbit]

A little over 10 years ago, I was given a Compaq as my first computer. It's a piece of crap and I while I didn't know better at the time, I realized when I got (built) my next computer that it was garbage. I've always run my machines at stock until now, but have been thrilled with the performance of the computers I've built versus that of any pre-built computer I've worked with. I make an exception for my laptop, though; that thing's a beast, despite its age and the fact that I need to reinstall XP on it to get it running well again.

I guess the point is that just because someone's running a computer at stock doesn't mean that they should be going with some crappy computer from HP or the like. Plus, building computers is a good way to learn more about them and eventually reach the point where you're going to be overclocking.

panheimer: And you never got bluescreens during that? That's alarming. I guess I might be willing to try a new install of XP, but only if I can set everything back to how it was if the new install doesn't fix anything. Does making an image capture everything on the drive? And what'd you use to make the image?

[loonym]

You want to run at stock that's your business but you must also be experienced enough after a few builds to know when flexibility is required for stability's sake. This isn't xtreme stock pc's. The forum was built around learning to run out of spec. MSI won't officially support issues encountered while running your system out of spec, that's why there are places like this for us, however they will support all these issues people seem to have while running stock speeds and default settings.

[wolf1974]

hey fiskbit, have you looked into the pci-e titainium x-fi i am using it in place of the one that came with the board it realy is a nice card and for once the drivers work,,,,,imagine that, but even if it dont fix youre reboots is worth getting it,,also have you tried every thing auto/default but use 1333 fsb i have read several times this has fixed the 6600 insability with this board, oh and to all i am now on my forth replacement from msi my last board was great for 2 weeks then my 2nd pci slot died and i had to move down to the 3rd slot witch is fine but i will be running 3 9800gtx+ cards as soon as my trade up is done with bfg so i will need that slot,,well good luck,,wolf

[Fiskbit]

Fourth? Ouch. I hope the newest one works out well for you.

I'm definitely planning on using a different sound card, but not yet sure about what I'll go with. The Creative PCI-e card is appealing, though I'm not keen on picking up hardware with the Fatal1ty branding. I plan on water cooling my GPUs when I have more money to put into this machine, which will free up my PCI slot. If I do that, a lot more sound card options become available, including using the Audigy 2 ZS Platinum card from my previous build.

I might give 1333 FSB a shot, but I'm worried about how much heat that'll produce. I'm still running stock cooling. I was planning to go with water for the CPU, but the Danamics liquid metal CPU cooler that should be coming out later this year looks really appealing and may be worth waiting for. I'll wait until my next reboot and forgo the RAM test for now in favor of seeing how things run at 1333 FSB, assuming I can figure out good settings for that and chip doesn't run too hot.

Thanks for the suggestions!

[panheimer]

to create an image i personaly use norton ghost. also acronis partition magic is a very good software. or you may try driveimagexml wich is freeware (never tried it but seems to works well).
googling around you may find hiren boot cd wich is a collection of utilities you have to burn on a bootable cd (but i think it's illegal...)
if you have a spare empy hd you may also look for your hd manufacturer homepage, they usually have hd utilities to clone an entire hd.

[loonym]

I use trueimage. I"m glad I did lately too. Had severe hdd corruption problems with a 790i I'm getting together.

[panheimer]

ops! yes it's acronis trueimage, i've made some confusion here...partition magic and acronis disk director are another softwares...

[loonym]

Here's a new bios file A7510NMS.123 date July 30. I haven't tried this yet but I will this afternoon.

[loonym]

Here's a new bios file A7510NMS.123 date July 30. I haven't tried this yet but I will this afternoon.

First impression, I like it. Here's what I do when I flash. I reboot and set optimal defaults in bios before flashing. Then I flash and clr cmos. The reason I immediately like this bios, after I cleared the cmos I set my boot order and all the numbers in cell menu and memory subsection that I know work for my q6600@3.6ghz, hit F10 to save and the board quickly posts and goes to windows. I could not do this with 1.22. I had to bit by bit move towards my overclock and one wrong setting would result in no post, that's why I never liked 122. I've only just flashed this 123 bios so first impressions is all I have but if there is anything, good or bad, I'll update. Too bad there are never release notes with these betas. I suspect it is a cpu support update.

[Fiskbit]

Well, I might grab 1.2B3 later due to your glowing review, loonym. Good to hear it's a good release.

I got a reboot earlier with only 1 video card and no sound card, so I'm back with SLI and sound now. I followed Wolf's suggestion of running 1333 FSB. My current settings are as follows:

FSB - 1333
RAM - 666
PCI-e - 105
NBv - 1.3v
CPU GTL - 0.83v
FSB Term - 1.225

All other settings are auto. I had a lot of reboots, freezes, and a blue screen at first while I was fiddling with settings, but then one time it worked just fine. I noticed my video card profile hadn't been loaded, so everything was still running at stock. I loaded the profile manually and immediately got a reboot. I figured out that the reboots that I get right when Windows boots up are apparently caused by loading the profile. If anyone has any idea why that might be, I'd love to here it. I went back to my previous settings and disabled the auto profile loading and had no trouble booting up after that. I tried overclocking my cards to the same settings as the profile manually and didn't have a reboot. I find this very strange.

Running Prime95 across all 4 cores right now and everything looks good. Load temperatures are 51-56 for the cores, and the two motherboard temps reported by SpeedFan are 40 and 46.

I'm mostly curious as to whether my settings look okay. I get the impression that nothing's gonna be burning up and voltage isn't too high, but I'm still not too clear on FSB term and CPU GTL Reference (gonna read more about them shortly).

Also, for those interested, my 3DMark06 score is now up to 15311, which is a gain of a couple thousand from raising my CPU speed 350MHz. I look forward to seeing what I can reach when I've got the CPU and GPUs clocked even higher.