My Dual Harper - Asus Z7S WS living review *56K warning*

[Tecman]

So they finally sell the addon fan..
I don't need one as you may have seen - just being curious.

Hello all,

I found the fan here.. http://www.pcuniverse.com/ASUS-MemCo...0T/pd/p4409247 Love this thread by the way

[sgmunson]

Hello All,

I'm working on the design for my next computer, and I'm thinking that based on what I know now, I'd like it to be an 8-core system based on the Asus Z7S, with a pair of QX9775's ideally (although I might not afford these right away and will have to settle for some kind of Xeon). Given the testing that so many of you have done so far, here's some questions I have:

RAM: Can I get to full RAM capacity on this board using 4GB sticks that will safely survive bringing the FSB to 400, using currently available product? ... and will I be able to afford such RAM?

MB: Is the Z7S the ONLY reliable alternative to a D5400 from Intel, and that can handle more than 16GB of RAM as well as provide overclock capability?

CASE/PS: I'm looking at ThermalTake for both. Your thoughts?

Finally, I found a decent source for QX9775's with the Intel warranty. If anyone is interested in at least 2 of them - I can get the price down to $1425 USD each, including shipping to any continental US location (not Alaska or Hawaii). PM me for details.

Thanks all for any help on the questions and for any other advice.

Steve
(aka sgmunson)

[Jaco]

Hello All,

RAM: Can I get to full RAM capacity on this board using 4GB sticks that will safely survive bringing the FSB to 400, using currently available product? ... and will I be able to afford such RAM?

We have never tried 4GB sticks on the Z7S. 4 x 4GB 800Mhz should work .
800Mhz 4GB sticks are still very expensive though.
You want to use all 6 slots? I'm not sure if that's quad channel.

MB: Is the Z7S the ONLY reliable alternative to a D5400 from Intel, and that can handle more than 16GB of RAM as well as provide overclock capability?

yes. those 2 boards are the only 5400 boards with overclock options in the bios. There's also the Supermicro X7 DWA-N , no overclock options in the bios , but with systool/clockgen/setFSB you can get up to 440FSB .

CASE/PS: I'm looking at ThermalTake for both. Your thoughts?

I'd go for a pc power & cooling 610/750w , but TT is ok too.

[Breit]

You want to use all 6 slots? I'm not sure if that's quad channel.

it is...

two of the four channels have 2 slots each and the other two slots have only one slot each. because of the serial nature of the fb-dimm architecture this setup should work fine (i'm using 6x 1gb modules right now). however as more modules are pluged into one channel, you mem latencies are a bit higher but also you mem throughput raises.

as you can see this is not an optimal setup as 2 of the four channels have higher latencies but also higher throughput and the other 2 channels have lower latencies but also lower throughput.

at the end i think it doesn't matter much for real world applications imho...

if anyone is interested in plain numbers let me know which benchmark i should run.


ps: anything like sisoft sandra or everest seems not adequate for testing ram performance on a quad-channel mainboard from what i've seen. for example sandra gives me roughly half the mem throughput on vista64 like it does on vista32 on the exactly same system without any changes to the settings in bios nor the configuration. anyways the measured ram-performance is quite low no matter what slot-configuration i use (2/4-dual/4-quad/6).

[milkmandan]

i want a new BIOS !!

[A1Ex]

6x FB-DIMM waterblock

[STEvil]

How do you make those A1Ex? Just a milling machine then press it over the ram? I need to make one for air cooling my fb-dimms that lets me mount an LGA775 heatsink on top

[jt1]

I've been looking for some good third party FBDIMM heatsinks. Right now, I have a couple fans blowing directly above them, but fans plus sinks would be even better. It seems most RAM sinks are designed for regular DDR2 and not FBDIMM (i.e. Thermalright HR-07 Duo).

A1Ex, those water blocks are so cool. Does your friend sell them?

[Aquacool]

Thanks for approbation 6x FB-DIMM waterblock is still in progress..A1Ex regaining first prototype..After that if all will ok i can make another waterblock for everyone

[milkmandan]

Thanks for approbation 6x FB-DIMM waterblock is still in progress..A1Ex regaining first prototype..After that if all will ok i can make another waterblock for everyone

any chance you'll be selling your asus z7s watercooling sets for consumers in the United States?

[Aquacool]

any chance you'll be selling your asus z7s watercooling sets for consumers in the United States?

I think that it won't be problem..but I have only small cnc and make one asus z7s set takes me one week time..maybe more..

[s0lid]

I think that it won't be problem..but I have only small cnc and make one asus z7s set takes me one week time..maybe more..

PM me the price of that set plz

[jcool]

Lol, you guys caused 80GB of traffic on my servers last month
Time to sort out some of the lesser pics...

On another note, does someone know a working tool to adjust FSB in windows for the Z7S?
I normally don't OC in Windows, but with the raidcon taking a minute to start up it's a PITA to play around.

[s0lid]

Hmpf these mobos are OOS in Germany and Finland the prices are going up allthe time

E: Omg the prices have gone little down :o
Earlier: 360€ now: 349€ according to Geizhals.at

[jcool]

SetFSB works rather well



Still 1,2V Vcore

[jcool]

Also rather nice:



Currently running Prime LargeFFT at FSB 450 with 7x mult.. stable so far
Which means I can run 450x9 if I can do a VID pin mod

Screw the Q6600 + phase, I'll put that beast in my mainrig

[msimax]

VID pin mod

does one exist??

[jt1]

Jcool, congrats on reaching the 4ghz octacore club.

[s0lid]

Where u did get those Buffalo sticks ?
Can't find them on geizhals :P

[jcool]

Jcool, congrats on reaching the 4ghz octacore club.

Thanks
Erm, is there a club?

S0lid: You can buy them from me

@msimax: Yes, there are pinmods, I just need to figure out which is the correct table for my chips, since these are 1,250 VID CPUs.

[s0lid]

S0lid: You can buy them from me

Great
Btw my nick is spelled "s0lid", not "S0lid", "sOlid" or "SOlid"

[jcool]

Oh come on, don't be such a sissy. People call me "Jcool" all the time, too

[STEvil]

wow, jcool.

now i'm even more excited to see what my '50's are gonna do when my 4x2gb 800mhz fb-dimm's get here that Dave got screens around 450ish with at 1.8v...

Consideirng I went from 386 24/7 at 1.8v on the Kingston 667's to 400 24/7 at 1.9v on the Z7S (386 on X7DAL-E).. 450-460 24/7 might not be a stretch for them

[jcool]

Haha, yeah, the Z7S runs mem like a champ. I can pass memtest at 450 with all 8GB using 1,83V so I don't even think the mems are the limiting factor with that screenie above
Sadly the Z7S needs a new bios (again) to properly run these new CPUs... half mults don't work or I would run 450x8,5 for now. FSB is really damn important for these CPUs to perform, especially when you're close to 4Ghz. Average computation for an HCC unit using 5.10.45 client on XP x64 is around 2:50 for eight WUs at 430x9. I bet I could get that down to 2:45 even tho I'd lose 50Mhz core clock at 450x8,5.

Need to figure out the correct Vid pin mod for those.. or find a Vdroop mod for the Z7S. 1,21V load would prolly be good enough for 4Ghz

Can't wait to see ur results!

[milkmandan]

grats on the 4Ghz jcool!
looks like you picked up a pair of 5450's while i was away!