Foxconn Quantum Force Black Ops X48 OC Guide (56k Warning)

[Sailindawg]

Thanks ether.real. Reading your sig over, if I go with the BOps, my rig would be similar to yours. I have a Q6600 and will be using some OCZ RAM. How is this board as a 24/7 board, once you finish playing around with it?

How are you cooling the northbridge? What volts are you running through the NB and how are the temps?

You are using a pretty large video card. It looks like a large card will cover 3 of the 6 SATA ports. Can you still access the SATA ports with 90 degree SATA cables where the card covers those ports? I plan on using 4 or 5 SATA devices.

Thanks again.

[Xello]

You are using a pretty large video card. It looks like a large card will cover 3 of the 6 SATA ports. Can you still access the SATA ports with 90 degree SATA cables where the card covers those ports? I plan on using 4 or 5 SATA devices.

Thanks again.

Hi mate, for your first question yep the 2 bios chips are independent and can have different bios on them. Each chip can even be loaded with around 8 different setting profiles of its own

For the SATA question, yeah the 3 top SATA connectors i believe are covered when using a dual slot card in the 2nd pci-e slot, and yeah you can use L shaped connectors in those to solve the problem. That's what other people have said, i'll be testing it myself when my 2 4870x2's come though there's no reason to believe they won't - i can even see without the card in that there will be space for it

If you're only using one card it'll be in the top slot right? So no problem.

[ether.real]

Thanks ether.real. Reading your sig over, if I go with the BOps, my rig would be similar to yours. I have a Q6600 and will be using some OCZ RAM. How is this board as a 24/7 board, once you finish playing around with it?

How are you cooling the northbridge? What volts are you running through the NB and how are the temps?

You are using a pretty large video card. It looks like a large card will cover 3 of the 6 SATA ports. Can you still access the SATA ports with 90 degree SATA cables where the card covers those ports? I plan on using 4 or 5 SATA devices.

Thanks again.

I dont recall the voltages off hand, however I have a bunch of Antec Tricools everywhere adding cooling to the SB, NB and mosfest. At the moment my Q6600 has maxed out at 442FSB.

At 442x8, the board is 100% stable.

[Sailindawg]

For the SATA question, yeah the 3 top SATA connectors i believe are covered when using a dual slot card in the 2nd pci-e slot, and yeah you can use L shaped connectors in those to solve the problem. That's what other people have said, i'll be testing it myself when my 2 4870x2's come though there's no reason to believe they won't - i can even see without the card in that there will be space for it

Thanks for the response. The reason I asked is because with my Expert board, I had a GX2 card and it blocked the first 2 SATA headers and I could not get a 90 degree cable to fit into the header with that GX2 card. I do not want to make the same mistake again.

If you're only using one card it'll be in the top slot right? So no problem.

I believe that the 16x slots are the middle red slot and the bottom blue slot. The white slot (very top slot) is only 4x. Using the red looks like it may not be so bad with a larger card, but using the bottm blue slot looks like it would block the bottom 3 SATA headers.

Please let me know how you make out with the 2 4870's.

Thanks.

[Xello]

Thanks for the response. The reason I asked is because with my Expert board, I had a GX2 card and it blocked the first 2 SATA headers and I could not get a 90 degree cable to fit into the header with that GX2 card. I do not want to make the same mistake again.



I believe that the 16x slots are the middle red slot and the bottom blue slot. The white slot (very top slot) is only 4x. Using the red looks like it may not be so bad with a larger card, but using the bottm blue slot looks like it would block the bottom 3 SATA headers.

Please let me know how you make out with the 2 4870's.

Thanks.

You have the speeds correct but the order wrong, the top slot is blue followed by the red middle and white at the bottom.



I hadn't thought about it before, but it looks like if you have a card also in the third slot that L shaped connectors will be needed in the bottom 3 SATA slots aswell.

Again though, with just 1 card you'll be putting it in the top slot so no worries

[Sailindawg]

@Xello

My bad. Been looking at several motherboards and I'm starting to blur them together. The top blue slot is the one I'd use. I'll only be using one card. Thanks much for the pic

I have my shopping basket at newegg filled and I believe that I'll be choosing the BOps. I'm glad to see the BIOS situation has settled a bit and hope that Foxconn continues to support the board. I was pretty impressed with how Foxconn supported the Mars board.

This has been a pretty informative thread giving the good, the bad and the ugly. I'm looking forward to playing with this board.

[gmcg]

OK, guys, here is the story:
August 9, 2008 - I've got a problem with motherboard. Tried to solve it by myself clearing CMOS, etc. - seems the MOBO died.
August 12, 2008 Contacted Foxconn service support regarding the issue
August 13, 2008 - got a response from service
August 19, 2008 - got decision from service to RMA the board after week of discussions
August 28, 2008 - sent the board to Foxconn service (spent 9 days building another PC, such as I can't leave without it)
August 29, 2008 - Foxconn has received the motherboard.
...
September 21, 2008 - still no info from Foxconn about status or anything.

Comparing to EVGA Advanced RMA (EAR) where I have received my replacement motherboard in advance-no question asked, Foxconn service simply suck.
Sorry to tell you this, LardArse and Saaya, but you need to make some adjustments in it.
I actually love the idea of customers feedback through forums.

[astronautis13]

which is the best RAM for this mobo,G.SKILL 2GB 1600MHZ (7-7-7-18) or SuperTalent 2GB 1800MHz (7-7-7-21)???

[NCspecV81]

which is the best RAM for this mobo,G.SKILL 2GB 1600MHZ (7-7-7-18) or SuperTalent 2GB 1800MHz (7-7-7-21)???

I dunno? But I've had some killer luck with these wintec cheapos! =o)

I'm not sure if you are in the US, but they can be found here as well as the info and model:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820161278


my results with them are 8-8-8-18 1T @ 2000mhz 1.91 bios / 1.94 real. Not bad for a set of 1333mhz 9-9-9-24 and 79 dollars! Gonna pick up another set here soon!

[gmcg]

I finally got my motherboard yesterday. It took almost a month ... and month and a half for me ... I am glad I had another PC and laptop.

Foxconn technical support is terrible. No one talks to you, no one responds to you unless you call them directly. Pretty bad launch for the new retail brand.

I wish they would combine EVGA service quality with Foxconn technical quality.

It looks that my issue has been resolved. The technical representative of Foxconn hasn't been honest to me, he said that the motherboard was OK - like I am stupid enough to RMA a working board.

Another technical representative confirmed on the phone that it was an issue not only with my motherboard, but with another testing one as well, which they have reported to the head quarters.

It looks that the issue is only related to latest Nvidia videocards, ATI cards are fine. DO NOT even touch *PCI Express clock setting in BIOS if you own such Nvidia card, this setting CAN NOT be removed by BIOS/CMOS reset and you will have to find an ATI card or old Nvidia card to remove the overclocking of PCI-E manually. In other case even with default BIOS settings newer Nvidia videocard (9XXX series and 2XX) will not be recognized and will not post video. Older ones like 8XXX and older work fine, and it looks that the issue is related to this feature somehow:
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/N...9600_GT/1.html

At least I know a solution for now .

[astronautis13]

@NCspecV81
I don't have the option to buy them.Another question...Q6600 or E8500 for this mobo??

[gmcg]

@NCspecV81
I don't have the option to buy them.Another question...Q6600 or E8500 for this mobo??

It really depends on applications which you intend to use, do you want to overclock it or not, etc.
I would vote for 8500 - they have it for $149 in Frys ... for many applications it will be faster.

[Lu(ky]

@NCspecV81
I don't have the option to buy them.Another question...Q6600 or E8500 for this mobo??

personally I would get the e8600 instead. I know it is more money, but I had a e8500 on my board and it was very hard to OC. I bought the e8600 threw it in my system at a FSB 1800 x 10 = 4.5GHz stable on water. I see some guys getting close to my speeds on air. Now it just depends on your memory setup.

CPU-Z 4.5GHz

[gmcg]

personally I would get the e8600 instead. I know it is more money, but I had a e8500 on my board and it was very hard to OC. I bought the e8600 threw it in my system at a FSB 1800 x 10 = 4.5GHz stable on water. I see some guys getting close to my speeds on air. Now it just depends on your memory setup.

CPU-Z 4.5GHz

I assume it is your particular 8500 chip problem (some batches behave differently during OC), some of those 8500 can be overclocked like a rocket. But 8600 may be a better solution anyway, such as 9770 in common is better than 9650 for overclocking. I have never tried 8600 though yet.

[Gendo]

I have recently gotten a Black Ops from Foxconn in the Netherlands to give an overclockingdemo at an event but after a few days my B ops started giving the 54 with beeps error when I use memory channel A (slot 1 and 2). So right now I can only use slots 3 and 4, which means I can't run in dual channel. I have talked to a few people and I have been told that this is a common problem with the B ops. Is there any way to fix it or do I have to send it back and get a new one?

[gmcg]

I have recently gotten a Black Ops from Foxconn in the Netherlands to give an overclockingdemo at an event but after a few days my B ops started giving the 54 with beeps error when I use memory channel A (slot 1 and 2). So right now I can only use slots 3 and 4, which means I can't run in dual channel. I have talked to a few people and I have been told that this is a common problem with the B ops. Is there any way to fix it or do I have to send it back and get a new one?

What memory do you use? I am not sure if a memory controller failure - at least how you describe it here - is a BlackOps common problem, I believe it may happen more on BlackOps comparing to other boards such as people usually overclock BlackOps heavily and the chipset air cooling solution is not perfect unless you modify it or use watercooling.

[Gendo]

I am currently using a cheap Corsair 1333 CL9 kit. (Borrowed it from corsair for the demo as I didn't have ddr3 yet) The weird thing is that it worked in dual channel for a few days and then 1 morning it started beeping. I am currently typing this message from the computer the blackops is in and I checked all temperatures and nothing is too hot. I'll make a topic for this problem.

[gmcg]

I am currently using a cheap Corsair 1333 CL9 kit. (Borrowed it from corsair for the demo as I didn't have ddr3 yet) The weird thing is that it worked in dual channel for a few days and then 1 morning it started beeping. I am currently typing this message from the computer the blackops is in and I checked all temperatures and nothing is too hot. I'll make a topic for this problem.

Cheap - doesn't mean bad, some Crucial 1066 DDR3 kit has Micron D9JNL chips in it and can do 2ghz 7,7,7,20,2T ... believe it or not
http://www.evga.com/forums/fb.asp?m=429861

[saaya]

really sorry to hear about this gmcg, and yes, i know there are issues with the support, interestingly and contrary to anything else, the china support is awesome while the us support is... not that good ive already contacted the tech support department and ill work with them to improve the support.

Its weird that the pciE speed did not reset after you reset the CMOS... it should reset the pciE speed even when oc recovery kicks in, so... this is definately weird...
Ill see if i can give it a try...

Gendo, the first 2 slots work very well with default clock dll settings while slot3 and 4 need clock dll adjustments to reach high clocks (2ghz)
thats what i found, but thats using 1gb micron sticks... its weird that you cant get the mem to clock well even at those low speeds...
try the clock dll settings in the memory timing section, usually going lower gives you better results. depending on the clockspeed -1 to -4 worked fine for me, the higher the clocks, the lower the setting.

[astronautis13]

Are these dims--->http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=2167 ,good for the mobo??

[RLM]

I guess gmcg, might be best for comment on this.

I'm looking for a quick replacement for my 790i. It's been a great board, but the vbat is screwed, meaning everytime I power off and on I need to re-set all by bios settings. fun.

on the 790i with my QX9650 and el cheapo OCZs 1066 golds I had some pretty reasonable oc's, 24/7 and benching. The QX would bench 485fsb and boot 495. My OCZ would bench well into the 1900s at 8-7-6 1T with 2.05v. on water I could bench up to about 4.56 ghz and on single stage up to 4.9+.

The reason I mention this is that I've bought an RE and it's just not as good as the 790i for my setup. It needs too much voltage compared to the 790i for the same clocks. Possibly as a result I'm now limited to about 4.4ghz on water if I'm lucky. FSB 480, but v shakey and that's limited to 480x9 for benching. on the 790i I could bench 480x9.5 no worries.

I'm not sure if it is heat related, whether it can be fixed with a new bios, but it's just not any fun.

So I'd like to know, how does the black ops compare? The first few pages I've read here are a bit of a turn off, but subsequent bioses have fixed a lot of issue right?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

RLM

[RLM]

Sorry to be an impatient sod. I need to buy my replacement board tomorrow as I'm going to be using this for work as well as fun. Any feedback would be much appreciated

RLM

[Catz]

I guess gmcg, might be best for comment on this.

I'm looking for a quick replacement for my 790i. It's been a great board, but the vbat is screwed, meaning everytime I power off and on I need to re-set all by bios settings. fun.

on the 790i with my QX9650 and el cheapo OCZs 1066 golds I had some pretty reasonable oc's, 24/7 and benching. The QX would bench 485fsb and boot 495. My OCZ would bench well into the 1900s at 8-7-6 1T with 2.05v. on water I could bench up to about 4.56 ghz and on single stage up to 4.9+.

The reason I mention this is that I've bought an RE and it's just not as good as the 790i for my setup. It needs too much voltage compared to the 790i for the same clocks. Possibly as a result I'm now limited to about 4.4ghz on water if I'm lucky. FSB 480, but v shakey and that's limited to 480x9 for benching. on the 790i I could bench 480x9.5 no worries.

I'm not sure if it is heat related, whether it can be fixed with a new bios, but it's just not any fun.

So I'd like to know, how does the black ops compare? The first few pages I've read here are a bit of a turn off, but subsequent bioses have fixed a lot of issue right?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

RLM

Well for the fsb problems: a blackops will do 550 easily so that shouldn't be a reason not to buy the blackops. Also a b-ops will start growing on you. At first you might get a little irritated when things don't run just like you want it to but after 1 week or so you will get the hang of it and love the board to death.

[RLM]

I hear you Remcokatz. Not expecting 550FSB, but sounds promising.

I like the review on Anandtech as well.

RLM

[Gendo]

I can confim what Remco is saying. I received a black ops from foxconn in the Netherlands just like he did and I can tell you this: 20 minutes after I threw my E8500 on there I was at 550 fsb. And I'm even running a bios from June. After this one a few wolfdale tweaks and performance biosses have been made. As soon as I have some free time I'll try the newest bios and see what I can do with my brand new E8600.