Testing / comparing : Intel D975XBX2 / Asus P5B DX ***56K WARNING***

[shimmishim]

yeah IDCC and cpu-z dont' play well unless opened in a certain order or somethng.... this was something discussed in this thread way before i got this board.... but that's the problem

[gtj]

IDCC has never played well with anything else for me. Dumped it long ago.

[theonlybabyface]

Everyone should submit an e-mail support request for the EIST BIOS bug, or any other bug in the BIOS. I'm going to do the worthless watchdog as well.

http://supportmail.intel.com/scripts...d=36,2386,2578

Did my part...

[Skerlnik]

So I've replaced my faulty P5WDH with this (so far stable) XBX2. Plugged in my hard drives, RAID-0 booted up just fine, and out of the special ASUS EZ Raid drives, 1 acted like a normal SATA drive, so I was using the Intel Matrix console to create a new RAID-1 using my existing drive (preserves data, but takes like 10 hours). All of that was great...

Until...

I have a Plextor SATA burner (sigh), and it is plugged into a Marvell port. I made the *HUGE* mistake of attempting to install the Marvell RAID driver from Intel's site. Immediate BSOD. Of course, now Vista (Ultimate 32) won't boot at ALL. It hangs on the Marvell driver file. No Safe mode, no last known good configuration - I don't know what to do. I NEED to get rid of that driver somehow.

I put in the Vista DVD, and attempt to boot using it, but after it loads files (white progress bar), it shows the green progress bar (like when you see Vista loading), but it just keeps moving forever... nothing is happening! What gives?

Is there a problem with booting Vista from a DVD drive on this MB?? I am booting using an old IDE Toshiba DVD drive. Any ideas??

Regards,
Sker

[gtj]

So I've replaced my faulty P5WDH with this (so far stable) XBX2. Plugged in my hard drives, RAID-0 booted up just fine, and out of the special ASUS EZ Raid drives, 1 acted like a normal SATA drive, so I was using the Intel Matrix console to create a new RAID-1 using my existing drive (preserves data, but takes like 10 hours). All of that was great...

Until...

I have a Plextor SATA burner (sigh), and it is plugged into a Marvell port. I made the *HUGE* mistake of attempting to install the Marvell RAID driver from Intel's site. Immediate BSOD. Of course, now Vista (Ultimate 32) won't boot at ALL. It hangs on the Marvell driver file. No Safe mode, no last known good configuration - I don't know what to do. I NEED to get rid of that driver somehow.

I put in the Vista DVD, and attempt to boot using it, but after it loads files (white progress bar), it shows the green progress bar (like when you see Vista loading), but it just keeps moving forever... nothing is happening! What gives?

Is there a problem with booting Vista from a DVD drive on this MB?? I am booting using an old IDE Toshiba DVD drive. Any ideas??

Regards,
Sker

In the BIOS, disable the Secondary SATA Controller (the Marvell). Vista should now boot. Go to Device manager and check View/Show Hidden Devices. Right click on the 2 Marvell devices and uninstall them. Go to Windows\System32\drivers and delete mv61xx.sys. Reboot.

[turtletrax]

Does anybody here have to run 1.7Vmch to run 450 fsb??? It is the ONLY way I can get my memory (OCZ pc2-80002GK) to run without errors. That kinda sucks because I didnt run my MCW-30 on the chipset due to crappy mounting hardware, so now I have to worry about chipset temps and running another fan

Looks like I got a crap board. Yikes....

Any other ideas? I am running out of them. This is on 2333 Bios as well.

Also as far as the EIST bug, I use RM clock to disable EIST and have it load setting in bootup and it works fine. At least untill Intel gets it fixed.

[Skerlnik]

In the BIOS, disable the Secondary SATA Controller (the Marvell). Vista should now boot. Go to Device manager and check View/Show Hidden Devices. Right click on the 2 Marvell devices and uninstall them. Go to Windows\System32\drivers and delete mv61xx.sys. Reboot.

gtj, that's the first thing I tried. Disabled the Secondary SATA in BIOS, but Windows still tries to load that damn mv61xx.sys. I still can't boot normally OR use any Vista DVD to boot (tried x64, x32 on my Toshiba PATA and Plextor SATA).

Not sure what to do now...

[gtj]

gtj, that's the first thing I tried. Disabled the Secondary SATA in BIOS, but Windows still tries to load that damn mv61xx.sys. I still can't boot normally OR use any Vista DVD to boot (tried x64, x32 on my Toshiba PATA and Plextor SATA).

Not sure what to do now...

Hmmm. Booting the DVD from the Toshiba doesn't work???

Make sure nothing is connected to the marvell ports. Even with the controller disabled, the BIOS might be picking up devices.

Double check your BIOS Boot settings to make sure the Toshiba is first in the boot order. Do you get the "Press any key to boot from CD/DVD" message?

If it's still not working, can you boot the DVD with ALL hard drives disconnected?

[Skerlnik]

Hmmm. Booting the DVD from the Toshiba doesn't work???

Make sure nothing is connected to the marvell ports. Even with the controller disabled, the BIOS might be picking up devices.

Double check your BIOS Boot settings to make sure the Toshiba is first in the boot order. Do you get the "Press any key to boot from CD/DVD" message?

If it's still not working, can you boot the DVD with ALL hard drives disconnected?

Strange... when I unplugged all drives it would boot Vista's install. Of course it was useless to me then so I plugged in my 2 RAID-0 drives, and it DID finally boot! Don't know what's going on there...

Hopefully the Repair will fix my problem.

Thanks for throwing your brain into the mix gtj!

- Sker

[Skerlnik]

The good news is, Vista's repair feature works just fine. Do any of you have the Marvell RAID driver working in Vista because I can't find one. My Plextor burner is a useless brick at the moment.

Bad news, the Matrix storage console is reporting a SMART event for one of my 500GB mirror drives What are the chances? Bad MB (Asus) and HD all in 3 months? Never had so many issues with one PC! It is a WD, so it's not like I'm totally shocked...

[heikis]

Does anybody here have to run 1.7Vmch to run 450 fsb??? It is the ONLY way I can get my memory (OCZ pc2-80002GK) to run without errors. That kinda sucks because I didnt run my MCW-30 on the chipset due to crappy mounting hardware, so now I have to worry about chipset temps and running another fan

Looks like I got a crap board. Yikes....

Any other ideas? I am running out of them. This is on 2333 Bios as well.

Also as far as the EIST bug, I use RM clock to disable EIST and have it load setting in bootup and it works fine. At least untill Intel gets it fixed.

in single channel my stable FSb is 450MHz. in dual channel my stable FSB is 440FSB. and yes- this is at the maximum 1,7V MCH.

[toadhall57]

Hi people!

Memory dividers:

I am awaiting delivery of Badaxe2 tomorrow.
Already have 2x1Gb OCZ 1066mhz (effective)
Will have E6600 retail & Zalman 9700 nt.

My plan is to get to 3.204Ghz by using a 2:3 divider and setting fsb to 356
so the memory will be running at "1070" effective (535mhz) which is what its rated to do.

Everyone says use 1:1 more stability and high fsb.

If I carry out my plan using mobo settings outlined in this thread (fantastic thread for info on the BX2 btw), should be less voltage required so less heat, less stress on everything, great oc on air, maximising ram, and 1066 strap to boot (pardon)

Any thoughts??

[new-b]

Everyone should submit an e-mail support request for the EIST BIOS bug, or any other bug in the BIOS. I'm going to do the worthless watchdog as well.

http://supportmail.intel.com/scripts...d=36,2386,2578

If the multi is changing from 9 to 6 and back, that is actually C1E....
You could use "RightMark CPU clock utility" to check if C1E (or EIST for that matter) is actually on. The program can also be used to turn it off at windows start up as a kind of workaround, that's what I use on my BA1 since there is no option for C1E in bios.....with c1e off, the multi stays steady.

[astrodave]

Does anyone know if i break my raid0 set will i lose all the data on my array? I want to break my raid array and use one of the drives for something else but don't want to lose the OS and data that are currently on the set. Appreciate any info.

[Poodle]

If the multi is changing from 9 to 6 and back, that is actually C1E....
You could use "RightMark CPU clock utility" to check if C1E (or EIST for that matter) is actually on. The program can also be used to turn it off at windows start up as a kind of workaround, that's what I use on my BA1 since there is no option for C1E in bios.....with c1e off, the multi stays steady.

Do you also use it for performance on demand? Meaning that you have a lower set multi and volts of your chose when cpu is in idle?

I'm just overlocking with Eist now as 2,9Ghz is all that I need for the moment but it would be nice in the future to be able to get 3,5Ghz on load with high Vcore and 2,3Ghz in idle with lower Vcore as 2,3Ghz is more than enough for IE.

I've checked out RM some with an 945chipset board. I think it was no problem to lower Multi but the Vcore didn't go down with it. Any thoughts?

[gtj]

Does anyone know if i break my raid0 set will i lose all the data on my array? I want to break my raid array and use one of the drives for something else but don't want to lose the OS and data that are currently on the set. Appreciate any info.

In RAID 0 the data is spread across all drives. Lose 1 and you've lost everything.

[gtj]

The good news is, Vista's repair feature works just fine. Do any of you have the Marvell RAID driver working in Vista because I can't find one. My Plextor burner is a useless brick at the moment.

Bad news, the Matrix storage console is reporting a SMART event for one of my 500GB mirror drives What are the chances? Bad MB (Asus) and HD all in 3 months? Never had so many issues with one PC! It is a WD, so it's not like I'm totally shocked...

The issue with the Marvell is strange. It's working fine for me under Vista-32. Do you remember any of the info from the BSOD?

[argylesocks]

i am planning a RAID 0 on the intel controller.

additionally, i need 500gig of storage. would it be wise to avoid the whole marvel controler & just do one drive.... or can i do a 2x250 RAID setup on the marvel? in vista x86

getting ready to order..

[gtj]

If the multi is changing from 9 to 6 and back, that is actually C1E....
You could use "RightMark CPU clock utility" to check if C1E (or EIST for that matter) is actually on. The program can also be used to turn it off at windows start up as a kind of workaround, that's what I use on my BA1 since there is no option for C1E in bios.....with c1e off, the multi stays steady.

My bad. You're correct.

Extended HALT Powerdown State
Extended HALT is a low power state entered when all processor cores have executed
the HALT or MWAIT instructions and Extended HALT has been enabled via the BIOS.
When one of the processor cores executes the HALT instruction, that logical processor
is halted; however, the other processor continues normal operation. The Extended
HALT Powerdown must be enabled via the BIOS for the processor to remain within its
specification.
The processor automatically transitions to a lower frequency and voltage operating
point before entering the Extended HALT state. Note that the processor FSB frequency
is not altered; only the internal core frequency is changed. When entering the low
power state, the processor first switches to the lower bus ratio and then transitions to
the lower VID.
While in Extended HALT state, the processor processes bus snoops.
The processor exits the Extended HALT state when a break event occurs. When the
processor exits the Extended HALT state, it first transitions the VID to the original value
and then changes the bus ratio back to the original value.

EIST does the same thing but it has to be initiated by the OS.

[argylesocks]

i am planning a RAID 0 on the intel controller.

additionally, i need 500gig of storage. would it be wise to avoid the whole marvel controler & just do one drive.... or can i do a 2x250 RAID setup on the marvel? in vista x86

getting ready to order..

actually, can i run two seperate raid arrays strictly off the intel matrix controller? (using all 4 ports)

then i could just off the marvel all together?
is this possible?

[gtj]

actually, can i run two seperate raid arrays strictly off the intel matrix controller? (using all 4 ports)

then i could just off the marvel all together?
is this possible?

Sure you can. Vista-64 might be problematic though. I couldn't get Vista-64 to install with the controller in RAID mode. I was going to retry this morning.

[ChaosMinionX]

OK so I seem to have figured out why my USB keyboard (g15) was disconnecting and reconnecting. It hasnt done it since I turned off the HPET (High Precision Event Timer) option in bus overrides. Apparently the HPET was doing something screwy as thats the only option I've changed and it seems to be working fine now.

[argylesocks]

Sure you can. Vista-64 might be problematic though. I couldn't get Vista-64 to install with the controller in RAID mode. I was going to retry this morning.

awesome! thanks. so am i understanding this correct, that i can use all 4 ports on the Intel controller for 2 seperate arrays & completely shut off the marvel controller?

in your opinion.. is 2x250(in raid) better than 1x500 for storage of music/videos/tv/etc???

thanks for the help
you guys rule.

[gtj]

awesome! thanks. so am i understanding this correct, that i can use all 4 ports on the Intel controller for 2 seperate arrays & completely shut off the marvel controller?

in your opinion.. is 2x250(in raid) better than 1x500 for storage of music/videos/tv/etc???

thanks for the help
you guys rule.

Yep the 4 ports can be mixed and matched. 2 arrays works just fine.

If you want to be scientific about the choice of 2x250 or 1x500, look at the failure rate of the drives. Since a RAID 0 has no redundency, a failure of EITHER 250 will cause a total data loss. So unless the 250's are twice as reliable as the 500 (not!) then stick with the single 500. The performance difference for storage and playback of music and video between the 2x250 and the 1x500 will be negligible. Now 2x500 in a RAID 1 will get you redundency and read performance with a slight cost of write performance.

[argylesocks]

Yep the 4 ports can be mixed and matched. 2 arrays works just fine.

If you want to be scientific about the choice of 2x250 or 1x500, look at the failure rate of the drives. Since a RAID 0 has no redundency, a failure of EITHER 250 will cause a total data loss. So unless the 250's are twice as reliable as the 500 (not!) then stick with the single 500. The performance difference for storage and playback of music and video between the 2x250 and the 1x500 will be negligible. Now 2x500 in a RAID 1 will get you redundency and read performance with a slight cost of write performance.

hmm. ok. if i did 1x500 now, can i add another later on & convert to raid-1?
i know its a no-go for raid-0. not sure on R-1.

thanks.