Asrock 4CoreDual-SATA2 + ASRock 4CoreDual-VSTA + ASRock 775Dual-VSTA

[Hlafordlaes]

@tripp7896,

Since I have never installed > 2 gigs of ram in one of these PT880 boards, I have not paid a lot of attention to the memory limits, but i_am_jwk's observation that regardless of OS, the chipset will not allow > 3+ gigs rings familiar. My guess is that the AGP memory aperture, even if set to 0, truncates addressable memory, so no amount of jiggling with BIOS or OS will do much to remedy the situation. Perhaps Mr. Vain, who has had more experience with different models can happily contradict that, which would be nice to know.

 

[Mr Vain]

Sure.

775dual-VSTA w/ 3.19a (flashed with WinFlasher 4.40)
4gb OCZ DDR2-1066
PCIe nVidia 8600gt
Windows 7 Enterprise 64bit

Hope that's everything. Thanks for your help, Mr. Vain :awe:.

I have not researched this subject much, looking back to page 13 here in this thread; you can get an idea of some of the reasons for your Ram allocations with this chipset.

Tcsenter and some others are very informed on this subject.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=311715&page=13


vixensjlin
Junior Member
________________________________________
Quote:
Originally Posted by Faxfane
Not really. The computer can see all 4 GB, but 32-bit OS's can only address up to 3.5 GB. There's some debate as towards whether the remainder can be utilized by programs or set aside for video buffers, as well as the /3GB switch

Quote:
Originally Posted by tcsenter
There's no "debate" and the OS "seeing" has nothing to do with this. The BIOS handles memory addressing then lets the OS know what is available to it via memory map.
The /3GB switch has nothing to do with DRAM addressing.

Second that, there's nothing to do with OS 32 or 64bit. MS's windows 2003 server 32bit can use more than 32G, even 32 bit XP sp1 can use all 4GB. Not to mention 32bit Linux can use more than 32G for long time.

I've tested 4G limitation on 4coredual SATA2 with 2*2G ram. Even 64bit windows XP or Linux can NOT use full 4G on this motherboard. It is PT880 chipset that limit system < 4G.

PS. PT880 can only address 4G exactly, less the mapping for video/drivers, so you only get ~3.3G out of 4G ram regardless of OS.


I have also repaired the links on page one to the archived threads if you want to get more information.

 

[anonxlg_]

what are the chances of a nvidia 450 working with this mobo

 

[i_am_jwk]

what are the chances of a nvidia 450 working with this mobo

From what research I've done, it seems "likely" that a GTS 450 should work with one of these boards, as long as it comes with an nvidia reference bios, or a modified bios that still includes PCIe 1.0 or 1.1 compatible modes. This comes from reading about the sucesses some users have had (particularly on the PCTreiber forums) with GTX 460 cards, as long as they met that particular criterion.

For example:http://translate.googleusercontent....le.com&usg=ALkJrhjWTa9J4uNVhqrUS7IgTwFJcrkdhQ

It may have been "suggested" to update to the PCTreiber beta bios, but the last post seems to imply that all he had to do was ensure that "PCIe Downstream Pipeline"

and "PCIe VC1 Request Queue" were both set to [Disabled] in the 775Dual-VSTA board's official bios to run "without problems."

Personally, I'm going back and forth between the idea of a GTS 450 or a GTX 460. The 460 easily trumps the 450 for single card performance, but a pair of 450's in SLI easily leave a single 460 in their dust, for not a whole lot more money - it would just require an SLI-compatible motherboard and a beefier power supply, which are components I would think I would want someday, anyway, seeing as I'll probably want to move on from my 4CoreDual-SATA2 R2.0 to let my CPU run at full speed (Core 2 Quad Q9550).

Anyway, if you go ahead and choose to try out one of these cards, check the manufacturer's site for whichever brand you have in mind, to see if you can find specific info on PCIe slot compatibility. I know that Zotac explicitly lists all of their cards as backwards-compatible, as do MSI's downloadable manuals, so they could be a good place to start looking. Let everyone know how it turns out - it could be useful info for more than just me!
​

 

[kiriakos]

In a week time, I will try the Q6600 on the 4Coredual-SATA2 R2.0 .
And I will post my findings .

The German Bios ( change log ) does not indicate changes over FSB or other tweaks , other than the memory extension to 4GB , that personally I do not care.

And so I will stay with the Asrock 2.20

Does any one have an explanation about the addition in the Bios,
of the " Enhanced Speed fan control" ... and what it does ?

Thanks.

 

[Coopz]

Hi guys im looking to add another fan to my PC and the fan headers are already taken

Could the VSTA motherboard handle a PWM splitter or should i just run one off a PSU molex?

TIA

 

[kiriakos]

I will advice to get power from the molex , the on board voltage circuitry of those boards, are " sensitive " to fail apart .

I was very optimistic about the 4Coredual-SATA2 R2.0 , it failed to boot with Core 2 Duo & quad core CPU's , even with the latest Bios.
It booted only with single core CPU, with lowered power needs.
And my conclusion are that age (used MB for 14 months of more ) , brings down the voltage circuitry, and causes instability .

And so, my advice are ... do not load anything more to it , not even a fan.

 

[Coopz]

Ok thanks

I installed my new fan today replacing the old generic one (to make the PC quieter) and its seems to have done the job with noise and cooling so i don't think i need to add another case fan now

I have a question off topic a little but may still relate to the mobo if i have to connect something to it

After changing the fans there is still a bit of noise coming from the PC and i think its my X1650 gfx card

Is there anything i can add to it to make it quieter?

 

[Hlafordlaes]

@Coopz,

Try downloading the Rivatuner application, which you can find on Guru3D.com, so you can gain some control over video card fan speed. If that's not enough, I recommend considering a card upgrade rather than a new vga cooler, since you can get cards that outperform yours for less than the cost of the cooler.

Hlaf.

 

[Coopz]

Thanks ill give it a go

I did find a cooler for my GFX card as well, its the Arctic Cooling Accelero S2 for &#163;15/$24

Can you get a better and quieter card for that? If so i will definitely do that

 

[Mustang104]

Hey guys, long time lurker here coming out of the woodwork to say thanks to all who have contributed to this thread

I'm currently running a 4CoreDual-SATA2 (2.20a BIOS) with an E7500 @3.15ghz, 4GB of DDR2-800 (3.25gb useable) and a XFX HD5770 and i can confidently say it's all running superbly.

The information gathered from this forum thread has helped me immensely, thanks again!

 

[czarofthetundra]

Hey everyone, thanks for all the posts. Spent a long time reading here, but never really had anything new to contribute until now. I actually don't have this MB, but got it for a friend whose old machine died. In searching for possible upgrades, we couldn't find any documentation on the web that anyone was running the E7500 (the one at the local store that we didn't have to wait to get) on the 775Dual-VSTA, but took the chance, and it seems to be working beautifully. The BIOS recognized the processor immediately, and everything else has been smooth thus far.

Just thought I would put this out there for other people in the world wondering what other processors the 3.19a BIOS can support. I know there have been documented cases of the E6300, E6500 (although a bunch of other people had problems), E6600 and the E7600. Chalk up the E7500 to the list.

Questions:
1. What are some of the best ATI graphics cards people have running on this board? I saw people running the GTX 460. How well are people getting them to run newer games and stuff?
2. What is the best DDR2 memory for this board. A lot of talk, but not a lot of solid answers. Is it worth getting DDR2-1066, or will it not run at that speed? If it can, can someone direct me as to how to do the right settings? Thanks so much.

P.S. Speaking of "lurkers," they need those in SC2. :biggrin:

 

[MKD]

Guyz just looking to re-use an old board from an ex-PC of my folks and was puzzled re board version and CPU support.

I know there are two releases of the board ie non-R2.0 and R2.0
http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=4CoreDual-SATA2
http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=4CoreDual-SATA2 R2.0

Looking for signs of which version the board is, I can only find a v1.02 under the main board name logo (between the PCI slots) and no R2.0 indications.

Comparing the two board illustrations & specs from the ASRock site the immediate thing I noticed was:
non-R2.0 board says 7.1CH HD on top edge of picture (which mine does)
the R2.0 board says 5.1CH HD

I know from past ASRock 775Dual-VSTA board experience that PCTreiber.net solved my not-upto-date BIOS issues there (eg 4GB support & later CPU than ASRock), so looking on their site I found a list of 4CoreDual-SATA2 BIOSes at:
http://www.pctreiber.net/asrock-bios-downloads?dlsearch=4coredual-sata2

Can't see any indication of which non-R2.0 and/or R2.0 boards they relate to.

I checksummed the offered non-R2.0 and R2.0 BIOS files from the ASRock site and they are identical so that gives me comfort that there's ONE board BIOS for both revisions!

The ASRock site says the Celeron E3300 is supported on R2.0 board though not mentioned on non-R2.0 board; so am hoping it is just a failure to update the non-R2.0 list!

So I guess my questions to anyone in the know are:
a) Anyone E3300'ing on the non-R2.0 board (couldn't find anything on here via Searching)?
b) Anyone doing that with the PC Treiber BIOS (as plan to go 4GB with 2 SIMMs I have)

Update: The BIOS ZIP files from the Treiber website aren't liked by Windows 7 Unzip function, but the freeware Extract Now coped. Now all I've got to do is remember what to do with the Treiber files and with what (have Winflash'd the 775Dual... before) but their website seems to have broken links/non-English issues : so if someone can point me to a relevant posting here that would also be helpful.

Thanks in advance for any assistance/advice.

MKD

 

[m00fin]

I installed an XFX Radeon 5850 card into the PCIe graphics slot, everything powers up but the MB will not POST or display anything on the DVI port. I installed an AGP video card at the same time as the PCIe card and booted into WindowsXP. Windows detected the PCIe graphics card as a 5850, however was unable to install drivers because of a hardware issue.

I've updated to the PC-Treiber 2.20a BIOS, and disabled the PCIe downstream options in the BIOS but the system would still not POST. I have an Antec True550W PS so it *should* be sufficient.

Are there any other options I need to set for the 5850 PCIe card to be used in this MB or will it flat-out not work?

 

[Hlafordlaes]

@m00fin:

Be sure you are using an updated BIOS. Then make sure you disable the two PCIe options at the middle-bottom of the chipset page (don't remember names, one is 'downstream pipeline').

 

[m00fin]

Thanks Hlafordlaes, I've read through this forum extensively and have already tried the latest official and PCTrieber BIOS's with those PCIe options disabled. ASRock is claiming to me they don't support 5000 series video cards, and XFX explained to me:
"Some older motherboards require a BIOS update to work with the new PCIE 2.1 cards. The problem that we have seen is that because many of these boards are older the manufacturer of the motherboard had dropped support for them before ever updating to include support for these upcoming features."

It looks like since the 5800 series is a PCIe2.1 card, it's not going to work in the 4CoreDual-SATA2, and only a PCIe2.0 card will function.

 

[rfelectron]

If you find out what to use to win flash the 3.19a bios please let me know. Thanks, Lee

 

[Hlafordlaes]

It looks like since the 5800 series is a PCIe2.1 card, it's not going to work in the 4CoreDual-SATA2, and only a PCIe2.0 card will function.

Bummer.

 

[m00fin]

Yeah, bummer. I saw some people had success with other 5xxx series cards so was hoping I would too. Got such a good deal on it I couldn't pass it up. Guess it's time for a new MB and PS to get the new VGA card working.:|


Update: After reading a little more and debugging, I realized why the card is not going to work. XFX has written a custom BIOS for this card, and others have had success using a 5xxx AMD reference BIOS. XFX support told me flashing the reference BIOS to this card will leave it dead.

 

[hkimura]

Note, I'm not talking about the officially supported C2D E6600 Conroe but the 45nm Wolfdale Pentium Dual Core E6600.

Seems like the beta bios 3.19a supports 45nm processors (E6300/E7600). Does it mean E6600 will also work?

 

[Hlafordlaes]

@hkimura,

IIRC the Wolfdales that do not work on the 775 board are those with a bus speed of 1333MHz. Make sure you are using an updated bios and you should be ok.

 

[hkimura]

Thanks!
I installed the beta bios 3.19a and E6600 on the mobo. Worked fine and doubled benchmark score from Pen 4. Great!

@hkimura,

IIRC the Wolfdales that do not work on the 775 board are those with a bus speed of 1333MHz. Make sure you are using an updated bios and you should be ok.

 

[azzurro]

i was a bit dubious about buying a gtx 460 but got one anyway so far so good - asrock 4coredual-sata2 r.2.0 and intel E5400 dual core, 2gb ddr2 667 ram with a Zotac GTX 460 (768mb synergy edition) - disabled pci-e options in offical bios 2.20, absolutely flawless installation first 3d mark 06 bench shows around 12000 3dmarks, but gonna start tweaking now - 100 quid well spent i.m.h.o

just tested in 3dmark vantage first run and got P11688 - which i dont think is too shabby seeing as tho its a 4x pci-e port.

 

[kingcold9]

i just recently bought a 4CoreDual-SATA2 rev1 motherboard as a stepup board to attempt to get rid of my only p4 socket 478 and i was wondering if this motherboard can take a Pentium E5500 with the 2.20a bios, the only references i can find about this board with that processor are all Rev2 boards. aside from a different revision is there any difference in the boards as long as i update the bios?

 

[nitroxi]

hi i just bought 775dual-vsta, here all the specs: http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=1551683
bios: P3.10

and on couple .exe files system restarts, like yesterday i removed realtek audio driver restarted and when windows starts computer imediatly restarts even in safemode, or when i trying to run redalert 2 computer restarts, or on one keygen, no windows setups fixed this problem...
and in my realtek driver i can't see front audio panel or in back i can't turn on 5.1 sound system becouse audio driver dont see bass and center audio jack so it dont work, i tryed couple drivers on all of them same problem
i realy apologise for my bad english, i'am from lithuania. i hope my description is understandable if not il try google translator