EPoX "EP-9NPA+Ultra" NVIDIA nForce4 ULTRA Chipset Motherboard

[imported_ShadowFlare]

Originally posted by: ShazK
So I'm getting the vibe that 6/29/05 is a good stable BIOS to flash to for Venice core. Thanks.

Well, actually, all you really need for the Venice core is the 3/22/05 BIOS for Venice core (or maybe even the one before that). I was using that one for a month before the 6/29/05 release. As far as I know, the only reasons you would need anything newer than that is for dual-core support, DDR433-500 support, or > 4 GB RAM support.

 

[ShazK]

Ah, well, I have no need for any of those 3 things at the moment, so I'll see what my mobo has on it and go from there...

I wonder how well my silly Corsair VS will run on this thing... silly me for getting Corsair VS... but it was so cheap...

 

[DARQ MX]

well I just bought mine from zippy, It was $108 with 2 day ship. Hey, the zalman site says only the GA will fit, will azalman hsf fit on the epox just fine?

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: SPQQKY
Why don't you STFU goku and go hump someone elses leg.

would that someone else be you?

---

It would also be me. Your previously posted:

All I gotta say is that EPOX sucks!

I think that says about everything you have to say, and you can stop posting in this thread, now.

AnandTech Moderator

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: bozack

Originally posted by: goku2100

I think you should return the motherboard and get a better one (assuming you CAN return it). I'm willing to give you $10 towards a better motherboard if you return this epox board.

And what would you suggest is a better motherboard Goku? out of curiosity why the hate towards Epox?? sure they haven't had a spotless record but then again show me a mainboard company that has...Asus, MSI, DFI and the rest all have problems.

EDIT:

Ahh now I see why:

When ever I start up my computer it says "disk boot error" and when I hit the reset button on the front, it boots up normally. While I'm able to use the computer perfectly fine, I want to find out a way I can make it so that the computer doesn't do this every time I start up. It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine

You have a POS mobo and just want to drag down others because you cannot solve your own problems...guess that will teach you for buying Abit.

Sorry but wrong agian, I'M not the one having the problem, simply a friend is... My abit system is by far the most reliable system I've EVER had (built and prebuilt). I've have only 1 problem, and thats the chipset fan that gets noisy when it's cold in the room during a cold boot. It's quite amazing how reliable this system is, I mean it's more reliable than some prebuilts I have AND it's overclocked! The problem where it says "disk boot error" occurs on a P4 1.7GHZ Dell desktop, sisters Sony Vaio Desktop and my friends desktop, this error is solved by softbooting the machine and I've yet to find out a reason WHY it does this and how to fix it.

 

[shrimpsiumai]

Can someone sugggest some memory to go along with this? I really don't know where to start (OCZ? Patriot? Corsair?) and any suggestions would help.


Thanks for your suggestion.

 

[TraumaRN]

Originally posted by: shrimpsiumai
Can someone sugggest some memory to go along with this? I really don't know where to start (OCZ? Patriot? Corsair?) and any suggestions would help.


Thanks for your suggestion.

Yea I'd second that, I'd like to know what memory to buy for this, I was leaning towards from Patriot specifically this ram http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820220006

 

[ChicagoPCGuy]

Originally posted by: DeathBUA

Originally posted by: shrimpsiumai
Can someone sugggest some memory to go along with this? I really don't know where to start (OCZ? Patriot? Corsair?) and any suggestions would help.


Thanks for your suggestion.

Yea I'd second that, I'd like to know what memory to buy for this, I was leaning towards from Patriot specifically this ram http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820220006

Well, for the EPoX 9NPA+ Ultra I typically use two brands of RAM in my builds after some interesting problems in the past. I use either OCZ (I recommend the Gold (not VX) or Platinum Rev2) or G.Skill low latency Winbond based chip one (2x512MB for $145 at NewEgg). Any of these choices work well with this motherboard because I have about six builds out there (including my own) using one of these brands/types.

One thing--forget about overclocking with that Winbond based G.Skill because the vDIMM on the EPoX only goes to 3.1v, and in order to overclock with that RAM you really need about 3.2 to 3.6 on vDIMM. At 2.8v, it is rock solid 2-2-2-7 at 200Mhz, though. Same goes for the OCZ stuff, but with the Plat Rev2 you can get about 240Mhz pretty easily with slightly loosened timings. Loosening the timings on the G.Skill does NOTHING. It does not respond to loosened timings like Samsung based TCC5/D.

Edited to say that I have used Patriot in the past and have found them to be not exactly what they are cracked up to be. I had stick fail on me about four months into system operation, and then another set of the expensive XBLK that refused to run at rated timings. Not a good track record in my book.

 

[Dark Wizard]

how well does the cossair VS ram run or OC in this board. I need the saving on this ram to buy a better graphics card, so really dont want to resort to ocz gold edition unless i have to. i know ocz has a better track record but is also 40 dollars more.

 

[TraumaRN]

Originally posted by: ChicagoPCGuy

Originally posted by: DeathBUA

Originally posted by: shrimpsiumai
Can someone sugggest some memory to go along with this? I really don't know where to start (OCZ? Patriot? Corsair?) and any suggestions would help.


Thanks for your suggestion.

Yea I'd second that, I'd like to know what memory to buy for this, I was leaning towards from Patriot specifically this ram http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820220006

Well, for the EPoX 9NPA+ Ultra I typically use two brands of RAM in my builds after some interesting problems in the past. I use either OCZ (I recommend the Gold (not VX) or Platinum Rev2) or G.Skill low latency Winbond based chip one (2x512MB for $145 at NewEgg). Any of these choices work well with this motherboard because I have about six builds out there (including my own) using one of these brands/types.

One thing--forget about overclocking with that Winbond based G.Skill because the vDIMM on the EPoX only goes to 3.1v, and in order to overclock with that RAM you really need about 3.2 to 3.6 on vDIMM. At 2.8v, it is rock solid 2-2-2-7 at 200Mhz, though. Same goes for the OCZ stuff, but with the Plat Rev2 you can get about 240Mhz pretty easily with slightly loosened timings. Loosening the timings on the G.Skill does NOTHING. It does not respond to loosened timings like Samsung based TCC5/D.

Edited to say that I have used Patriot in the past and have found them to be not exactly what they are cracked up to be. I had stick fail on me about four months into system operation, and then another set of the expensive XBLK that refused to run at rated timings. Not a good track record in my book.

Thanks for the reply but I'm not going to be heavily overclocking much maybe just 200Mhz OC on the AMD system I'm going to buy and I'm not going to spend more than $130 on Ram because I'm on a tight budget however their is some corsair and OCZ under 130 also that I'll look into, thanks for the help tho!

 

[enwar3]

actually im in the same situation as DeathBUA, dont know what ram to get for this mobo..

i was thinking corsair value, the ocz value vx, or corsair XMS C2PT.. these are all 2x512, anyone tried these out before? im looking to do maybe a little ocing, up to 230mhz? ]

EDIT: one more question - i tried to find this mobo on motherboard monitor's configurator, but couldnt find it.. so how do u guys tell how hot your comp is?

 

[Dark Wizard]

so will the cossair value select work well with this board and OC well or not? gonna need to know soon as i need to get my parts ordered.

 

[RobbyG]

Corsair VS should work fine at rated specs, but if you are hoping to OC with this it's a crapshoot since it is unbinned. If you can't OC it 1:1 then just use a divider and you should be fine. That is what I am doing with my Mushkin, it is Winbond UTT so it needs more volts than 3.1 to OC so I'm running with a 166 divider (CPU is at 245*10 so memory is at 204) at 2-3-3-6 1T.

Like I said in a previous thread, your best bet is to get some Samsung TCCD/TCC5 based memory since it OCs better with the lower voltage. Check out the forums over at xtremesystems here for more info on memory and OC.

enwar3 - I'm using the Epox USDM utility that comes with the board to monitor temps and voltage. You can also use Speedfan, but be aware that there is no 12V monitor on this board so if you use Speedfan don't become alarmed at the 12V value it ends up showing.

 

[Hacp]

I would still suggest WInbound UTT. WHy? because they can still get 2-2-2-5 with 210-220 FSB at 3.1 volts. This is good because it helps you get the optimal overclock with the ram divider. If your 3200+ can do 2.58 GHZ, your only option if you want to get close to that overclock with regular ram is to downclock your ram.. With UTT< you can set the FSB a little higher, and then use the divider to get close to 2.58.... You don't need 240-250FSB with UTT, it only provides like 1% benefit over 210-220 FSB.

 

[bozack]

Originally posted by: goku2100
The problem where it says "disk boot error" occurs on a P4 1.7GHZ Dell desktop, sisters Sony Vaio Desktop and my friends desktop, this error is solved by softbooting the machine and I've yet to find out a reason WHY it does this and how to fix it.

Yet in your original post which I quoted you said:

It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine

So which is it? or were you lying in your first post? sorry if I call BS on this one.

 

[shrimpsiumai]

can someone link up some possible memory that is good for this mobo? I don't want to end up buyin somethin that's crap for this mobo. Thanks a lot!

 

[bozack]

I have heard crucial value is pretty good as well (I run 4x512 sticks of it)...good luck.

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: bozack

Originally posted by: goku2100
The problem where it says "disk boot error" occurs on a P4 1.7GHZ Dell desktop, sisters Sony Vaio Desktop and my friends desktop, this error is solved by softbooting the machine and I've yet to find out a reason WHY it does this and how to fix it.

Yet in your original post which I quoted you said:

It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine

So which is it? or were you lying in your first post? sorry if I call BS on this one.

LOL! You clearly didn't read the post carefully because if you DID you would see I said "friends desktop", dumbass. Here I will quote my self...

The problem where it says "disk boot error" occurs on a P4 1.7GHZ Dell desktop, sisters Sony Vaio Desktop and my friends desktop, this error is solved by softbooting the machine and I've yet to find out a reason WHY it does this and how to fix it.

Congrats! you didn't read the post carefully and now you look dumb. Oh and BTW, what fvcking dell has an Nforce 2 motherboard anyways? Last I heard Dell was JUST adding an NVIDIA board to it's line up (for SLI).

 

[imported_ShadowFlare]

Originally posted by: enwar3
actually im in the same situation as DeathBUA, dont know what ram to get for this mobo..

i was thinking corsair value, the ocz value vx, or corsair XMS C2PT.. these are all 2x512, anyone tried these out before? im looking to do maybe a little ocing, up to 230mhz? ]

EDIT: one more question - i tried to find this mobo on motherboard monitor's configurator, but couldnt find it.. so how do u guys tell how hot your comp is?

I have the corsair XMS C2PT that you mentioned. I got it for $115, not too expensive compared with the value ram. I'm able to overclock it to a max of about 236 MHz and still able to use almost the best timings (2-3-2-5 1T) and that's without even increasing the voltage. I may be able to go higher with more volts, but I haven't bothered to try it yet.

 

[BigCoolJesus]

How does the chipset fan run on the mobo?

Is it loud or annoying?


If so, would it be worth replacing with an all copper Vantec Iceberg heatsink/fan combo (its about the same size of the stock cooler)?

 

[bozack]

Originally posted by: goku2100
LOL! You clearly didn't read the post carefully because if you DID you would see I said "friends desktop", dumbass. Here I will quote my self...Congrats! you didn't read the post carefully and now you look dumb. Oh and BTW, what fvcking dell has an Nforce 2 motherboard anyways? Last I heard Dell was JUST adding an NVIDIA board to it's line up (for SLI).

I feel awful for continuing this in the thread but since you decided to use the term "dumbass" I figured that the only thing left to do was a direct link to your thread on another forum and also a cut and paste quote just so that you don't go and edit your previous post...

Here is the link:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=27&threadid=1645616&enterthread=y

and here is the quote:

goku2100
Senior Member

Posts: 451
Joined: 03/28/2004
When ever I start up my computer it says "disk boot error" and when I hit the reset button on the front, it boots up normally. While I'm able to use the computer perfectly fine, I want to find out a way I can make it so that the computer doesn't do this every time I start up. It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine.

I see no mention of this post made by you on 7/23/2005 in the general hardware section that would indicate this was a problem with your friends or sisters computer...if anything it says clearly that the problem is on an ABIT nforce 2 based system...

So again I ask who would really take the advice of someone who cannot figure out their own problems on which hardware they should and or shouldn't buy??...please enlighten me as to how you know Epox suck as you so eloquently put it and why they should be avoided?

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: bozack

Originally posted by: goku2100
LOL! You clearly didn't read the post carefully because if you DID you would see I said "friends desktop", dumbass. Here I will quote my self...Congrats! you didn't read the post carefully and now you look dumb. Oh and BTW, what fvcking dell has an Nforce 2 motherboard anyways? Last I heard Dell was JUST adding an NVIDIA board to it's line up (for SLI).

I feel awful for continuing this in the thread but since you decided to use the term "dumbass" I figured that the only thing left to do was a direct link to your thread on another forum and also a cut and paste quote just so that you don't go and edit your previous post...

Here is the link:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=27&threadid=1645616&enterthread=y

and here is the quote:

goku2100
Senior Member

Posts: 451
Joined: 03/28/2004
When ever I start up my computer it says "disk boot error" and when I hit the reset button on the front, it boots up normally. While I'm able to use the computer perfectly fine, I want to find out a way I can make it so that the computer doesn't do this every time I start up. It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine.

I see no mention of this post made by you on 7/23/2005 in the general hardware section that would indicate this was a problem with your friends or sisters computer...if anything it says clearly that the problem is on an ABIT nforce 2 based system...

So again I ask who would really take the advice of someone who cannot figure out their own problems on which hardware they should and or shouldn't buy??...please enlighten me as to how you know Epox suck as you so eloquently put it and why they should be avoided?

Why does it matter if I specify if it's my computer or some one elses computer? I care for a friend's computer like I do my own. How was I suppose to know that some guy in a separate unrelated thread would quote me later asking/telling me "is this your computer? It seems like you said it was". You still can't explain why you quote the part where I said "dell 1.7GHZ P4 and that being the same system as the Nforce 2 system... You should know that 1. Dell doesn't use non intel chipsets until now and 2. They don't use AMD processor based computers either.

Look all I know is that 1. I've used a few epox based systems and they were very unreliable and 2. I've heard many many complaints from people about their epox based systems and how they're crap. I find it funny that you defend EPOX like as if they're PC Power and cooling or some other high end brand :roll:

 

[BigCoolJesus]

Originally posted by: goku2100

Originally posted by: bozack

Originally posted by: goku2100
LOL! You clearly didn't read the post carefully because if you DID you would see I said "friends desktop", dumbass. Here I will quote my self...Congrats! you didn't read the post carefully and now you look dumb. Oh and BTW, what fvcking dell has an Nforce 2 motherboard anyways? Last I heard Dell was JUST adding an NVIDIA board to it's line up (for SLI).

I feel awful for continuing this in the thread but since you decided to use the term "dumbass" I figured that the only thing left to do was a direct link to your thread on another forum and also a cut and paste quote just so that you don't go and edit your previous post...

Here is the link:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=27&threadid=1645616&enterthread=y

and here is the quote:

goku2100
Senior Member

Posts: 451
Joined: 03/28/2004
When ever I start up my computer it says "disk boot error" and when I hit the reset button on the front, it boots up normally. While I'm able to use the computer perfectly fine, I want to find out a way I can make it so that the computer doesn't do this every time I start up. It's an ABIT nforce 2 motherboard, the HDD runs fine but I'm still not sure why it does this every time I boot the machine.

I see no mention of this post made by you on 7/23/2005 in the general hardware section that would indicate this was a problem with your friends or sisters computer...if anything it says clearly that the problem is on an ABIT nforce 2 based system...

So again I ask who would really take the advice of someone who cannot figure out their own problems on which hardware they should and or shouldn't buy??...please enlighten me as to how you know Epox suck as you so eloquently put it and why they should be avoided?

Why does it matter if I specify if it's my computer or some one elses computer? I care for a friend's computer like I do my own. How was I suppose to know that some guy in a separate unrelated thread would quote me later asking/telling me "is this your computer? It seems like you said it was". You still can't explain why you quote the part where I said "dell 1.7GHZ P4 and that being the same system as the Nforce 2 system... You should know that 1. Dell doesn't use non intel chipsets until now and 2. They don't use AMD processor based computers either.

Look all I know is that 1. I've used a few epox based systems and they were very unreliable and 2. I've heard many many complaints from people about their epox based systems and how they're crap. I find it funny that you defend EPOX like as if they're PC Power and cooling or some other high end brand :roll:

I have no problem with Epox, better stability then Asus, and a hell of a lot better then DFI

 

[enwar3]

well with ppl like goku defending dfi im tempted to go epox =)

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: enwar3
well with ppl like goku defending dfi im tempted to go epox =)

I defended DFI I've got no problems with DFI because I haven't heard complaints about DFI like I have about PC Chips and Epox.