Gigabyte GA-K8NS Pro

[Leros]

has anyone had any problems with this board turning off?

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...7&threadid=1473668

 

[Budman]

n/m

 

[rogelio]

Looks like i'll never be able to use 2 sticks or more of RAM... causes crashing and severe instability when I use the 2 sticks of 512 Mb PC3200 Corsair DDR.

You think it's possible Corsaiar would send me a single stick of 1 Gb PC3200 for my two sticks of 512 Mb... considering the rather stagnant situation with the K8NS Pro board?

 

[MornNB]

Have you updated your bios? Tried at 333mhz?

 

[rogelio]

Yup... tried everything, new bios, upping dram voltage, trying 2 different sticks of pc3200... nothing works.

 

[Vestan Pance]

Posted here before about my ram issues where it stopped working with two sticks of ram. Well my first board was replaced by the people I bought it from and I got a second one, but that wasn't the end of my problems.

With the second board I was still getting ram issues the board won't pass the POST without setting the ram to 1t timings and using slots 2 and 3 and this has reduced my ram frequency to 100mhz. It runs fine with 1 stick and I have tried over 12 different sticks now of various speeds and brand and none seem to work at all unless I use the 1t setting with slots 2 and 3.

I contacted AMD support about this thinking it may be an issue with the onboard memory controller. They took the CPU in for testing and found no faults, this was back in November. I am currently trying to arrange for the second board to be sent back to place I bought it from, though they have been very slow in replying to my emails.

 

[rogelio]

Sounds very possible that Gigabyte had a bad batch of boards with memory controller problems (in handling two ram sticks). It's just such a pain in the arse to have to RMA the board and swap out the CPU and all the devices. I wish I could just "Trade-in" my two sticks of 512mb corsair pc3200 for a 1 gig stick... since it seems there problem goes away if I use only 1 stick of ram.

 

[rperezlo]

Due to what I read in this thread I was reluctant to buy a second stick of 512 MB for my MB. I found a good deal and I went for it assuming that it wouldn't work at DDR400 but at DDR333, but at least I would have 1 GB RAM.

Well, I guess I'm the lucky guy. My system is running the same as before, bus @ 240 MHz, HTT @ 4X, memory @ 240 MHz, but this time with two sticks of RAM. The only thing I had to change was the 'Max Memory Speed' in the BIOS from 'Auto' to '200 MHz', as it defaulted to 166 MHz for some reason.

The configurations is: Gigabyte K8NS Pro, F8 BIOS, AMD 3000+ Newcastle, 2 sticks of 512 Mb Kingston ValueRAM KVR400X64C3A/512, based on Hynix chips.

I haven't had a lot of time for testing, but it seems fully stable. It has survived three runs of Aquamark and one hour of Doom 3 (those who play Doom3 know that it is a definitive test) without a hitch.

 

[MornNB]

Same story for me rperezlo, I also have 2 sticks of "512 Mb Kingston ValueRAM KVR400X64C3A/512, based on Hynix chips." And a newcastle 3400+.
The reason is defaults to DDR333 is because that is the limit in the specs for dual sided dual slot ram and gigabyte said they'd prefer to stick to specs rather than make it easier for users to run their ram faster. And to run it at DDR400 is really an overclock. I had to update my bios from F4 to do it with stablity.

 

[Savarak]

I can't run mine at 200mhz ... I run a AMD 3000+ NC with bus at 230mhz, HTT 4x, but MEMORY at 166(in bios, around 191mhz according to CPUZ cuz of the divider)...

My superPI 1meg is around 41 seconds.... how fast is yours rperezlo?


I need to replace my 2x512m with a 1x1g someday..

 

[rperezlo]

My SuperPi 1M is 39s.

Regarding the 166 vs 200 MHz, my plan was to try with relaxed timings if my memory didn't work at 200 MHz (fortunately it did). I agree with MornNB that I'm overclocking in some sense and it is out of specs, and maybe relaxing the timings would help the MB to take the 200 MHz.

I also say this because this MB seems to have some means of memory validation before booting the OS. When I set the memory to 200 with my old DDR333 memory the computer started twice, first with 200 MHz and then the PC resets before boot and starts with 166 MHz. I assumed that my meory failed the test at 200 MHz (no susprise because it was DDR333 memory running at DDR480) and the MB falls back to 166 MHz. With the DDR400 memory I intended to play with the settings to pass that initial check.

And last point, some people have actually reported that it worked after setting the memory timings to manual and changing them. THey usually set manually the same data that was in the SPD for the highest speed but it doesn't work for most of the people.

Resume: try what happens when you relax the memory timings. I don't say it will work but it is worthed to try.

 

[rogelio]

I *wish* I could run two sticks of 512 PC3200 at 333MHz. Problem with mine is severe instability and lock-ups in 3D games with 2 sticks (running underclocked at 333MHz). I've done a complete test on my RAM (Tuff Test) at every inteveral and the results are always that the RAM is in tip-top shape. Both sticks initially worked fine for 3 months... then instability began... bumped dRam voltage to +.1, and worked fine for 2 weeks... then needed to bump to +.2, and eventually... it would only be stable using a single stick of ram (until this day... for the last 4 months). I just better hope i don't have to run ZERO sticks of RAM

 

[Rukkian]

I will probably sound like a complete noob, but here goes. For some reason, I cannot find the ram timings in the bios. I have never had any trouble finding on any other mb. I found the voltages, but no timings, as well as where to set 1t or 2t. I am currently running 245x9.5, memory is at 195 according to Easy Tune.


TIA

 

[rperezlo]

You have to hit Ctrl-F1 to access the Advanced Bios Settings screen in this MB.

 

[Rukkian]

Thank You

 

[Rukkian]

One more, is there any way to see accurate temps? Bios, and Nvidia system monitor are always between 21c (idle) and 28c (load). I know these have to be way to low.

 

[chiyangu]

Originally posted by: Lamberth
Thanks a lot man. Very interesting.

Well, does anybody have a SATA hard disk and the GA-K8NS ? Please post overclock results!

Thank you very much

Gigabyte K8NS Pro
F4 bios
2x512mb Centon PC3200 DDR RAM
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ AX

Overclock:
stock hsf.
10x250 = 2500 MHz
4xHT = 4x250 = 1000 HT
1.6v cpu vcore
+.2v HT voltage
memory set to auto timings and 166 divider
Western Digital 120GB SE IDE HDD.

I have no temperature problems...

I just helped my friend has the K8NS setup a similar system yesterday. Athlon 64 2800+ with GA-K8NS standard.
It has the temp problems even with F8 bios.
Overclock was not as good. but managed 3xHT, 9x266=2400mhz. 1.55v cpu vcore.

 

[Rageheart]

Greetings,
I'm a long time lurker here, but I just had to hop on to point this out.

Gigibyte's Web Page has a new bios version f9 titled under f10...

Let me know how it werks guys!

(BTW: no I can currently only get one of my ram sticks to work at a time using F8... I'm hopeful though.)

 

[TaiJohn]

Originally posted by: Rukkian
One more, is there any way to see accurate temps? Bios, and Nvidia system monitor are always between 21c (idle) and 28c (load). I know these have to be way to low.

I'm running F8 bios, temps looks accurate in speedfan and some other programs.

 

[rperezlo]

Same for me. CPU temps indicated by F8 bios seem to be OK, but MB temps are wrong (fixed at 1 C, whatever I do).

This CPU runs really cool when C'n'Q is activated, although not as cool as yours. I can get 25 C in idle and 40 under load when the fans are at maximum, but not your temps.

 

[Rukkian]

My case is supposed to be one of the best cooling cases and the ambient room temp is around 60, so that may be part of it, just seems so low.

 

[wallis]

has anyone tried the F9 bios for K8NSpro yet?????

 

[Rageheart]

I am, it allows me to run my 2 512 Mushkin blue DDR400 sticks, just not at full speed... :disgust: Still it's better than the rest of my experiences so far.

 

[wallis]

cheap infineon ram has worked for me, 2 sticks at 200mhz, very stable can play doom3 for hours on end and prime 95 runs for hours no errors

athlon 64 3400+
k8ns pro
2sticks 512MB infineon ram
6800gt
XPpro sp2
EZcool 550w PSU

 

[GhosT 64]

I'm using 2 sticks of Corsair Value Ram, not the fastest timings, but runs stably at 200 on this board without any problems.

Using F9 Bios but has been ok (touch wood) since F4