Maybe it's just me, but I think the nForce 2 deserves LESS credit than it is getting

[Gerbil333]

Yea, here's how mine went:

Installing my Abit KT7A -- KT133A:
-Put board in case
-Put other hardware in
-Turn it on, setup BIOS
-Install OS, chipset drivers, other hardware drivers
-Compute and game for a couple YEARS with a few upgrades during that time

Installing my MSI K7N2-L -- nForce 2:
-Put board in case
-Put other hardware in
-Turn it on, setup BIOS
-Install Windows XP Pro, SP1, chipset drivers, other drivers
-Compute for a couple days, find glitch.
-Spend days formatting a few times attempting to fix glitch.
-Figure it out, fixed.
-Try out a quieter hsf for my CPU...a routine thing...but NOOOOO, it BSOD's after ~10min. because I messed with the BIOS.
-Put HHC-001 back on, load high performance defaults, enter usual settings, and act like nothing happened.
-Computer & Game for a few days
-Tribes 2 decides to generate an Unhandled Exception (common error in the game meaning CRASH)
-Lower memory timings from 2-2-2-6 to 2-2-3-6 (this is Corsair XMS2700 at only 133mhz BTW)
-Cross fingers, hope everything's stable.
-Seems stable, runs great few a couple weeks.
-Get new Kingston HyperX memory (two sticks), and install it.
-Run at 2-2-2-6 perfectly for 4 days, no crashes after lots of gaming. I'm happy.
-Mess with BIOS (only first boot device for Pete's FN sake)
-Load WinXP, run 3DMark 2001, score 10,901 stock. Happy. Submit score, and surf for a couple minutes.
-BSOD :|
-Load high performance defaults, enter correct BIOS settings.
-Load WindXP, do the same routine...here I am about 12 hours later. Stable like a rock??? WTH!?

So, it's just REALLY picky with memory and BIOS stuff. I'm not liking that.

 

[Idoxash]

Originally posted by: floccus
Um, you might want to look at every hardware site on the net... cause they seem to think the nForce2 is as good as it really is. Just because you might not think so doesn't make it true.

Also, nForce2 is not to blame for memory issues,
WD drives are all compatible, people just can't set them up right
BIOS corruptions... well, thats what happens when you get a bad flash, but a very small # of people have had that happen in actuality

Also, this is nVidia's second attempt at making a chipset, its 6months old now and still rules the fold. Via has a ton of problems and can't come close to the nForce2 in performance, despite issuing new chipsets..

Come back and try again when you can give me a legitimate arguement....

I looked at every hardware site and see how they talk great of these mobos that somehow seems to be blowing their caps, killen the bios, and a lot of other things. Infact it's got to where when I build computers for ppl I stay away from 3rd party mobos all together cause i ran into so many probs with DOA/s and then just reading on them turns the stomach... guess you could say i build a lot of very nice Intel computers. All thoe dun get me wrong I like AMD but they need to find some better mobo makers them thoes cheap rip offs.

Now I messed with some nf1 and 2 chipsets and i found out sometimes they work great and sometimes they dun. Now why would it not be nf chipset prob for ram not working right? what you going to say it's the ram? lmao! and how about the WD hard drives? what it's now WD but you said ppl set them up wrong? what is there to set up? you set the jumpers right, hook them up right, and expect them to work? well till you found out the bios is crap.

I'm not here to make a "legitimate arguemnet" or to prove i'm right! I'm here to state my opinion of what i seen over the last 9 years of building computers and simply reading what goes around the net of late. In other words you ask me both VIA and NF sucks!

--Idoxash

 

[NesuD]

Originally posted by: floccus
Um, you might want to look at every hardware site on the net... cause they seem to think the nForce2 is as good as it really is. Just because you might not think so doesn't make it true.

Also, nForce2 is not to blame for memory issues,
WD drives are all compatible, people just can't set them up right
BIOS corruptions... well, thats what happens when you get a bad flash, but a very small # of people have had that happen in actuality

Also, this is nVidia's second attempt at making a chipset, its 6months old now and still rules the fold. Via has a ton of problems and can't come close to the nForce2 in performance, despite issuing new chipsets..

Come back and try again when you can give me a legitimate arguement....

Wrong Western digital drives are not all compatible and i am very capable of setting one up right. Theres is a problem at the drive detection with SOME not all WD drives that will hang the system at post. This problem is acknowledged by WD. The dirty fix for it is to cut the pin 1 wires on the ide cable apparently the issue is associated with the reset. Western digital will send anyone a modified cable that has this problem. here is the response to me fro WD tech support:

Response (Christina) 01/14/2003 10:50 AM
I apologize in the delay in answering your emails. I phone the records and there was a request to send you a modified cable I am not sure why you have not received the cable yet, however I have requested another cable be sent to you. This issue affected only a very small about of drives and has been correctly.

We did identify a timing anomaly with a certain BIOS, where the drive is not recognized by the system on power-up. During the drive's power-up initialization, before busy is cleared, there is a very small timing window during which a reset may cause the drive to become inaccessible. This affects only an isolated group of WD hard drives. Western Digital has since optimized its hard drives' power-up initialization sequence to ensure compatibility. This optimization does not cause any functional changes with the power-up initialization

The cable that we send will work with this drive and other IDE devices there are no performance issues related to the new cable or issues with other devices recognizing on the cable.

Maybe you should come back when yoy know what you are talking about! the bios corruptions he is talking about is a well know issue that occurs when you make bios changes then save them. Apparently the bios has to write changes in a different way than most chipsets have in the past at shutdown. something doesn't go right on occasion when writing the changes and the board is left in an unbootable state. this is why the nvidia reference design included a safe mode jumper that forces a 100mhz system bios settings in hardware so that you could recover from this state and reset your bios settings. Unfortunately practically no motherboard manufacturers felt it was important to include this jumper on their final board designs except for MSI an 1 or 2 others that i don't recall.

As far as who is responsible for memory compatibilitys who knows. seems to vary from board to board. I am more inclined to lay that at the board makers feet since MSI for example actually has ram on their recommended list that has issues with their board. i am also convinced that a lot of these bios coruptions happen as a result of ram/board incompatibilities. Used to happen to me a couple of times a week (thanks the powers for safemode jumper) until i stopped using the ram that i had gotten that was on msi's recommended list and replaced it with what i am using now.

 

[NesuD]

Originally posted by: McCarthy
Gerbil333 - I agree. I posted a similar, but much more emotional (I was quite angry) post awhile back.

My issues:
Ran into the problem with a Western Digital 400BB drive. Floccus, thank you for pointing out that you're uninformed and should not be listened to. It's not a matter of 'not knowing how to set up the drive', it doesn't work, period.

Gameport on the Santa Cruz Turtle Beach will not work with a nForce2 board. Is this a major problem? Nah. Not unless you're the one affected anyway.

Since I can't use my Santa Cruz's gameport and since games lock up when even it's drivers are installed on this board I took it out completely. Now I'm having to use a splitter on the speaker out of the onboard sound to have two simple stereo channels - one for speakers and other for headphones. Seems you can have 4.1, 5.1, whatever.1, but can't have two simple stereo outputs.

Did you try the santa cruz in pci slot 3? i have talked to some people who had this clear up the gameport issue for them. as far as the WD drive issue I had it as well and as you see in my post above it is WDs fault not the boards there is a dirty fix. Take an ata66/100/133 cable and cut the first 2 conductors(one of them is the color keyed wire)these are the 2 wires that go to pin one which is the reset pin. use that cable and you won't get the drive detect hangs. Here is a very extensive thread at NforcersHQ that deals with the issue.
Nforce2 WD drive issues

 

[Megatomic]

The only issue I had with my Epox 8RDA+ is it's memory pickiness. I had 2 512MB PC2700 modules of Kingston ValueRam that refused to run at anything over 145MHz even when using just one DIMM. They just refused to work right. Once I got my Corsair XMS PC3200 I was able to run at up to 197MHz FSB (held back by a low Vdd). And now I have 2 x 512MB Kingston HyperX PC2700 and they're humming along at 166MHz FSB 2-2-2-5.

I guess one just needs to do their homework prior to implementing an nForce2 board. They are worth the effort as once they are running properly they are magnificient.

 

[RedRonin]

Thanks a lot everyone for expanding on your point of view regarding nForce2! This is the kind of debate I like to see on message boards. Though I have been involved with computers for much of the past twenty years, and have upgraded several during that time, I only recently began building them from scratch. It's nice to hear the opinions of folks who have had more experience in this arena.

Gerbil333: I was wondering about something, as it isn't listed among your list of troubleshooting trials... After running the benchmark program, did you restart the system first before beginning your web browsing? True enough, one shouldn't have to do so, I agree. But the reality is that neither the Windows OS or the software written for it is quite as efficient as one might hope. I don't run benchmark programs myself, because I honestly don't care about the numbers generated.

However, I do think it would be prudent to fully purge the system memory through a hardware reset after such an exhaustive activity. I don't know how the benchmark program works, but if it opens and closes a bunch of windows automatically, that could be a problem. There is a lingering issue with WinXP that causes the memory manager to lose track of things after about 400 windows have been opened or closed. So if I spend an extended amount of time editing photos or web pictures, I restart the system periodically.

Yes, you made a BIOS change, but it could just as well have been a memory leak from the benchmarking program that caused your BSOD. No motherboard is perfect, but neither is any software, be it OS or Application. What I'm saying is that this may have been a software issue rather than a hardware failing during your first benchmark run. The fact that your system was stable for hours after changing BIOS settings could merely be a coincidence. You mentioned "the same routine..." , are you saying that with the reverted BIOS settings you could run the benchmark program and still surf the net without a restart or system error? To make sure, try running the benchmark program to its completion using either of the two settings you switched in the BIOS. Let us know how it works out, OK?

HUN-YA!

Red Ronin

 

[DAPUNISHER]

This is a interesting and valid topic of discussion and has been largely conducted in an adult manner with intelligent and detailed responses so cheers for that :beer:

Maybe it's just me, but I think the nForce 2 deserves LESS credit than it is getting

I understand the perspective which inspires this remark, however there are mitigating circumstances behind the nearly unending praise for the Nforce2 chipset which aren't merely "excuses" or "bias" that should be considered. For instance, the fact that in just it's second offering Nvidia has managed to capture and hold the performance crown and looks to retain it for some time yet is impressive and praiseworthy and speaks volumes about the fresh ideas Nvidia is bringing to the sktA arena. Add features such as DC-DDR combined with inexpensive integrated graphics that reach a higher performance level than any the competition provides, Soundstorm, and the PCI/AGP lock and it becomes evident why most reviewers and users alike are enamored with the NF2.

There are issues yes, but as has been pointed out, many are correctly laid at certain board makers feet, and as in the case of the WD drives are isolated and successfully resolved. I can't speak to any soundstorm issues and I haven't seen many though that certainly doesn't mean they aren't posted, most I've seen are with audio solutions that don't utilize soundstorm which wouldn't be Nvidia's problem but the board makers who used different solutions to lower costs.

None of that legitimizes VIA bashing since their products have been no more problematic nor unresolvable in nature than the NF2 IMHO. I do however share the sentiment that VIA has dropped the proverbial ball not only in sktA but for the Intel platform as well and needs to refocus or continue to lose market share to companies like Nvidia and SiS.

Myself, I've had no issues with the NF2 that haven't been resolved and the performance and overclockability are the best of any sktA board I've ever owned, and the renewed interest it's created in AMD based solutions is a positive not only for Nvidiia but AMD as well. This isn't one of my better structured or articulated responses to be certain and I admit I am indifferent to VIA products, but in all honesty I feel I'm being logical in saying that I see no reason to prefer or use a via based solution for either AMD or Intel at this time and that they are 2nd choices for me despite still offering good price/performance.

 

[cisco]

I had posted about my sound problem , in win98se no sound on blackhawk down, the fix was a microsoft win98 patch downloaded from the aopen website (??) it worked!!!!

now I still have some weird issues , I installed a DVD-rw (pioneer 105) can't seem to get it to work I have one drive as a master and the other slaved with the HD. the source drive (a DVD drive) (using nero express) doesn't read discs (??) will play around with it some more , I had read something about problems like this in a few posts on other websites, I'm almost ready to just put the burner in another system and keep this Nforce2 setup just for games ,
I gotta say the MB is real buggy . the USB driver in device manager isn't right yet and keeps detecting itself in the middle of nothing (I move the USB mouse) .
so one problem solved two to go,
I'll bet if I had winXP installed I wouldn't have had the audio problem or this pending USB problem.
the CD drive reading problems seem to be mentioned even with win XP so that one I'm not sure.

I don't mind bugs as long as there is a fix out there somewhere , my patience is wearing thin on this one!

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Hey cisco, I'm pretty sure 9x OS do not support USB2.0 (EDIT:I think there are 3rd party drivers available from various manufacturers that provide the support) so someone feel free to correct or confirm this please. If the NF2 is anything like the original NF it doesn't play well with 98. It was like pulling teeth to get all the drivers and software to work correctly with the A7N266-VM, installed XP and it was all gravy after that, HTH

 

[NesuD]

Originally posted by: cisco
I had posted about my sound problem , in win98se no sound on blackhawk down, the fix was a microsoft win98 patch downloaded from the aopen website (??) it worked!!!!

now I still have some weird issues , I installed a DVD-rw (pioneer 105) can't seem to get it to work I have one drive as a master and the other slaved with the HD. the source drive (a DVD drive) (using nero express) doesn't read discs (??) will play around with it some more , I had read something about problems like this in a few posts on other websites, I'm almost ready to just put the burner in another system and keep this Nforce2 setup just for games ,
I gotta say the MB is real buggy . the USB driver in device manager isn't right yet and keeps detecting itself in the middle of nothing (I move the USB mouse) .
so one problem solved two to go,
I'll bet if I had winXP installed I wouldn't have had the audio problem or this pending USB problem.
the CD drive reading problems seem to be mentioned even with win XP so that one I'm not sure.

I don't mind bugs as long as there is a fix out there somewhere , my patience is wearing thin on this one!

The fact is that the win 98 support is weak for nforce boards. As i recall most board makers did not really support the win 9x OSs initially. Reality is that these boards were designed and optimized for use with win XP. I think most of the issues win 9x users are experiencing is a result of this fact. pretty sure win 9x is required for USB 2.0 on these boards. Remember for USB 2.0 work on these boards Win xp SP1 is also required. That tells me something about the boards USB support.

 

[Corsairpro]

I hate the nForce 2 right now. I HATE IT! I've built 2 systems... one w/ MSI, one w/ Epox. BOTH ARE STILL NOT FUNCTIONING. One will power off before i can even INSTALL windows, the other reboots every 5 minutes. Its not heat, ram, hdd, vid or anything. Its the DASM motherboard. I almost decided to go Pentium 4 i was so p#ssed off. But I looked at the p4 prices and decided against it. KT400A here I come!

 

[Killrose]

My only gripes with the nForce2 (Epox 8RDA) is that I think we were a little mislead by some reveiwers getting boards able to do 200+MHz FSB speeds with-out vdd modding. These were probably handpicked by the manufacture for reveiws. Yes I realise they are'nt advertizing this in actuall specs., but still

I had the bios crash once as well, and thought I was totally screwed, but all I had to do was load a floppy with the bios, restart my computer and it auto loaded the bios, I did'nt have to do anything. It booted from the floppy and flashed it all by itself. I was surpised that this fail-safe feature was not listed in the manual.

 

[Gerbil333]

However, I do think it would be prudent to fully purge the system memory through a hardware reset after such an exhaustive activity. I don't know how the benchmark program works, but if it opens and closes a bunch of windows automatically, that could be a problem. There is a lingering issue with WinXP that causes the memory manager to lose track of things after about 400 windows have been opened or closed. So if I spend an extended amount of time editing photos or web pictures, I restart the system periodically.

Yes, you made a BIOS change, but it could just as well have been a memory leak from the benchmarking program that caused your BSOD. No motherboard is perfect, but neither is any software, be it OS or Application. What I'm saying is that this may have been a software issue rather than a hardware failing during your first benchmark run. The fact that your system was stable for hours after changing BIOS settings could merely be a coincidence. You mentioned "the same routine..." , are you saying that with the reverted BIOS settings you could run the benchmark program and still surf the net without a restart or system error? To make sure, try running the benchmark program to its completion using either of the two settings you switched in the BIOS. Let us know how it works out, OK?

I have no doubt in my mind it was a BIOS/software glitch. Just to test further, I left my computer on all night in UT2003. It was still going when I came back. The last time I rebooted was after changing the BIOS after the BSOD...

Yes, I always reboot before benchmarking. I'm a tweaker. I've held #1 spots in some configurations in the 3DMark 2001 ORB before

 

[onelin]

Good post. Sums up the reasons I decided not to get an nforce2 (by viewing the official threads of all the nforce2 boards I was considering and seeing how many problems there would be w/ my use/hardware). It's a sweet chipset on paper, but there are way too many 'potential' issues I'd run into for it to be worth my time/$. Besides, now I'm in love w/ canterwood/springdale.

I'd still say it's probably the best chipset out there for Athlons, but take MMORPGs for example. EQ "may or may not" be the best one out, but so what if it's only because it screws me "less" than the other ones...it still screws me, so I won't bother.

On another note, you don't even want to hear how unstable my KT333 board is right now :|

 

[Gerbil333]

Yes, I should have done that (not bought the nForce 2 for my main rig). My KR7A is only ~150 points slower in 3DMark 2001 than my nForce 2 is in single channel mode, and I didn't notice a difference in games until I changed to two sticks of Kingston 256mb HyperX. That's because I went from 256mb's of RAM to 512mb's of RAM, and it enabled dual channel though.

I had planned on waiting for the Athlon 64 and then determined what to buy (Intel or AMD). I'm considering Intel again...their stuff looks decent for a change

 

[Megatomic]

I posted this in another thread but I feel that I should post it here as well. Here goes:

What would be truly enticing on the AMD side of the fence would be an nForce2 Ultra (coming soon) motherboard with ALL the bells and whistles available to it through the nForce2 chipset. With:

Onboard optical sound output allowing for SoundStorm certification
2x parallel ATA RAID channels onboard
Active/efficient cooling on the SPP/IGP chip
Efficient passive cooling on the MCP2-T chip
Adjustable Vdd
Broad memory compatability
New very highly tweaked/optimized platform drivers for all supported OSes

Were this board for sale today I'd jump on it.

If you guys were presented with such a board, would that lure you in? I'd jump all over it myself. Does this board exist or will it ever exist?

 

[chizow]

I've had no complaints about this board other than the well-documented BIOS death issues. It only happened to me b/c I was pushing a non-C1/A1 revision board from 210MHz to 220MHz FSB, so I can't really fault the board. I'm not going to sit here and say its a simple chipset or board to work with, but it certainly helps if you've had a lot of experience building/troubleshooting in the past. It also helps if you pick premium components and research potential incompatibility issues beforehand. Its a lot to ask, I know, but its how I've avoided problems.

I don't think my bios would've died if I wasn't pushing it so hard; if I set stock settings and let er rip, I'm sure I wouldn't have 2 A7N8Xs (I just hotflashed the old BIOS to get the first one working). If I was content running 206MHz FSB or if I eased my FSB from 210MHz, I probably would've avoided BIOS death. Regardless, this is easily the best OC'ing chipset created, which is one of my primary interests when choosing a board/chipset. With PCI locks, T-bred multiplier unlocking, AGP frequency selection, FSB/memory ratios, DDR333 (and now DDR400) support and possibly beyond, I've never owned a more compatible and flexible board when it comes to performance and OC'ing.

I've used VIA since I switched to AMD a few years back, from the KT133A to the KT266A, and although I never had any major issues with either, a lot of "weird" annoyances simply stopped happening when I upgraded to my nForce2.

Chiz

 

[azkiwi]

I don't have an NForce board (yet) but I've had a few VIA chipsets. They weren't exactly without their quirks, but they were generally good stable platforms - I'm on one now. I do remember just this sort of complaint at the outset of each new chipset though.

Its not easy atttributing blame for odd errors to the chipset specifically. Correct me if I'm wrong; but I thought a specific compatibility issue was found between Corsair XMS2700 and the NForce. if so , that could explain a lot of your problems. Also, each mobo manufacturer is implementing the chipset a little diffferently - each deviation from the reference board may introduce new problems. Finally, when we overclock we are taking the machine beyond the intended stable design limits - as much as anything to get a little extra for nothing. When your Hyundai won't corner at 120 you really can't complain too loud!

Its remarkable how one bad experience can color your whole perception of a genre. Overall, I'd much rather be tweaking my NForce2 than my TX-5...

 

[Gerbil333]

Correct me if I'm wrong; but I thought a specific compatibility issue was found between Corsair XMS2700 and the NForce. if so , that could explain a lot of your problems.

You didn't read anything but the first post did you...

I didn't have that many problems. Besides, that issue is only with Corsair XMS2700C2 in PAIRS. I had one. And I'm not even using it now. I've switched to two sticks of Kingston 256mb HyperX PC3000.

BTW, the system has now been on for over 26 hours straight. Nothing has gone wrong. Lots of multitasking, several hours of UT2003, etc. It's fine. It's just picky.

 

[azkiwi]

see there - you switched out your problem RAM and now its stable - great chipset!!

Yes, I should have read the other posts more carefully - though I did hit them all. My greater point stands though - most people most of the time have few problems. One difficult experience with one difficult board changes your opinion about a whole chipset - and perhaps thats not rational.

 

[Gerbil333]

No, it's just as stable with the HyperX as the Corsair, except the Corsair ran at 2-2-3-6 and the HyperX is running at 2-2-2-6. Note that I currently have the Corsair in my other computer (KR7A) and it's now running at 2-2-2-6 just fine....hmmm...that says something.

 

[RedRonin]

More great responses! I'm starting to really like it here in these forums... I have been pretty thorough in my search for different motherboards to use. Still, it seems that effort must be redoubled for anyone considering serious, heavy duty overclocking. That is a point that seems to have been conveyed from many different points of view over the course of this thread. Trust me, I am taking note of all that is said here for future reference. I trust that others will do the same.

HUN-YA!

Red Ronin

 

[kponds]

Via has a code letter they use when they make a good chipset. If it ends with an A, its a good one, if not its in beta. KT133A was a good one and afix to the KT133, KT266A was a good one and fixed the KT266. When they release (and if they ship the KT400A, I may be interested).

I have had no experince with Nvidia chipsets but have been lurking for a while and pretty much thought that the "2" was their code for non-beta chipset. From the comments, maybe I was wrong. I am on a P4 Intel PE chipset now and it is rock solid from my experince. I am considering a NForce 2 (8RDA+ or the new Soltek) to play around with but may wait after some of the comments in this post.

 

[Gerbil333]

No, the nForce to the nForce "2" is pretty much like the KT266A to the KT333...another beta platform.

 

[MARMADUKE]

MSI nforce2 mobos got very bad reviews, ya gotta do your homework!

Chiz

You should get a refund for that defective Asus that died on you and use it to get a 8RDA+
You dont even know why it died?.. that is sad!.. Nvidia knows!..I know!
I will give you a hint...JUMPER!