MSI K7T Pro2-A...

[PCResources]

<< how do know the quality of components on the motherboards? >>



Read my post below, i really test the components individually...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[PCResources]

<< Patrick, you are starting to get me excited about my purchase, quit it!! >>



Ahhh, when you buy something you want it right away don't you, you want to try it out right this minute, now don't you, that is the crappy thing about mail-order...

And when someone tells you how great it is, well, then you want it even more... ;-)

Well, i think your buy was a good one..

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[|TOAST|]

Hey people,

I am just installing my first MSI K7T Pro-2A with a Duron 650 and noticed that the motherboard and BIOS detected it as a Duron 700. I also noticed the BIOS only has 7.0 multipliers and up (in 0.5 increments obviously) and is lacking the 6.5 multiplier... Right now the system is installing WIN2K without any problems at 700MHz and I am wondering why the teh CPU is unlocked without me ever using the &quot;gold ink/thread&quot; multiplier unlocking method. Also, since I don't need the onboard sound to work what drivers do I need to install for the Chipset/motherboard? Just the latest 4in1's from VIA's website for WIN2K? What about the ATA100 drivers? Who's onboard ATA100 IDE channels are those and what drivers do I need for that to work (using a 10 GB Seagate ATA66 drive)? Sorry I am confused and have no idea what to do about the ATA100 and was about to leave it alone (but I intend to install the latest 4in1's for this system. I am looking for stability and not speed so I have to ask is it better to stick with the WIN2K drivers for the IDE channels?

Thanks much.

 

[soulm4tter]

<< The higher quality components used by MSI involves resistors, capacitors and the design of the motherboard itself

<<

How does one go about rating the quality of the components? Is it purely subjective or are some said components known to be better than others? You really sound like you know your stuff.......i just wanna know also...=)



<< The Abit board has been the worst i ever tested, i have tested thousands of KT133 boards]

In what way has it been the worst?... More defective boards per boards tested... or is it poor stability...etc.

I've used a few Abits and never had any problems with them.
I would say all of the systems were very stable. The KT7A will be my first Abit/Via combo and it seems to very stable so far at 147mhz bus. I'm really impressed with the BIOS tweaking.....i just wish the manual would explain the setttings more.

 

[|TOAST|]

I am confused since I have yet to use this board and put together a Duron system. Sorry I am a P!!/P!!! Athlon/Thunderbird guy. Ususally use Asus or Soyo and stopped using Abit (several years ago) since their quality declined a while ago IMO.

 

[PCResources]

<< Who's onboard ATA100 IDE channels are those and what drivers do I need for that to work (using a 10 GB Seagate ATA66 drive)? >>



With that drive the 4 in 1 drivers should work out nicely, if you have probs with it, download the ATA100 drivers from Soltek's site...

If you encounter any problems, PM me...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[gtd2000]

I'm not disputing your knowledge about the quality issues of the various motherboards, however, this does not translate to performance according to these (presumably objective) benchmarks see this link...Text
I'm basically only able to refer to Soltek and Epox in this comparision.

 

[dcdomain]

Hey Patrick, the damn soltek driver causes the system to read all drives as SCSI, you know of a work around for it? After my format and install, I chose not to install them and have been running my computer for almost a month in PIO mode. Mad slow... I'm hoping SP2 for Win2K will fix things up with it's ATA100 support...

 

[|TOAST|]

would it be the line in the boot.ini where SCSI(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT=&quot;Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional&quot; /fastdetect is the first thing there and you need to change it to multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT=&quot;Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional&quot; /fastdetect

That worked for me in NT4 when I got an ATA 66 card... says &quot;multi...&quot; now in WIN2K and works without probs

 

[Bane25]

Re: Patrick Palm

Ok, here are some answerings to your questions about my original post:

The problem I experienced was related to the harddrive and IDE DMA Bus Mastering drivers.
To be very specific, the system locks up/crashes during harddrive intensive usage/activies.
Sometimes the system reboots. Sometimes it just freezes. Sometimes it freezes, with a green
line at the top of the screen.

I found what caused this problem, which many others experienced. It was due to the VIA 4in1
drivers that came on the CD that shipped with my MSI motherboard. Now you want to know the
version, unfortunately, I can't tell you for sure what it is. Why? Because theres so many
damn different versions out there, it's almost impossible to keep track. Although the version
number is 4.205, I'm not sure if it's 4.205(1) or 4.205(2) or 4.205(3) or 4.205(b) or whatever.
All I know is that it's buggy and it caused the crash problem for me.

How did I solve it? Through the help of others on this forum, I got a link to Soltek's website
and downloaded the VIA 4in1 ver 4.28(v) and the newest IDE driver from the same page. I
installed the VIA 4in1 ver 4.28(v), it installed everything except the IDE driver for some
reason. So then I installed the IDE driver by itself and things started to look better.
No more crashes, no more problems. That's when I started benchmarking, and realized that I
only got 66.9 burst read speed, whereas others with my same system setup get on average, 75-77
burst read speed. Now, I realize you can't get full 100mps, but note that my harddisk seems to
be running slower than others who have my same setup. I think the reason my system is slower
could be because of all the different versions of VIA 4in1 I installed, including 4.205(3),
4.27, 4.28(b), 4.28(v), etc. As a side note, my friend, who has the same harddrive as me,
but different motherboard, benched 80 burst read speed. Go figure.

Anyway, I don't think there is really any major problems with MSI motherboard. It's the drivers
that come with the motherboard that screw you. Had I installed the newest drivers off the net
in the first place, I'm sure I would have had no problems. My only other gripe is that my
harddisk seems to be running slower than others, the cause is still unknown.

P.S., theres a difference between Mini-port and VXD options on the IDE drivers. With Miniport,
there was a high CPU usage (22%), and burst read of 66.7 However, the drivers have a newer
datestamp, and they enabled Windows to recognize my IBM harddisk.
With VxD, the drivers seem older, but they use less CPU (7.7%) and burst read of 66.9 The
only thing is Windows doesn't recognize my IBM harddrive and only lists it as &quot;Generic Harddisk&quot;.
Also, the IDE Tool that comes with the IDE drivers don't work for me, they don't detect *any*
of my drives

-Bane25

 

[PCResources]

Well first of all... your problem wasn't with the motherboard, it was due to the chipset and the drivers for it...

And a burst speed of 80MB/sec, well, anything higher than 40MB for an IDE drive is just not true...

And even 40MB/sec, it will not happen in the real world, only with benchmarks...

So the point is, if you are using your computer mainly for benchmarking, ATA100 does matter, otherwise it doesn't... If you want fast disk access and throughput, get SCSI, you just cannot beat that...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[PCResources]

<< How does one go about rating the quality of the components? Is it purely subjective or are some said components known to be better than others? You really sound like you know your stuff.......i just wanna know also...=) >>



You unweld the components and test their capacity and their througput, as well as their stamina and how they secure of the voltage holding... then you test the signalling quality within a magnetic resistance chamber where each component has to deliver the exact amount of data throughput... then you do a electronic circuit conductive test and check out the conductivity of each signalling line per trace of the circuits and the trace lines of the motherboard...




<< In what way has it been the worst?... More defective boards per boards tested... or is it poor stability...etc. >>



When i determine the stability of a board i run it through torture tests that lasts for about 8 weeks, these tests include server tasks, video editing, gameplay, 3D-editing and such...

Abit has a higher RMA/DOA rate, a higher instability rate and a lower quality rate in ALL of the tests that i have conducted... However, this is compared to MSI, compared to ASUS, they are about equal... just a little worse...

The thing is, i have tested so many boards, ALL Abit boards have crapped out during one test or another (and NO, not speaking of quality tests here) and therefore i cannot recommend Abit to anyone...

I have had discussions about this with people who think that random reboots at least twice a day is normal, or once a day, for my customers random reboots or system hangups aren't normal, not once a year, not EVER! PC Resources customers does not know what instability means...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[PCResources]

<< Hey Patrick, the damn soltek driver causes the system to read all drives as SCSI, you know of a work around for it? After my format and install, I chose not to install them and have been running my computer for almost a month in PIO mode. Mad slow... I'm hoping SP2 for Win2K will fix things up with it's ATA100 support... >>



Read TOAST's post, he knows how to do it... and he is perfectly right...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[PCResources]

<< I'm not disputing your knowledge about the quality issues of the various motherboards, however, this does not translate to performance according to these (presumably objective) benchmarks see this link... >>



Yes, you are quite right... but the performance hit is too small to notice, and if you have to restart your system due to instability, well then how great is that performance increase...

Remember, i am not disputing your statement, i know that it is true, but in terms of stability, well, these days that is what you will really be looking for, right? Unstable boards are a thing that no one should tolerate...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[tjdavis1138]

Didn't get my system put together last night, went to bed instead. Anyway, my IBM 75gxp will be running off of a promise ata100 controller. The only thing on the mb ide channels will be my Plextor 12/10/32 and Asus DVD drive. Should I even install the IDE driver's since the hd won't be on the motherboard?

Thanks

 

[gtd2000]

I actually thought that the ABIT performed at quite a substantial level (in certain benches) from the others, but maybe the difference in the real world is not noticeable?

You are correct - it's a bit like having a nice looking/performing Italian car that breaks down all the time vs a Japanese one that gets you everywhere flawlessly - but perhaps not in as much style
I personally prefer Japanese cars but that's another story.

I've had problems with ABIT's too but not anything too serious...just things like one ISA slot not working or overclocking problems with certain RAM slots, I tend to blame my OS or software more than the hardware.

I'd like to try somebody like MSI for my next motherboard as they are quite a bit cheaper here than the offerings from ABIT and Epox (2theMax in Hong Kong). I'll just wait till I hear more feedback about the 133A versions first though

 

[Recneps]

These are special motherboards designed for the VERY high end, where ten minutes of down time might mean a loss of tens of thousands of dollars, or even worse, the loss of human lifes...

Lol do they use them to run them to run taxes electric chair?

Can anyone tell me how to enable the onboard sound on my Pro2-A all I see in the bios is auto/disable. Anyone know some kind of a trick to get it to work?

 

[Jalapeno]

My guess would be you have to install the audio drivers They should be on the CD.

 

[Cessna172]

<< I'm not disputing your knowledge about the quality issues of the various motherboards, however, this does not translate to performance according to these (presumably objective) benchmarks see this link...Text >>



The person who made those graphs is an idiot. You're supposed to start at 0 when graphing. If you don't, it exaggerates the results, such as on that page. The difference in performance between those boards is pretty minimal when you look at the numbers closely.

 

[Bane25]

Re: Patrick Palm

You say that you don't have any problems at all with your MSI motherboard and drivers, etc.
Can you tell me how I can get VIA's IDE Tool to work? It doesn't work on my comp, doesn't
recognize that I have VIA Bus mastering installed. I tried reinstalling, uninstalling,
reinstalling, no avail.

-Bane25

 

[forouza1]

I recently put my MSI K7tPro2A together and can't complain one bit about it. I haven't had any crashes with it, outside of WinME related stuff. The board works great. I don't overclock so that's probably different than most people here. I recommend the MSI. As it usually goes most people only write on this forum if they have problems. Hardly anyone writes to tell about their problem-less systems (which are the majority of us who own MSI k7tPro2A.) Good luck with your setup.

 

[PCResources]

<< You say that you don't have any problems at all with your MSI motherboard and drivers, etc. Can you tell me how I can get VIA's IDE Tool to work? It doesn't work on my comp, doesn't recognize that I have VIA Bus mastering installed. I tried reinstalling, uninstalling, reinstalling, no avail. >>



Which OS are you running? I assume NT4?

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[holdencommodore]

You need to install the VIA Miniport driver to get the VIA IDE Tool to work. To do this, you need to download the Busmaster driver (if you have win9x etc...).

Had no problems with the MSI K7T Pro2-A. No probs with VIA drivers, ATA 100 or stability. Even MSI Live BIOS has worked perfectly in updating from 1.8 to 1.9, 2.0, 2.10.
And it wasn't expensive, it only cost $235!

 

[PCResources]

<< You need to install the VIA Miniport driver to get the VIA IDE Tool to work. To do this, you need to download the Busmaster driver (if you have win9x etc...). >>



Which you usually do not with anything else than NT4... And that is a good thing, the vxd driver is just as good, just as stable, just as fast and it doesn't wear your CPU down as much as the miniport driver...

So stick with the vxd and do not worry about the tool, just install it with the support and then do not worry about it...

Patrick Palm

Am speaking for PC Resources

 

[RGN]

I don't know what the problem is with these boards. I have one (rock stable) a good friend has one (rock stable) and there have been NO problems. NONE. We both run Win2K, have different components, and have HAD no problems. We have discussed that this might be the most stable boards we have EVER owned. Both of use came from a Abit BE6-II system that also rocked.


Power supplies are important, as is good RAM. Our systems are even overclocked all to he11 and they still are fine.


I would not worry to much, experiance the Pro2a for yourself. Just use good components doing it.