**OFFICIAL** Abit BG7 (i845G) Thread

[THUGSROOK]

maybe you guys should wait for Asus to make an "Overclockers" version, like the P4B266-C board is?

thx for all your info so far tho - kept me from wasting $

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: THUGSROOK
maybe you guys should wait for Asus to make an "Overclockers" version, like the P4B266-C board is?

thx for all your info so far tho - kept me from wasting $

The overclockers version looks to be the P4B533-V.

 

[THUGSROOK]

ummm, actually the P4B266-C has nothing oboard at all. its a stripped down version....
2 dimms, no audio, no lan, no usb 2.0, no post reporter, no smart card reader, very bare, very fast

mine can post and run windows @ 180fsb :Q
gaming tested to 177fsb.
prime95 tested to 175fsb.

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: THUGSROOK
ummm, actually the P4B266-C has nothing oboard at all. its a stripped down version....
2 dimms, no audio, no lan, no usb 2.0, no post reporter, no smart card reader, very bare, very fast

mine can post and run windows @ 180fsb :Q
gaming tested to 177fsb.
prime95 tested to 175fsb.

Well you won't be finding any bare 845G's since the G indicates integrated graphics. I don't see how having integrated options (provided they're good) hinders overclocking. You can disable most onboard stuff if you don't like it or feel it's holding back your o/c. It really boils down to how good your chip, ram and psu is provided you have a good board. If you know something I don't I'd definitely like to hear it.

 

[THUGSROOK]

in the overclockers forum....
we are using the P4B266-C .....we are consistantly getting over 160fsb.
no other board is showing the success rate that the P4B266-C has.
it doesnt have any ratios - but at 166fsb 1:1 333ddr who cares?

 

[ChrisADuffy]

Anyone own the ABIT BG7m Intel 845G chipset P4 478 Micro ATX motherboard ???

Or any of the micro atx 845G Boards for that matter?

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: THUGSROOK
in the overclockers forum....
we are using the P4B266-C .....we are consistantly getting over 160fsb.
no other board is showing the success rate that the P4B266-C has.
it doesnt have any ratios - but at 166fsb 1:1 333ddr who cares?

My friend has the regular p4b266 and his hits 170 fsb consistently. I still haven't seen any proof that suggests integrated devices hamper overclocking. Like I said, if there is such concrete info out there I'd love to see it. BTW, I wrote Asus an email inquiring about the 4:5 divider for the P4B533-V and the rep flat out denied that the board supports it I guess Intel doesn't let them state the board unofficially has the 4:5 divider.


Dear valued Customer,
Thanks for Contacting ASUSTeK.
No, it will not support it.
sorry for any your inconvenience.
According to Intel's official Spec, I845E/G/GL doesn't support DDR 333. You can refer to the URL below:
http://developer.intel.com/design/chipsets/845E/
http://developer.intel.com/design/chipsets/845G/
So, our P4B533 only support to DDR 266 at most.
¡ô



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---------- Original Message ----------
From : sinful-1@pacbell.net
Sent : 2002-6-6 1:29:00
To : "tsd@asus.com.tw"
Subject : Asus P4B533-V



Hi,

I was wondering if the Asus P4B533-V (845G chipset) offers 3:4 and 4:5
memory ratios above 133 fsb? I have an Intel 1.6a chip that is capable
of reaching 2.6 ghz but I would like to make sure the P4B533-V allows
4:5 at 160+ fsb before I make my decision to purchase one.

Thanks,
Brian

 

[THUGSROOK]

wow! they actually replied!

 

[gpanda]

I've had good luck with googlegear. They have the P4B533-VM in stock and $0.50 FEDEX shipping on it to boot! Nothing I ever order has that shipping special
I ordered a Gigabyte8IEXP from them which I should be getting tomorrow. The 1.6A I got from then a couple of weeks ago had a 5/5/2002 pack date. They shipped the same day of the order (ordered at 6AM their time).

 

[ChrisADuffy]

gpanda, thanks for the info. I like googlegear except they don't ship to my location(apo/fpo) anymore. So I was looking at that same board at newegg for $115. This looks like the most interesting one so far, as far as micro atx 845G boards go.

 

[TuffGuy]

UPDATE:

my ghetto system (mobo/cpu/hsf/ram on antistatic wrap, power supply, hard-drive) is doing fairly well. it's running at 152mhz 2-5-2-2 right at 1:1 right now. running seti@home for stability right now and to burn in my new samsung pc2700.

the one thing that sucks is that my old gf2 mx with the blorb won't fit on this board, so i have to use the onboard video which BLOWS.

 

[JamesC]

Thanks everybody for replying to my previous post.
It was actually on this forum that i read that the bg7 appeared to be a bit of a cheap board. Is this in comparison to the bd7II? I am not sure i want to buy this board if it is not a quality product.

Also could someone please confirm how many usb2 ports this board has, is it 2?

Finally, how good quality is the onboard sound and the spdif is an optical connection isnt it?

Thanks for all the help. I am currently 90% for buying this board, just want to check everything is good before spending the $. Thanks to everyone who had more guts than me and went out on a limb to test it.

James

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: JamesC
Thanks everybody for replying to my previous post.
It was actually on this forum that i read that the bg7 appeared to be a bit of a cheap board. Is this in comparison to the bd7II? I am not sure i want to buy this board if it is not a quality product.

Also could someone please confirm how many usb2 ports this board has, is it 2?

Finally, how good quality is the onboard sound and the spdif is an optical connection isnt it?

Thanks for all the help. I am currently 90% for buying this board, just want to check everything is good before spending the $. Thanks to everyone who had more guts than me and went out on a limb to test it.

James

James, I was the one that said the board had a cheap look and feel to it. However, the board itself delivers very well and is a good performer. Infact, I liked it quite a bit more than than bd7-II raid. Right now I'm debating between a Gigabyte 8IGX and an Asus P4B533-V as my next 845G board. I'm still looking for more information on both boards before I commit. If you're intent on the BG7 then you can't go wrong, it's a good board and I recommend it. However, it lacks extras that you may or may not care about.

 

[jaybee]

Can you guys compare the BG7 to the IT7? It looks like one difference is that (afaik) the BG7 has a 4:5 ratio while the IT7 does not. I've got an IT7 in my shopping cart right now but am still considering the BG7. Also, obviously the IT7 has a lot of features the BG7 doesn't.

Thanks
jaybee

 

[5150Joker]

Originally posted by: jaybee
Can you guys compare the BG7 to the IT7? It looks like one difference is that (afaik) the BG7 has a 4:5 ratio while the IT7 does not. I've got an IT7 in my shopping cart right now but am still considering the BG7. Also, obviously the IT7 has a lot of features the BG7 doesn't.

Thanks
jaybee

Well in a nutshell the IT7 has the 845E chipset and does not offer legacy support or the 4:5 divider. However, it does have a ton of usb ports, IEEE 1394A Firewire support, RAID and probably other stuff that I'm forgetting. If you care about features, then IT7 is what you are looking for. If you still like legacy support and an average set of features with good performance (and support for ddr 333) then BG7 is the board you want. If I had to choose between the two, I'd pick BG7 since I like the ddr 333 support and don't really care about legacy free features.

 

[Beatnik]

Well... I got my BG7, and 256MB of Corsair C3000XMSC2.
P4 2.26/533 CPU. Mixed opinions so far.

Performance is very good. It's saying DDR 333 on boot so it looks like
it is automatically picking the 5/4 4:5 ratio. Sandra is approx 2500/2400.
Kicked it up to 150FSB, ran for a little while, but unstable.
At 133FSB with a Ti4400, got about 10400 3DMarks 2001.
At 150FSB I think I was getting around 2700/2600 on Sandra.

Now for the bad news.
The ICH4 gives you IDE that is a bee-yatch to work with. The ABIT
drivers are on CD-ROM. So... I dare you to try install Windows XP Pro.
Makes for a nightmare install. It was truly a challenge to get my Win9X
setup to see those IDE controllers. As for Windows XP Pro, I'm going to
go ahead and use a Promise TX2 and I have that floppy so.

What I'm trying to say here is that ICH4 makes it so that you will have a
hell of a time on a clean install, unless you have floppies. I wonder if
MSI does something different. The Gigabyte board with the new Promise
RAID setup on it would have been perfect for me.

The Realtek LAN seems a bit squirrely too, but I won't rank on that yet.
Let me get rid of Win9X and get to XP Pro, then I'll do another critique.

Pros: much snappier than my old Athlon XP 1600+ Epox 8KHA+ board.
Cons: ICH4 IDE is weird, no drivers on floppies to help with XP install.

 

[Dason]

Now for the bad news.
The ICH4 gives you IDE that is a bee-yatch to work with. The ABIT
drivers are on CD-ROM. So... I dare you to try install Windows XP Pro.
Makes for a nightmare install. It was truly a challenge to get my Win9X
setup to see those IDE controllers. As for Windows XP Pro, I'm going to
go ahead and use a Promise TX2 and I have that floppy so.

I got the BG7 yesterday, and the XP install was clean as can be. I had some trouble tracking down the USB 2.0 drivers, but finally found some linked on Intel's support site. Loving the board overall.

One question I have though about DDR 333 memory. I've got one stick right now, and it auto-detected DDR 333. I've heard that most 845G boards don't support DDR 333 with more than one stick. Anyone prove this wrong? I hope it's wrong....

 

[Beatnik]

Hmmm. Maybe my media or MBR is messed up. I got a kernel panic on the 1st start after the WinXP CD copies files onto the hard disk.

Are you using an 80-pin or a 40-pin IDE cable?
Is your CD-ROM on Channel 2, and HD on Channel 1?
I'm really surprised it went clean for you.

The USB2 driver is on the ABIT site now also. Nice to know. I still don't
see downloads on their site for Realtek and the I845G stuff.

 

[Beatnik]

 

[gmoss]

I have been following this tread with great interest. But I guess I am a little slow. I think the BG7 have the 3/4 and the 4/5 mem. settings at 133 and above. I also gather the BD7II only has the 3/4 mem. setting at 133 and above. Rather supprised to find they have anything above 1/1 at or above 133. One of the things I am interested in is are their DRR333 mem setting (3/4 & 4/5) show at that the standard 133 buss settings or do you have to start doing some minor overclocker. I am interested in running an unoverclocked (or very minor CPU overclocking) but want the Mem bandwith. The BD7II at 133 with 3/4 would only be 7% above DRR333 and would be great for my uses for this box.

In case if you are wondering about mild overclocking. This box is for my wife and I to do video editing on. She who must obeyed does not understand unstable.

Thanks

Gary

 

[5150Joker]

Gary, if you don't plan to go over 133 fsb with your motherboard, then I'd recommend you buy the BD7-II Raid. It has slightly better memory scores than BG7 at 133 fsb with 3:4 enabled. Just make sure you have good memory and you shouldn't have any instability problems. Set your vcore to 5% and memory to 2.7 v to ensure complete stability at 133 fsb since BD7-II Raid does undervolt a bit.

 

[Dason]

Originally posted by: Beatnik
Hmmm. Maybe my media or MBR is messed up. I got a kernel panic on the 1st start after the WinXP CD copies files onto the hard disk.

Are you using an 80-pin or a 40-pin IDE cable?
Is your CD-ROM on Channel 2, and HD on Channel 1?
I'm really surprised it went clean for you.

The USB2 driver is on the ABIT site now also. Nice to know. I still don't
see downloads on their site for Realtek and the I845G stuff.

I have a WD 80 GB drive on channel 1 and a DVD-ROM on channel 2. I'm using the cable that came with the motherboard on my HD. Was that an 80-pin?

I did a clean install to a FAT partition on my HD. I installed from a CDR with the corporate version of XP Pro. No problems with the file copy or any of the setup afterwards, except for my USB stuff not working until I got the USB 2.0 driver. I installed the I845G chipset stuff from the CD that came with the motherboard, then found an updated version on support.intel.com. After that I installed the application accelerator from the CD-ROM. Windows Update had an updated NIC driver. I wasn't overclocked during the install.

Don't know what to tell you....

 

[Beatnik]

Thanks for the moral support. Just gave it one more try, and BHAM!
It's all good now. I think it was either the floppy or the SBLive or extra TX2U133
or something I was doing. This install went super clean.

The IDE detected was the standard. Then after doing the Intel INF update from
the BG7 CDROM it picked up the chipset IDE driver. Simple. The Realtek worked
from the XP Pro install CD as well. So... like you said, totally clean.

It's great to be off Win9X again... this is so much nicer... Thanks again.

 

[Beatnik]

I have a stick of 256MB DDR Corsair CMX256A-3000C2 PC3000 370MHz Cas2 . After reading the PDF at Corsair's site, I see this is a 6ns chip, and that it is tested at 2-3-3. So, I set my "strap" to low (only way I could get 4:3 to show up), and it detected at 2-6-3-3. I had to set my DRAM voltage to 2.8v to get this to run stable. At 2.5v or 2.6v I would get a crash about half way through 3DMark2001SE. Oh well. I guess I can run at high voltage. Here's the numbers for the two tests, one at DDR333, one at DDR354:

P42.26 ABIT BG7 133FSB 333DDR By SPD 2-7-3-3 (MEM2.5v)
3DMark2001SE 10773 3D Marks
Sisoft RAM Int 2564 MB/s
Sisoft RAM Flt 2579 MB/s

P42.26 ABIT BG7 133FSB 354DDR By SPD 2-6-3-3 (MEM2.8v)
3DMark2001SE 10899 3D Marks
Sisoft RAM Int 2729 MB/s
Sisoft RAM Flt 2728 MB/s

 

[NanoMem]

Beatnick, is your first set of scores based on 4:5 ratio and second with 3:4? Just trying to make sure!

I know your scores speak for themselves but which of the two modes, you feel performs best for you? which is more stable? There is a poll in the "Overclocking" forum. Take a look and see how everybody else is doing.

Thanks for your input and congratulations on making it through.