** Official EPoX 9NDA3+ Thread ** S939

[Denithor]

Question for the 9NDA3+ users out there: does anyone know if I will be able to attach my SATA drive to the 1/2 ports while using a Radeon 9800 Pro with a VGA Silencer on it?

Thanks!

Edit: after further reading, I hit upon the right-angle SATA connector cable idea. Can anyone vouch for whether these actually work, especially with the card/cooler I have? Note that I only need to connect one SATA drive for this system (250Gb Seagate 7200.8).

 

[pnb263]

Any suggestions for the BEST CPU for this board? I have the board already and will be putting in an ATI AIW 9800. I also need some suggestions for RAM for this board.

This machine will be used exclusively for encoding dvd compliant video, so stability (with overclock) is a must. other than that, just the fastest chip I can cram into here... (mind you it will be the stock bios as i have no other CPU to put in to flash the bios with...

Thanks

 

[MoboMojo]

Finally installed the board today......powers up fine, except that the power LED on the case won't light. I've swapped the power and HDD LED connectors to the case to confirm that the case light is OK (it is), so it looks like the mobo isn't applying power to the power LED connector. Anybody else have any problems with the power LED?? Any fix? I'd hate to RMA the board over something like this.

 

[markiemrboo]

For people with the serious undervolting (voltage drops around 0.8v when idle), if you're comfortable with a soldering iron it can be fixed. I've done it myself and now get a nice steady 0.02v flucuation all around

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?p=646544

OCCT vcore graph
http://img284.echo.cx/img284/6744/2005033122h08voltcore5fo.gif

It does seem like the image showing how to do the mod is broken though. If it doesn't reappear, I may know someone, from another forum, who could take pictures of the area. Mine is glued down and I don't really feel like trying to peel it all back off ( and possibly ruining the whole thing )

 

[FruitGull]

Does this board currently (with the latest BIOS) work with 4 512meg DDR modules? Am going to use a Venice cpu. If yes: Are there any problems when going beyond 400mhz on the RAMS?

Thx

 

[blues02]

ok, I just got one of these yesterday and I have a problem.

I installed my other components and installed windows. When I installed the chipset drivers it rebooted the system. Now it boots to a dos screen with three options, to make floppies for the RAID or to boot to a command prompt. I don't have a raid, just a single ATA133 drive.

 

[MoboMojo]

Originally posted by: blues02
ok, I just got one of these yesterday and I have a problem.

I installed my other components and installed windows. When I installed the chipset drivers it rebooted the system. Now it boots to a dos screen with three options, to make floppies for the RAID or to boot to a command prompt. I don't have a raid, just a single ATA133 drive.

Err....take the Epox software CD out of the CD/DVD drive when you reboot and that should take care of it.

 

[m1ndh4ck]

Hi, i have a big problem with my epox 9nda3+. It conceirns the RAM.

Until a few days ago, i ran my OCZ PE rev 1 @ 200 mhz, 3:2 divider, 2-3-2-5 timings, 2.6 V. I have a very OC-able 3000+ , which is able to run 300 x 9 @ 1.5 V

Since these babies would'nt overclock very much i decided it's time for a memory upgrade for a much needed improvement in performance.

I went for the Corsair 4400c25 Platinum (2x 512), which run 2.5-4-4-8 by SPD. Oh well, at least in theory. The mobo would post, windows began to load, but upon entering it, the system rebooted. I tried all sort of voltages, timings & 1T / 2T, but the damn thing wouldn't load windows. Oh, i forgot, these things were pretested & ran 2.5-3-3-7 dual-channel @ DDR 602, 2.7 V.

When i took one module out, everything went perfect, i even reached DDR606 @ 2.5-4-3-7, memtest & windows (prime 95 blend) stable.

Thing is the best i could achieve in dual-channel, 1T, was 2.5-4-4-8 @ 200 mhz

Not the performance increase i'd hoped for, that's for sure.

Ok, so i replaced them with some corsair twinx 3200c2pt, which did (PRETESTED) ddr 610 dual-channel, at 2.75 V, memtest & win stable. These things have TCC5 chips on'em.

Tried them out, 215 mhz 2-2-2-5 @ 2.6 v, no problem. DDR 240 mhz , 2.5-4-3-7, memtest & windows stable. Then i got kinda lazy, and did'nt go into windows anymore. I just checked them with memtest (at higher and higher frequences)

I got to 290 mhz memtest stable, would'n go any higher. But when i tried to run windows... oh my god, they gave error after error.

The highest frequency that is windows stable (prime blend) is 240 mhz 2.5-4-4-8, a far cry from the ddr610.

I'm getting kinda desperate, and i have no clue why this is happening.

Let me tell you you the test setups.

No. 1 is my computer and No. 2 is my computer with another mainboard (on which the RAM was pretested). i just cannot comprehend what is going wrong with my board

No. 1 :

a64 winnie CBBHD 3000+ @ zalman 7700 CNPS al-cu
epox 9nda3+ / April Bios / passive chipset cooling ; active cooling on the ram
powerstream 520 W
80 gig WD
GF 6800GT

No. 2 : Abit AN8 (nforce 4)

Please, if you have any suggestions, please share them (replies like "Get a new board" will be ignored ).

Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post.

 

[Setoman]

I have EPOX 9NDA3J NF3 Ultra motherboard and AMD 64 3000+ 939 and I have 1 problem. I cant set ram frequency higher than 166. I have 2 different 512mb rams (ddr400) on slot 3 and 4 but they run only at speed 166mhz (cpuz says 164,4).
I changed Max memclock in bios to 200mhz but it doeasn change anything.
Here is screenshot from cpuz:
CLICK

I tought that problem is in timings becose of this ram wich should have slower timings at 200mhz as you see here: CLIK and I changed timings in bios to these values and frequency is still the same.

How can I set my ram to run at 200mhz speed?
Plz help

 

[alexandreBR]

have you tried to clear the CMOS? Try that... maybe it can solve your problem...

also, try to test other memory sticks on your mobo, just like OCZ or CORSAIR ones.

 

[Setoman]

Hm I didnt tryed to clear the CMOS becose I dont know how and I dont like to do it becose I dont want to broke up something. It is better I dont risk.

Tomorrow I will try to take out 1 ram or change it with another 1 but I dont have any OCZ or CORSAIR. I have some "usual" ram sticks but they are 400ddr so they should work on at least 200mhz with no problem.

Today I tryed to change ram settings with nTune so I run autotune and it set 175mhz. When I set it higher manualy, my comp freezes and I have to restart.

More I am looking settings from other people with simmilar computer, more angry I am. Some are running ram on their mainboards around 250-300mhz but I cant set it above 175. This is sad.

So plz if anyone has an idea, help me.
tnx

 

[m1ndh4ck]

Yeah, thanks for the replies

Another thing that bugs me. I can't manage to remove the chipset cooler (it's heatsink actually) - got me a zalman passive cooler ...

If anyone did it, i'd love some pointers. 10x

 

[m1ndh4ck]

Oh come on, a little help here ...

 

[Setoman]

I solved my problem with changing 1 of my ram sticks, now it works fine on 200mhz.

 

[arswihart]

m1ndh4ck - you have to use needle nose pliers or something to squeeze the clamps on the back of the mobo that hold the heatsink down, but those aren't really holding it down that much because it's glued on with thermal paste. You just have to wiggle and pull it off, you won't hurt anything. It is a pain getting the paste adequately removed though so look forward to that

 

[m1ndh4ck]

I did manage to remove those push-pins before i posted my previous message, just can't unglue the heatsink from the chipset. I thought you'd have better ideas than me (i wiggled the damn thing for like 10 minutes and it didn't budge)

If i pull harder are you sure the heatsink won't come off with the chipset attached to it ?

 

[arswihart]

yeah just put more power into twisting and pulling, you'll get it

but with such a grip, i'd just leave it on and unplug the fan, i don't think you'll run into any problems unless you've already half way pulled it off

 

[m1ndh4ck]

The fan is unplugged (even physically removed), but i just got a zalman passive chipset cooler and i really wanna use it.

I'll try to remove the darned heatsink (again) in a few moments. If i don't reply within 10 minutes say i prayer for my mobo

 

[pnb263]

Well, I am back again, and using this board (finally). I was able to POST/boot/install windows/run prime95 stable at 300x9 out of the box. I am using the XP-120 for the HS and a panaflo 115cfm fan. The CPU is know is good since it does all this at stock (undervolted) volts, and has been idling at 32C with a full load of 41C.

My only complaint is the memory. I dont know if it is the mem that is slowing the computer down and not letting me go higher, or if it is the CPU that wont go any more.

I have tried to go over the 300 mark that i set when i first booted the thing up, but it wont do it. every time i go to 301 or higher, it simply fails to POST or boot into windows.

The mem timings are already relaxed about as far as the board will take them, and I have tried to bump the voltages up on the CPU/Chipset/RAM with no success.

Any suggestions or help for my cause? I would like to hit at least 2800 if not 3000 by the end of June. i would prefer not to have to go to water cooling for such a feat as I think that the CPU can do it on air from what I have seen of its performance thus far.

thanks for any help/suggestions in advance.

oh, btw: the mem is running at 192Mhz right now (not even 200) and it is unstable when i try to tighten the mem timings down any...The mem is generic OCZ PC3200 with copper heat spreader.

 

[THESANTINI]

have these issues been addressed?
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2253&p=13