*** Official Gigabyte P965-DS3 Thread ***

[Ricochet]

StopSign, I'm curious as to what your bios setting is like. I have the same RAM but couldn't get my overclock to go over 410Mhz. My board is a Rev1, though.

 

[StopSign]

I'll take some pictures of my bios when I get home. I can't remember all the settings off the top of my head. It looks like I have one of the better overclocks on this board considering my memory is nowhere near D9.

PS: I'm not upgrading to F10 until there's confirmation that it fixes the X-Fi problem without degrading overclocks. F7 has treated me well.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

Just to chime in. Bought 2 Rev 1.0 DS3s about 3 weeks ago.
Both had the damned cold boot bug with F8 and F9. Absolutely perfect with F7 (and I'm getting the same overclocks with E6400s - 3.3GHz).

 

[yiranhu]

Can you guys post stuff about stability/overclockability of F10? I'm also going to stick with F7 until absolutely necessary (which looks like never).

 

[yiranhu]

Question about RAID:

I just got a second HD for my computer (identical to first WDC 250 SATA II). I would like to setup RAID 0 for performance. But I have a very well setup windows installation that I do not want to destroy. Is it possible to enable RAID and still not lose the data on my current HD and keep windows working? Doesn't sound very feasible for me... but just in case...

Thanks all

 

[vailr]

Originally posted by: yiranhu
Question about RAID:

I just got a second HD for my computer (identical to first WDC 250 SATA II). I would like to setup RAID 0 for performance. But I have a very well setup windows installation that I do not want to destroy. Is it possible to enable RAID and still not lose the data on my current HD and keep windows working? Doesn't sound very feasible for me... but just in case...

Thanks all

Won't work, probably. I attempted shifting a SATA Raid 0 HD pair from an Intel ICH5R board to the DS3's JMicron Raid controller, and doing so required a complete backup to other drives and re-building the raid array, specifying the partition size, etc.

 

[StopSign]

Originally posted by: ricochet
StopSign, I'm curious as to what your bios setting is like. I have the same RAM but couldn't get my overclock to go over 410Mhz. My board is a Rev1, though.

http://img80.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitled1bg2.jpg

http://img207.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitled1ti1.jpg

http://img209.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0004ba4.jpg

http://img209.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0006ed2.jpg

http://img373.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0007hp7.jpg

http://img412.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0008nk2.jpg

 

[redhawk56]

IMO..........raid on the DS3 or S3 or any of the GB 965P motherboards for that matter is risky. If I dont' miss my guess, that is why my bios recovery could not complete. They dont tell you in the manual anywhere, but the backup bios gets written to the hard drive (boot volume) somewhere and I believe that if you have raid setup it doesn't create the backup bios file at all. If it does manage to create it, it can't find and restore it when it needs to.

Of course there isn't any documentation anywhere to validate my assumption, but I feel very strongly that I am right. I think Gary could probably confirm this with a call to his friends at GB. So be warned if you are going to raid your boot volume, you probably wont have the bios protection that you think you have.

That being said, if you dont have the backup bios and your bios gets corrupted or it cannot recover from an overclock, you will be screwed due to the fact that GB does not allow you to flash the bios outside of the bios maintenance screen after you have already posted or in windows with @bios.

 

[StopSign]

Originally posted by: redhawk56
That being said, if you dont have the backup bios and your bios gets corrupted or it cannot recover from an overclock, you will be screwed do to the fact that GB does not allow you to flash the bios outside of the bios maintenance screen after you have already posted or in windows with @bios.

That's pretty ridiculous...

 

[Ricochet]

Originally posted by: StopSign

Originally posted by: ricochet
StopSign, I'm curious as to what your bios setting is like. I have the same RAM but couldn't get my overclock to go over 410Mhz. My board is a Rev1, though.

http://img80.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitled1bg2.jpg

http://img207.imageshack.us/my.php?image=untitled1ti1.jpg

http://img209.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0004ba4.jpg

http://img209.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0006ed2.jpg

http://img373.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0007hp7.jpg

http://img412.imageshack.us/my.php?image=dscf0008nk2.jpg

Thanks a lot. I'm impressed that you got such an overclock with the CPU Vcore lower than default.

 

[yiranhu]

Originally posted by: StopSign

Originally posted by: redhawk56
That being said, if you dont have the backup bios and your bios gets corrupted or it cannot recover from an overclock, you will be screwed do to the fact that GB does not allow you to flash the bios outside of the bios maintenance screen after you have already posted or in windows with @bios.

That's pretty ridiculous...

Say I take this risk. Can I do the following:
1. Use Acronis to make an image of my two logical drives and store them on a USB HD.
2. Setup RAID in bios to do RAID 0.
3. Repartition the combined 500 GB RAID partition into what I want.
4. Image my backup partitions onto the new partitions.

Question: Will windows start? Right now my drives are both on the Gigabyte SATA controllers, running in SATA mode.

 

[Tates]

Originally posted by: yiranhu

Originally posted by: StopSign

Originally posted by: redhawk56
That being said, if you dont have the backup bios and your bios gets corrupted or it cannot recover from an overclock, you will be screwed do to the fact that GB does not allow you to flash the bios outside of the bios maintenance screen after you have already posted or in windows with @bios.

That's pretty ridiculous...

Say I take this risk. Can I do the following:
1. Use Acronis to make an image of my two logical drives and store them on a USB HD.
2. Setup RAID in bios to do RAID 0.
3. Repartition the combined 500 GB RAID partition into what I want.
4. Image my backup partitions onto the new partitions.

Question: Will windows start? Right now my drives are both on the Gigabyte SATA controllers, running in SATA mode.

I think you can just run the SATA/Raid driver in wondows and it should build the raid volume in windows. After rebooting, set BIOS to RAID and voila.

 

[StopSign]

That I don't know. I've never used RAID before.

 

[yiranhu]

Well wouldn't the partitions get messed up?

I'm trying to do RAID 0, so the computer has to think of my 2*250 HDs to be one 500 HD.

 

[vailr]

Originally posted by: redhawk56
IMO..........raid on the DS3 or S3 or any of the GB 965P motherboards for that matter is risky. If I dont' miss my guess, that is why my bios recovery could not complete. They dont tell you in the manual anywhere, but the backup bios gets written to the hard drive (boot volume) somewhere and I believe that .....

So: how to explain the location of the "backup bios" on a new-from-factory board?
The correct answer is: they place both the "in use" bios and the "backup bios" on the same CMOS flash memory chip. It's twice the capacity of a "normal" (replacable type) CMOS chip.

 

[Conky]

Originally posted by: yiranhu
Can you guys post stuff about stability/overclockability of F10? I'm also going to stick with F7 until absolutely necessary (which looks like never).

I too have been wondering about the new F10 bios. And, like you, I have no intention of moving off of the F7 unless something else is proven to be better. I have a stable overclock with no reboot issues although I do not do "nosebleed" overclocks... 3.2Ghz stable is enough for me.

And yet, I would like to hear more F10 experiences. F10 link for the adventurous

 

[audscott]

Originally posted by: Beachboy

Originally posted by: yiranhu
Can you guys post stuff about stability/overclockability of F10? I'm also going to stick with F7 until absolutely necessary (which looks like never).

I too have been wondering about the new F10 bios. And, like you, I have no intention of moving off of the F7 unless something else is proven to be better. I have a stable overclock with no reboot issues although I do not do "nosebleed" overclocks... 3.2Ghz stable is enough for me.

And yet, I would like to hear more F10 experiences. F10 link for the adventurous

I was a bit bored tonight, so I updated BIOS to F10 from F6 on my R2 DS3: I've tried all the others with lackluster results except F6, which has allowed me max OC of 485, 1:1, 5, 5, 5, 15 with memory VMEM at +.4: always stable, 24/7 or off at night. No cold boot or unusual behavior.

Running Vista RC2, BTY.

Just flashed like 10 minutes ago, so can't comment on stability, but I'm running 495 now, which I had never been able to boot into - although I had to crank VMEM to +.5. Temps (memory diode) are right in line with +.4 on F6.

I'll post some screen links later if anyone's interested. My 6300 has always run at 1.325 - set manually.

For me, F10 is looking like a great release out of Gigabyte.

By the way: Maybe my imagination (playin' 'round with meeee) but it "seems" really snappy: boot, loading GUI and apps response.

Fun anyway I look at it (al long as no BSD).

 

[Conky]

Originally posted by: audscott

Originally posted by: Beachboy

Originally posted by: yiranhu
Can you guys post stuff about stability/overclockability of F10? I'm also going to stick with F7 until absolutely necessary (which looks like never).

I too have been wondering about the new F10 bios. And, like you, I have no intention of moving off of the F7 unless something else is proven to be better. I have a stable overclock with no reboot issues although I do not do "nosebleed" overclocks... 3.2Ghz stable is enough for me.

And yet, I would like to hear more F10 experiences. F10 link for the adventurous

I was a bit bored tonight, so I updated BIOS to F10 from F6 on my R2 DS3: I've tried all the others with lackluster results except F6, which has allowed me max OC of 485, 1:1, 5, 5, 5, 15 with memory VMEM at +.4: always stable, 24/7 or off at night. No cold boot or unusual behavior.

Running Vista RC2, BTY.

Just flashed like 10 minutes ago, so can't comment on stability, but I'm running 495 now, which I had never been able to boot into - although I had to crank VMEM to +.5. Temps (memory diode) are right in line with +.4 on F6.

I'll post some screen links later if anyone's interested. My 6300 has always run at 1.325 - set manually.

For me, F10 is looking like a great release out of Gigabyte.

By the way: Maybe my imagination (playin' 'round with meeee) but it "seems" really snappy: boot, loading GUI and apps response.

Fun anyway I look at it (al long as no BSD).

Coolness. Glad to see it working out for you.

 

[redhawk56]

Originally posted by: vailr

Originally posted by: redhawk56
IMO..........raid on the DS3 or S3 or any of the GB 965P motherboards for that matter is risky. If I dont' miss my guess, that is why my bios recovery could not complete. They dont tell you in the manual anywhere, but the backup bios gets written to the hard drive (boot volume) somewhere and I believe that .....

So: how to explain the location of the "backup bios" on a new-from-factory board?
The correct answer is: they place both the "in use" bios and the "backup bios" on the same CMOS flash memory chip. It's twice the capacity of a "normal" (replacable type) CMOS chip.

Can you be more clear please? Are you saying that I am incorrect?

I did see a message on the screen that said "searching for bios image on hard drive" both times this happened.

 

[StopSign]

Originally posted by: audscott
I was a bit bored tonight, so I updated BIOS to F10 from F6 on my R2 DS3: I've tried all the others with lackluster results except F6, which has allowed me max OC of 485, 1:1, 5, 5, 5, 15 with memory VMEM at +.4: always stable, 24/7 or off at night. No cold boot or unusual behavior.

Running Vista RC2, BTY.

Just flashed like 10 minutes ago, so can't comment on stability, but I'm running 495 now, which I had never been able to boot into - although I had to crank VMEM to +.5. Temps (memory diode) are right in line with +.4 on F6.

I'll post some screen links later if anyone's interested. My 6300 has always run at 1.325 - set manually.

For me, F10 is looking like a great release out of Gigabyte.

By the way: Maybe my imagination (playin' 'round with meeee) but it "seems" really snappy: boot, loading GUI and apps response.

Fun anyway I look at it (al long as no BSD).

I'm gonna do some more research on F10 to try and find out if it fixes the X-Fi issues or not. If it does, it sure sounds like a winner.

 

[MichaelD]

Does anyone else find it funny that Gigabyte took forever to move from F7 to F8, then they released F9 and F10 within just a few weeks of each other?

To my eyes, that means that F8/F9 were buggy and they found out after the fact.

Not complaining, just pointing out the obvious I guess.

My Rev 1.0 came with F4; I flashed to F7 right away and it's been perfect. Interestingly, CPU-Z shows that I have the F4 bios. So does SANDRA. Weird.

I have no issues at all; happily at 3.2GHz with my E6400 at a nice, normal 8x400. Everything in sync, no cold/warm boot issues at all.

I had read that the JMicron raid chip was a bit buggy and that F8 and later fixed that, but I don't have any drives on it, so I don't care. Still have two SATA ports open on the Intel controller.

No intentions of flashing to F10 anytime soon. Maybe after a few weeks and I see what issues, if any, crop up b/c of F10.

 

[ThePiston]

quick F10 update - the ram timings are gone in F10 and replaced by 2 options - option 1 for ram running <1000Mhz and option 2 for ram running >1000Mhz. I could get my FSB a little higher than with F7-F9 at 465 (could have gone higher but still do not have good cooling). My pseudo-top speed really didn't change much with any config (~3.4Ghz) and I still got the cold boot problem - really badly too. Last night I booted up and checked email at 7X465 with everything mostly at stock (ram at 2.1 and cpu at 1.40) but then i rebooted and had to back it way down to boot again. I left it at 8X410 which was really stable at night and tried to boot in the morning - it went through 20 on/off cycles before I finally had to clear CMOS. Bottom line: F10 suffers from same cold boot issue and you can't fine-tune ram.

 

[mcurphy]

Edit

Do these boards still have the issue where if the RAM voltage is not at 1.8v the board won't boot and you have to install one stick and change the settings? Or has this since been corrected in a BIOS update?

Using: Corsair XMS2 PC6400 (2 x 1GB) in an S3 / E6600 build.

I appologize if this question has been repeated very often. I couldn't find an immediate answer throuh the last 10 or so pages of this thread. And we all know how useful the search function is these days

 

[StopSign]

I'm not sure if it was ever "fixed" or not but my RAM is rated at 2.1 and I booted with two sticks at 1.8 when I first put my system together.

Originally posted by: ThePiston
quick F10 update - the ram timings are gone in F10 and replaced by 2 options - option 1 for ram running <1000Mhz and option 2 for ram running >1000Mhz. I could get my FSB a little higher than with F7-F9 at 465 (could have gone higher but still do not have good cooling). My pseudo-top speed really didn't change much with any config (~3.4Ghz) and I still got the cold boot problem - really badly too. Last night I booted up and checked email at 7X465 with everything mostly at stock (ram at 2.1 and cpu at 1.40) but then i rebooted and had to back it way down to boot again. I left it at 8X410 which was really stable at night and tried to boot in the morning - it went threw 20 on/off cycles before I finally had to clear CMOS. Bottom line: F10 suffers from same cold boot issue and you can't fine-tune ram.

That pretty much answers my questions about F10...

 

[MichaelD]

Originally posted by: StopSign
I'm not sure if it was ever "fixed" or not but my RAM is rated at 2.1 and I booted with two sticks at 1.8 when I first put my system together.

Originally posted by: ThePiston
quick F10 update - the ram timings are gone in F10 and replaced by 2 options - option 1 for ram running <1000Mhz and option 2 for ram running >1000Mhz. I could get my FSB a little higher than with F7-F9 at 465 (could have gone higher but still do not have good cooling). My pseudo-top speed really didn't change much with any config (~3.4Ghz) and I still got the cold boot problem - really badly too. Last night I booted up and checked email at 7X465 with everything mostly at stock (ram at 2.1 and cpu at 1.40) but then i rebooted and had to back it way down to boot again. I left it at 8X410 which was really stable at night and tried to boot in the morning - it went threw 20 on/off cycles before I finally had to clear CMOS. Bottom line: F10 suffers from same cold boot issue and you can't fine-tune ram.

That pretty much answers my questions about F10...

Yep. Me too.

/holds down Shift, right clicks downloaded D10 bios, clicks Delete