The EPoX 4G4A+ seems very promising.

[gsethi]

Originally posted by: MetroRider
ok guys, here's an update to how my rig here is going:

I have gotten my system stable at 2640 MHz, by using a 165 fsb, with memory settings at 2.5,2,3,5 for 440 DDR

linked below are my wcpuid and sandra screenshots:

WCPUID - 2640 MHz

Sandra Memory - 3405/3404


Now, this is all great, except for one thing which is not letting me finalize this system. I have a Geforce3 Ti200 video card installed in the system, and before I install the Detonator drivers for it, the machine works great, except given for the fact that I am running 800x600 in 16 colors. When I proceed to install the nvidia drivers and then reboot, I cannot get past the Windows 2000 splash screen. The machine will just hang right there. At best, I can get into the desktop, and two seconds later, the screen will freeze with slight image corruption. When the system is set to 100 fsb, for a 1600 MHz stock speed, the Geforce3 works fine.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what could be causing this? Is it the nvidia drivers or the Window 2000 drivers? Maye an IRQ problem? I tried changing some, but it hasnt worked for me yet.

I would appreciate any other tips and ideas.... thanks!

-David

its the Windows 2000 drivers for your video card. I was also having the same problems like you with Windows XP. It used to freeze and do weird things when i was overclocking. I downloaded the latest drivers from nvidia webiste and from then on, i havnt had a single problem with it. It were the the original drivers supplied by Windows for GF3 that were causing the problems. Make sure that in properties, the driver shows up as Nvidia drivers and not Windows drivers.

hope that solves your problem.

 

[MetroRider]

gsethi,

thanks for the input, but i wish that were the case and fix to my problem. It is when I use the nvidia Detonator drivers, that I cannot boot back into Win2k fully. I have tried both the 23.11 and 23.82 drivers. I dont know if it is an IRQ problem, or just this mobo not liking to have its AGP o/c'd. I have now tried both a gefoce3 ti200 and a geforce 3. I may go and try once more with a riva tnt2 Ultra 32mb card, hehe. I may also try out the 1mb trident pci video card i have too, just to see

one note though as mentioned previously, the heatsink on the motherboard gets EXTREMELY hot, and cannot be touched for more than 2 seconds without burning your finger. It definitely needs some sort of ciikubg whether it is via a hs/fan or not.

thanks again...

 

[MetroRider]

Ok, here's another interesting tidbit. I just connected my linux hard-drive to the computer, and it booted up just fine. I am in currently in X-Windows with it, and there have been no problems with it loading it. I am using Red Hat 7.3 for this testing. It picked up everything except the for Realtek Audio card (i guess the drivers for this sound card haven't come out yet).

So i guess that this leads me to believe that there is something weird going inside of Windows 2000. I just might try installing Windows XP to see if it exhibits the same problems.

 

[Sukhoi]

Originally posted by: oldfart
I would say the ATA100 controller will be faster than the ATA133 controller. You can use Intel Application Accelerator IDE drivers with the onboard controller, but not the RAID controller. I run the fastest IDE drive available, the WD 1200JB on the ATA100 controller. It doesn't slow it down a bit.

Any idea how much of a difference the Intel drivers make? Right now I have my HDD on the Promise RAID controller (being used as ATA) on my 8IEXP, but I'll move it over to the ATA100 channel if I can get my DVD-ROM working on the RAID controller.

 

[Sukhoi]

MetroRider, I'm running a GeForce4 Ti 4400 under Win2KPro using the newest nVidia drivers (I'm thinking 29.42 or something like that) just fine. You might want to try newer drivers.

 

[oldfart]

Sukhoi, the IAA drivers speed up my boot time and big games levels load faster. I'm running Win2K. From what I understand, WinXP is not as noticeable. I dont think RAID controllers like ATAPI drives too much.

 

[Sukhoi]

Since in the BIOS I can actually set the RAID controller as ATA, I think there is atleast a chance that my DVD-ROM will work on it. I'll have to try it out next week.

 

[CrazySaint]

Originally posted by: oldfart
I would say the ATA100 controller will be faster than the ATA133 controller. You can use Intel Application Accelerator IDE drivers with the onboard controller, but not the RAID controller. I run the fastest IDE drive available, the WD 1200JB on the ATA100 controller. It doesn't slow it down a bit.

I believe the WDs are actually ATA100 drives. AFAIK, the only ATA133 drives are the Maxtors.

This board looks really nice and I'll probably get it. Some people have mentioned that the NB gets really hot and that there's no thermal paste between the HS and chip. I'll probably at least stick some ASIII on there, but what would it take to put a fan on there? Could I put a regular case fan on it (and if so, what size?) or would I need some sort of special chipset cooler on it?

 

[gsethi]

any fan should be fine. I would definately go with a chipset fan though but you can drill a hole in your case right above it and put a case fan up there.

Right now, i have nothing on it or between it (no AS3) but i will be putting some. I do have good case cooling though. I have 1 intake fan and 2 outlet fans (all sunons) for excellent air flow. Plus there are 2 fans on the PSU. the NB is very near to the CPU and so my CPU fan also helps a bit in cooling the NB. (if you touch the side near the CPU, that side is noticably cooler than the farther side implying that the CPU fan is cooling the NB down a bit)

you will have to glue the fan on the NB heatsink though.......

 

[CrazySaint]

Hmmm...I think I'll just see what it can do with ASIII for now.

Also, (excuse the noob question, but I'm new to the world of P4s), on P4s motherboards read the temp directly off the CPU or do they use socket thermisters?

 

[Ryu]

Hi, i've been following this thread for a while now and wanted to ask all of you a question about this board, at least the one's with a enermax psu.

Whats your +5v rail voltage with the enermax?

I currently have a 8k7a and for some lame reason it doesn't draw power from the +3v rail so all power comes from the 5v. To make a long story short it causes problem for people and especially those with enermax psu for some reason. I just want to know if i can expect the same result this this board also.

 

[ANY2]

I just read on another thread that the 4G4A+ is not a great overclocker.

Now I see that gsethi has his 1.6A overclocked to 2.6 using a 4G4A+ and some Samsung DDR333 RAM.

That is an awesome overclock, considering it is only air-cooled...

I would also like to buy this 4G4A+/1.6A/512MB_Samsung_DDR333 combo. Is that the way to go for O/C that 1.6 to atleast ~2400?

I also noticed that gsethi has a very powerfull PSU, that might be compensating for the lack of the 12V input on the 4G4A+
Am I right? If so, which PSU should I get?

 

[agrall]

Originally posted by: Sukhoi
MetroRider, I'm running a GeForce4 Ti 4400 under Win2KPro using the newest nVidia drivers (I'm thinking 29.42 or something like that) just fine. You might want to try newer drivers.

29.60 are out now...

 

[gsethi]

Originally posted by: ANY2
I just read on another thread that the 4G4A+ is not a great overclocker.

Now I see that gsethi has his 1.6A overclocked to 2.6 using a 4G4A+ and some Samsung DDR333 RAM.

That is an awesome overclock, considering it is only air-cooled...

I would also like to buy this 4G4A+/1.6A/512MB_Samsung_DDR333 combo. Is that the way to go for O/C that 1.6 to atleast ~2400?

I also noticed that gsethi has a very powerfull PSU, that might be compensating for the lack of the 12V input on the 4G4A+
Am I right? If so, which PSU should I get?

Hello, i think that this board is a good overclocker. I am running rock stable for about a week now at 160 FSB. I can do 163 FSB rock stable too and thats with 3:4 memory ratio. I will try once again over this weekend to see if i can go any higher after burning my board.

Regarding the PSU, i am using Antec 400w PSU right now. Its a great PSU and is also very quiet and i love it. you might want to go with atleast 450w-500w if you want to go over 2.6 Ghz. Thats the same i am wondering. I wonder if its my PSU thats holding my back now on higher upgrades by not able to provide enough power ? dont know for sure but go with atleast 400w PSU, i definately recommend atleast 450-500w PSU though.

hope that helps

 

[phillyTIM]

I just got blown away over there at ASUSBOARDS.COM, in my attempt to defend the 4G4A+. I myself love the board, and seeing you guys here overclock it like mad, makes me believe in it, but prometheus over there keeps shooting me down.

http://www.asusboards.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=19035

Well I did the best I could in a hostile situation over there.

 

[gsethi]

Originally posted by: phillyTIM
I just got blown away over there at ASUSBOARDS.COM, in my attempt to defend the 4G4A+. I myself love the board, and seeing you guys here overclock it like mad, makes me believe in it, but prometheus over there keeps shooting me down.

http://www.asusboards.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=19035

Well I did the best I could in a hostile situation over there.

Dont worry, you got cover now (from me)
lets take them down !!!!

 

[MetroRider]

ok, i will try out the latest nvidia drivers. I just downloaded the 29.20 drivers, but will get the 29.60 if i find them. If this does not work, I will either re-install Win2k or just install WinXP to see what happens.

ANY2:
add me to the list of people who will vouch for the 4g4a+ being a great overclocker. I have one upped gsethi by being able to have my p4-1.6a running at 164 fsb stable with my Samsung 333 DDR Ram via the 3:4 ratio for a 440 DDR speed

i will update back to let you know how my results turn out...

 

[DocACE]

Has anyone gotten the EPOX stable with >1 DIMM - say 2 DIMMS

I really want to add 1GB memory if I get this board. I understand then (since the samsung is double sided) I will ONLY be able to
use slots 1 and 2.

 

[CrazySaint]

Btw, I know a lot of people have had positive experiences with refurbs (from places like newegg, mwave), but is there any reason to expect that a refurbed 4G4A+ wouldn't OC as well as retail one?

 

[MetroRider]

ok, another piece to this puzzle...

i have finished installing WinXP Pro, and the setup goes through fine. However, using the built-in XP drivers for the Geforce3, whenever i run either a DirectX game or OpenGL game, it locks up immediately. So i say fine, maybe this is due to not having the latest nVidia drivers. So I proceed to install the latest 29.42 drivers, and upon rebooting of the machine, it freezes once it finishes loading the WinXP splash screen. I get a black screen at the moment my monitor changes resolutions to go into the desktop, but the machine sits right there. So this gives me the same result as I had with the Win2k installation. My only guess now is that there is an IRQ problem somewhere here.

I do not have any pci cards installed in the mobo, but i am using the onboard nic, but have not installed the audio. I am not a master at IRQ device changing and would appreciate any help out there. The only thing which I have read in the mobo's manual is that if I am to set the IRQ's by hand, I have to set it for each and every device out there.

thanks again in advance for the info...

 

[soljahz]

Hey metro i think i had a similiar problem like yours, when i install new drivers for winme and winxp it would just hang when it loads up in black screen. The way that i solved it is not using your rams in the first slot that it doesn't share resources, i had to use the ones that are shared two slots. I have two rams and they don't like each other when i used the two slots that shares.

 

[CTPAX]

Hello everybody!

The problem MetroRider gets is in fact THE PROBLEM of 4g4a+. Im wondering how gsethi gets such high memory speeds. Gsethi, please tell us:
1. In which dimm slot you are running your memory
2. What bios ver do you use
3. Have you tried 3dmark ? Because thats the easiest way to get the agp lockup.
4. Is ur RAM singlesided or doublesided
5. What are your advanced chipset settings?

Im running at the moment a 256MB Kingmax DDR300 stick at DDR402. I tried 256 MB Samsung DDR333, refused to boot Win2k at 402, locked up in 3d mark at 390. That is all on dimm2, on dimm1 and dimm3 i get max DDR360.

I dont think it is a driver problem, i think its more some chipset/video incompatibility problem. Gsethi uses Ti4400 as i recall. Well, i have GF2 GTS Pro, MetroRider tried GF3...

 

[soljahz]

Just incase, I have the geforce 3 and using the the fake samsungs, samsung chips on powmem pcb. Hope they solve that problem quick.

 

[MetroRider]

WOOHOOO!!!

My machine finally boots up into Windows with the 29.42 nvidia drivers with me using a fsb of greater than 122. I switched the ram from DIMM1 and into DIMM2 and running at fsb 150 it loads up just fine. I just did some bench demos of Quake 3, and boy was it fast! Nice to be getting a score of 299 fps

soljahz and CTPAX,
thanks again for your help and advice.

CTPAX:

the comment you make about the nvidia graphics card being a problem, do you think it is only relating to Geforce3's and lower? I ask this because I have a Geforce4 which I am also interested in testing out here. just an idea

 

[NFS4]

Epox 4G4A+ vs Epox 4G4A...any other differences besides lack of NIC & RAID on the latter?