Installing AB9 Pro

[Hidden Hippo]

Memory is specced for 1.9-2.0V. At the moment I'm running it at 1.95V at 533MHz. I think that the motherboard just doesn't like having anything other than a 1:1 ratio between CPU and RAM. I'll stick with this until something sorts it out (hopefully) but I'm happy with it.

[Isy]

Pressure is now on abit to provide a better solution. The Abit pro board has fallen into the same category as the rest of the new conroe boards.

[ABIT Sean]

Believe me when I say lots of people are working on this problem, and I hope we have a better response from our new conroe board. The AW9 series is being released soon.

[Isy]

Can we get some more info on the AW9?

[ABIT Sean]

All the info is on the abit site.


http://www.abit.com.tw/page/uk/mothe...775&DEFTITLE=Y

[DKViper]

Well,

After all I managed to boot with the G.Skill memory in Dual channel mode, but only at DDR2-600 speed. The solution (if you can call it a solution) was to select bootstrap CPU as FSB1066 and select DDR2-800 as the memory speed. With my Pentium D 830 CPU I can go to around 216 MHz, which is much lower than I've been able to on another board. So my guess is that problem lies with the motherboard/ram combination. I am considering to go for Corsair ram instead, perhaps even the 6400 C3 ones.

Regards

[Norphy]

I've just bought an AB9 Pro. I found getting Windows on it a little bit of a chore as every time I tried to install it, it got as far as saying "Setup is starting Windows" and then bluescreen. I then noticed that the PATA port was hanging off a third party controller and suddenly it all clicked.

It was nice of Abit to include floppy driver disks for the RAID controllers but it would have been nice if there was a piece of paper in the package to say "The JMicron RAID/SATA controller driver must be installed during Windows Setup if you want to use a CD-ROM drive on the IDE Port" or something similar.

The positioning of the IDE port is a bit daft as well. It is impossible for me to install 2 optical drives as the IDE cable just isn't long enough to get round the graphics card and into the second drive. I don't even have a very big case.

Otherwise, so far so good.

[ABIT Sean]

Intel decided that the 965 chipset wouldn't need an IDE controller? So ABIT had to put a IDE controller chip onboard, and unfortunately there limited options on where it could be placed. I think Intel are going to start doing this with all there future chipsets.

[Hidden Hippo]

Well, I just bit the bullet and got an SATA DVDRW. Samsung make one which you can buy for about £25 now so it's no more expensive than the IDE one I was going to get. Plus it means I can have some nice small cables instead of the large ribbons which are used for IDE.

[Supershanks]

@Hidden Hippo - Sorry 2 hear of your problems. Like many am following conroe builds trying to find out best components (mobo & memory). Had been looking at the g-skill memory myself , which are you using there are a few varieties G-Skill DDR2 6400 kits

[Hidden Hippo]

I'm using the NR stuff, with the green heatspreaders. Even with the RAM trouble, the rig still runs everything at full with high framerates.

[DKViper]

I have finally got hold of 2 Gigs or Corsair ram and to those who want to know: It does make all the difference.

At the moment I am running with an FSB of 1,333 (4x333) and the memory speed at PC800, which equals to DDR2-1000 with latencies set at 4-4-4-12. To run stably the DDR2 Voltage is set at 2.1V, which is the rated voltage for these rams, but you still have to set the voltage manually. I have also had to increase the Vcore from 1.3250 to 1.3750. What I find really interesting is that the chipset/motherboard run at a speed of 500 Mhz with no problems. I haven't had to increase the chipset voltage or find another cooling solution. The uguru tells me that the system temperature is 35 Centigrades at a 100 pct load using only air.

Even if I am running succesfully with these Corsair rams it could still be said that the motherboard ought to have run without problems, using the G.skill rams or perhaps you really get what you pay for.

Best regards

[Supershanks]

DKViper that's good news what 2 Gigs or Corsair ram are you running. Corsair XMS2: Xtreme Performance DDR2 Memory there's a few sets

luck

[DKViper]

I'm using the TWIN2X2048-6400C3 to be precise. The SPD of these rams are programmed so that they work after having cleared cmos, which will bring you back to 1.8 Volts. The first thing to remember is to change the DDR2 Voltage to 2.1 or 2.2 Volts. I chose the low latency version, because I think lower latencies are more important than higher frequency.

Best Regards

[Supershanks]

DKViper,
thanks 4 feedback, am speccing out conroe build & like always it's the memory that taking the time to source. Yours look the business TWIN2X2048-6400C3 but are £328.99 are probably around a £100 over my budget There is quiet a gap between those & the C4 which are £187.99 (OCUK) Which i guess reflects the yield of course. Does the EPP work with the 965 chipset/abit implementation, i've seen it as a feature on the nvidia 590. Ths development of a decent bios for these boards seems to be part of the issue Abit AB9-Pro: Mainstream P965 - Overclocking

thanks again for feedback
luck

[DKViper]

I think EPP is really a great feature, but only nVidia chipsets supports it at this point. With these Corsair sticks it is, however, very easy. After having increased the voltage to 2.1V I can simply set the latencies to the lowest values 3-3-3-9 @ DDR2-6400 speed. I have, though, increased the FSB to 333x4 and the memory now runs at 4-4-4-12 @ DDR2-8000 still with a voltage of 2.1V. Sandra says that my memory bandwidth is now 6740 MB/s, which is a decent number, I reckon. I might try to overclock further later on, but what originally attracted me to Intel Core processors was the low wattage and low noise.

Best regards