MSI 745 Ultra Feels Sluggish

[Jonny M]

I accept this may be a symptom of the SiS chipset, but my sister has an MSI 745 Ultra with 256MB of PC2700 (Samsung), and even on a fresh XP install the system feels sluggish. For example, clicking to load IE from the quick launch menu, the icon stays depressed and the system pauses for about a second until the window loads. The rest of the system is an XP1900+ Pally, D-Link 10/100 network card, ELSA GF2MX and IBM 60GB hard drive (the GXP120 verison I think).

Any idea / BIOS optomisations for this particular board?

Cheers

[Austin]

MSI 745 Ultra is based on the SiS745 chipset which snapped at the heels of VIA KT333 and nForce1 for quite a while. Being SiS it lacked any real o/c'ing or tweaking features ... that's what made VIA so popular (and unstable). Anyway SiS745 was designed for 266FSB only ... just like KT333 and nForce1 were, it was essentially just SiS735 but with the ability to run the RAM faster than the FSB as was seen with the KT333. However the KT333 gained 5% perf from running async (266FSB with DDR333-PC2700) but SiS was actually 5%ish SLOWER than using 266FSB+DDR266(PC2100). If you're running async drop the RAM speed back down to sync (1:1, PC2100, equal to FSB etc) and you should find because it is mroe capable RAM than PC2100 it will handle tighter RAM timings for a few more % on top (if you bother).

256MB is still more than enough for most home users, if using Win9x be sure to manually tweak Windows as anything more than 192MB gets a little mis-managed, XP no tweaking req'd. XP1900+ is still VERY fast, being Pally it does run hot and doesn't o/c but other than that it is a fine CPU. The 60GB may be 5400rpm and may not even be 2MB, that may make it seem a little sluggish, be sure to run Scandisk and Defrag at least monthly and be sure to use the latest mobo drivers and peferaby BIOS (UDMA mode is very important). Only other thing would be the GF2MX, for basic gaming that is okay but considering how much GF4MX (or better still Rad8500-9200 or GF-FX5200) are going for (< £50) it makes sense to upgrade if gaming is at all important ... should see a little improvement in 2D too. Lastly, latest drivers for all the hw is generally best, check both manu (eg Gigabyte) and chipset (eg nVidia) websites.

[Austin]

You should also check that there's at least 2GB free, preferably more otherwise once again things will grind to a halt. Additionally ensure the swap file has a fixed minimum size (256MB minimum IMHO) and is in one continuous block, IIRC WinXP does this automatically for you. To do it manually you simply defrag, disable virtual memory (swap file) ensuring you have enough to load Windows, restart, defrag and then reenable the swapfile setting the minimum size (256MB for example).

Another factor in HD perf is the file system used. FAT32 is still very cmmon and is the most compatible, but it gets very wasteful and cumbersome over 32GB ... if using WinXP (and not dual booting) it's certainly best to use NTFS or else split your HD up in to partitions of 32GB or less. Many people like to keep their OS on a smaller partition but I think it just adds to headaches. Finally you can check that an ATA66-133 cable is used otherwise you're stuck to ATA33 maximum and also that your IDE devices are managed well (in terms of Primary/Secondary and Master/Slave). Any devices that are likely to be used simultaneously (HD & CDRW most common) should be on seperate channels (not Master Slave together).

[jon bda]

Built a system for a friend the other day using one of these boards. Damn thing wouldn't even run with generic RAM in it...

[Jonny M]

Thanks Austin, I'll look into the FSB. It's running XP Pro with 256MB of Samsung PC2700. Any ideas what sort of timings to select? And also in the box above the RAM timings there's things like "Safe, Normal, Fast, Turbo". What do those do, and it is worth fiddling with them?

Thanks

[Austin]

Ensure the RAM is running at FSB speed only (ie PC2100, 1:1, 3:3, synced or disable FSB+33 etc). You should then find a good 5% improvement in speed, you could then try faster RAM timings but gains are often very small for the time it takes and the trouble it can cause. However since it is branded PC2700 it shoud run very happily with pretty tight timings at PC2100 speed (266mhz). Terminology varies by mobo but generally CL (Cas Latency) is the most crucial one, basically this along with RAS-to-CAS, TRP, Strobes are all faster when set lower as it reduces the delay for the RAM to refresh. Other good settings are to disable RAM/gfx caches/shadows, use 4 banked mode and possibly try Command T1 (vs T2). Experiment but really stress that system to ensure it really is 100% stable. For an easier life you can just set 'SPD' which will automatically set these things for you and should realise PC2700 @ PC2100 can run with pretty fast timings, otherwise simply try the Normal, Fast, Turbo which again do the same sort of thing automatically for you, Turbo should be fine.

[Jonny M]

Tried your suggestions. What exactly does cacheing/shadowing do? I heard that it improves performance (although we are talking SiS here )

Thanks

[Austin]

Basically hang overs from the days of DOS, they use little resources but are completely pointless in modern PC's and can even lead to instability. Do note CPU caches are good (very good), leave those enabled for sure!