6800GT + NF3 = Problems :(

[gorby]

Hey guys,

I recently bought bits to put together a 939 NF3 system.

I have a Manchester X2 3800

BH5 (2226)

DFI lanparty ut nf3 939

seasonic psu

galaxy G-force 6800gt

HDA-Mystique sound card.

Im loving this system, it really flys *but*, (and its a big b sadly) there seem to be some serious gfx issues. I seem to have fallen victim to the 6800gt + NF3 AGP fastwrites bugs

Googleing for similar phrases brings up lots of threads all over the web relateing to this combo of hardware and the problems that go with it.

If any one has any experienced the same problems and could be of assistance, a happy gamer would I be.

Ill list the problems and what I have tried:

(Clean build XP32 no OC)

With fast writes / sideband addressing enabled in bios D3D games normally stay up for around 10 mins before freezing occurs. (some game engine consoles (serious sam 2) list the device as 'restarting' If ur unlucky its bluescren time. Other symptoms are tearing artifacts etc...

I have improved the situation by doing the following:

disabling fastwrites / sideband in bios and using riva tuner to force these settings.

trying a million different revisions of the nforce / nvidia video drivers. (atm im on the latest beta from guru3d. It seems the best and im able to play BF2 with them for + 30mins!)

Uninstalling nvidia GART drivers,. (This improves stability dramatically but naturally after deleteing ur OS's agp drivers things take a massive performance hit)

adjusting my AGP / PCI latency with a tweak tool.

Flashing the card memory to 1.4 V

Undeclocking the card from 370 core to 350 core. (Its a galaxy with an nv silencer.)

The only thing i haven't tried which some people say really helps is using XP64. Im kind of loathed to do this however as there are no (good) drivers for my sound card.

Btw, card and mem were working fine in an intel 875 system.

Any thoughts =/

-thoughts today:

Perhaps caused inadvertantly by throttleing? Try hard setting 2d / 3d clocks in card bios later...

 

[maverik-sg1]

mmmmmmmmmmmm

Sounds like a right weird one. Although one thing I could suggest is that I was told never to disable the fastwrite/SBA in the cards BIOS and just to use Riva to force them off.

I really don't know enough about the issue you have right now to advise anything else,perhaps a BIOS update from DFI or a modded BIOS from a DFI expert solves the issue?

Mav

 

[fatty]

I remember back in the day there was a punkbuster issue with the nvidia cards and nforce 3 mobo's but I am not sure if yours is the same issue???

Does it freeze and bsod in all games and benchmarks??

 

[gorby]

Here is a link to a thread where the problem is detailed @ hardforum

Then @ nvnews

Both threads have +100 posts and have been going strong for over a year

For clarification, I have not altered the card bios fastwrite / sideband, only the system bios.

mmmmmmmmmmmm

perhaps a BIOS update from DFI or a modded BIOS from a DFI expert solves the issue?

Mav

who can i tap up for one of these- just get in contact with dfi support? or is there some dark corner of the net where they like to hang out?

I remember back in the day there was a punkbuster issue with the nvidia cards and nforce 3 mobo's but I am not sure if yours is the same issue???

Does it freeze and bsod in all games and benchmarks??

All D3D games seem to suffer the worst, game engines handdle thr prob differently though. Worst case scenario is BSOD with problem being reported as anything from IRQ not >=, kernel page error,. BF2 simply drops me back the menu, Serious sam 2 freezes for a few seconds (reporting d3d device restart in console). After the fisrt freeze its generally a good idea to get out of the game beacuse i know the big crash is comming I didnt want to try until the system was good, but WOW also died after running for 1/2 an hour or so

Havent run many bench's although aqua mark was fine.

Does any one have any experiance running 32 bit linux on a 64 bit chip? I was thinking of finding some way to initiate a 'fastwrites test' in linux, but then thought it wont be a meaninful test unless I : A: Replicate the problem in xp64 B: Get linux to run on an amd64 in 32 bit mode.

 

[gorby]

a frustraighted update

I got really anoyed last night :$

I lost 250 quid playing poker.

I then attempted to install XP64, didnt update my raid floppy and had windows

right over my raid with its atapi drivers. niceone mike!

then, without a windows box i attempted to download the raid disk from dfi.com. IT uses linux unfriendly zipped .exe files (they are normal zips but with extra info about paths etc) DD would create the floppy but the image length was always wrong so windows would not read the floppy.

I said to myself: Ok, ill get up early, use my housemates win box to make the disk, do the initial build b4 work, leave it attached to my dns and do the rest via vnc during the day.

I woke up @ 7:00 turned off my alarm in my sleep and was an hour late for work. nice one gorby!

Ill whack my xp64 results in this part of the thread later:- hopefully

cest la vis

 

[maverik-sg1]

Get the BIOS from www.dfi-street.com Gorby mate, might be the answer not sure?

Maybe try a different BIOS in your GPU?

Mav

 

[gorby]

(31/01/06) Good ideas. - thx

I found another sata today @ wrk, so ill re-do my images on seperate disks....

(1/02/06)Installed XP64 last night, sadly same issues - Happily XP64 is cool! I had a big grin on my face when i changed from "new start bar" to "classic style" : Never seen explorer / the registery be pulled about so fast!

I have started a thread on dfi-steet

I couldnt find an obvious bios that addressed these issues so ive asked for help there. Ill also try a few differnet GPU bios's tonight.

 

[gorby]

update...

Installed XP64 last night, sadly same issues - Happily XP64 is cool! I had a big grin on my face when i changed from "new start bar" to "classic style" : Never seen explorer / the registery be pulled about so fast!

I have started a thread on dfi-steet

I couldnt find an obvious bios that addressed these issues so ive asked for help there.

I tried a bios from the tmods cd (82) and my sata went nuts, and my screen started moveing around. (no, really) Im trying the video card ones now...

 

[gorby]

from bad to worse

meh, I installed a new bios from dfi street and the system has been degradeing ever since.. not sure if its related though...

I managed to get an old bios back on (and have since tried several different media types to flash the bios with) currently useing the 6 version from the dfi site. Here is my plethora of prolems;

HD's arent detected in any config (sata raid /ide)

some times the time from powering up until the intial post screen is displayed is very long.

Normally the system wont survive 4 consecuative reboots, after that i have to reset the cmos.

Not a very positive experiance for my 1st a64 system.

I bought the chip from a local retailer so i have the option to swap that, ill give it a try.

tbh I think its the board, there are so many people out there that have had a nightmare with it. Annoyingly i have bought this board from a retailer who often takes +10 days to even look at ur rma. My options are running out though, there doesnt seem to be many 939 nf3 boards around now... (and no other variants from this particular retailer.) So no gameing for me for another week or so prob, its been around 7 months now

/me makes sad tombone noises.

 

[maverik-sg1]

Gorby mate - If you can return it, swap it for and ASRock skt939 it does AGP or PCI-E graphics and is a solid platform (Volt mods available too - see thickbrit if required).

Much more stable system than the current one - just sorry your experience has not been pleasant - you perseveranc above and beyond the call of duty is commendable though

Mav

 

[boardy]

Gorby if you can hold on about a week mate, you can buy my AsRock ULi board off me It's the PCI-x / AGP one and I have to say I've been bloody impressed, it's just not got the clocking options I personally want.

As soon as I get the SLI-DR off Mav I can send this one your way if you would like it?

Boardy

 

[gorby]

oooo silver lineing!

Cool cool cool!

When you say its lacking the clocking options you want, im presumeing thats +300 fsb stuff? Im only going after a small air clock, (with a thermalright + tornado + reohstat) and some bh5. One nice thing about dfi board is it has the option for 3.2 vdimm without a mod. I measured it though and it was more like 3.0/1.

If you think this epox has got options for me there then id love to take it of yas! This one? It looks crazy!

On a positive note id never flashed my 6800gt until now. Until my system went belly up it was running opengl stuff with the ultra bios on it without skipping a beat

-Thx guys!

 

[boardy]

Thats the one mate

It will OC on air well enough, just doesnt have enough play for phase without vmodding cos I want very high voltage to keep my BH5 happy @ high FSB (i want 3.5-3.7v), and also lacks SLI which I need.

The great thing about the AsRock board I have, is that it can take PCI-x and AGP at the same time so you could have the latest PCI-x card and AMD64 without upgrading the mobo, or just stick to AGP, it's a great board lol.

I should be getting my board very soon, so I will keep this one for you and send you a PM later in the week when I have the DFI.

Cheers

Boardy

 

[gorby]

sounds awesom im up for that. Your a hero! my bh5 needs the juice too, so i guess ill either v mod or or get hold of some cheapish tccd.

edit: done a forum trawl on this board and it looks like it should be really good fun Seen the vmods, 3 options, the vr one seems dooable