.........MATT P
 

Matt,

Well, I am ready to jump ship and hit that Lan Party Board. I assume this DFI is the correct board, yes?

I just wanted to run a couple of things past you if I may.......

I want to keep the 3 Raptor SATA drives, the SATA DVD drive and my Crucial PC3200 RAM to use with this board.

So, will I:

Be able to use all of these drives on that Board?
Be able to use them as seperate drives (see them as seperate drives in the Bios or in My Computer?)
Can I sue the same RAM? (this is the same recommended RAM in Allen's Sticky post)
Can I use this HUGE Zalman fan? Here it is: Zalman Quiet Heatsink/Fan for Athlon 64?
Can I use the Enermax Power supply I got for the K8V? It is: Enermax EG365P-VE (FMA) 350W PSU?
Also, I have Rosewill ATI Radeon 9600 128mb graphics card...

I am going to order the new Board as soon as I hear from you......

I really, really appreciate you helping me. Thank you so much,

~ J

Re: .........MATT P
 

Hey Joel,

I just got home and most of your questions I can answer off
the top of my head. but the SATA DVD/CDROM I don't know since I don't
have one. I'll try in a little while to simulate one using a SATA/IDE adaptor
on a IDE DVD/CDROM I have laying around. Same with the third SATA Drive.
The Power supply I'll have to check what it is rated at.
The memory I'll have to check but should be good.
The ATI 9600 should be good.
The Fan should be fine. (I haven't run a fan in years)

Let me check a few things out and I'll get back with you.

Matt

Re: .........MATT P
 

That would really, really be great Matt.

The reviews I have read about that board are just phenomonal.


Looking forward to your post...


~ J

Re: .........MATT P
 

Hey Joel,

The fan checks out good togo!
The Power supply should be fine!
(Plenty of amps(26) on the 12v, most important for AMD64's since Vcore come from this.)
The Ram will work and has been used on this board, although I have not seen 1.5G's of it used.
The Crucial Ram timings are pretty slow (3-4-4-7) and this DOES HURT performance.
(I would perfer Ram with better timings (2-2-2-5) Though such as the G.Skil TCCD)
But we can deal with that later.
My tests of SATA connectors worked fine and yes it saw 3 drives and a DVD/CDROM
not as a RAID!!

The one thing about the DFI is that you need to flash for the AMD DTR's
If you get a board from old stock.

I don't see any problems (famous last words)
Matt

Re: .........MATT P
 

Too Cool Matt!


Alright, the board should be here before the weekend. I am glad the drives check out. I had to RMA the existing board. No refund.

I am not sure what DTR is, but if it needs special attention when flashing the bios, I'll pay attention. (can you tell me what that entails?)
May I ask what kind of PTLE results you were getting before OC'ing that bad boy? (not sure you tried that)

Also, are you using processor intensive plugins by chance? I have some amp modelers and the Waves Platinum package, so as a result, I was looking for a processor that would be able to hand me better performance than my last CPU. (Athlon 3000+)

Not sure if you are around Friday night, but I will be putting that bad boy together then. Any things I should do in any special order? I will start with one stick of RAM, one drive, graphics card..etc... and then go from there.

Thanks again for the help and encouragement. I think I need to make a donation to you PayPal!


~J

Re: .........MATT P
 

Hey Joel,

The DTR is the AMD 3400+ mobile chip you have.
We will get to what BIOS you need once we see what your board POST's with.
I did try that for a ref. for Allen and that was 32+22
Yes I use Waves, Amplitube, Guitar Rig, etc....
One of my pervious PTLE system was based on an ABIT NF7-S (nforce-2) with a Mobile Athlon XP2500
OC'ed to 2800MHz and this system smokes it. (now its my cd replicator).
I'll be around Fri and all weekend but I'm under some pretty heavy meds.
I have to take for the next 6 months.Some weeks are better than others.
But will get it together remember what I said patience is the key.
I appreciate the offer for donations.
But I would do this for anyone.
Like I say The Music Is What Is Important.
And if this gets you going then that why I do it.
Let face it Our music is our legacy.
Food for thought.

Matt

Re: .........MATT P
 

You're the man Matt.

I should have the board tomorrow and set up tomorrow night. I'll let you know what I know as soon as I can get to the Bios.

I'll start with one stick 'O RAM, one SATA Drive, a CDROM and Floppy. (Graphics card too, duh)

Thanks again Matt. Please let me know if there is anything I can do to assist you...


~ J

Re: .........MATT P
 

Matt,

I got the DFI board. This thing is SWEET!

Okay, I have the system up and running, but I did not flash the Bios for the 3400+ Mobile. I am not sure if I need to order not.

By install was flawless, but I do have a few Q's.

1. I do not see a place for me to set the Voltage to 1.4 for the CPU
2. HOw do I know if I need to flash the Bios for the 3400+?
3. It (the CPU) is running at about 41C. On the other Mobo, it was running at about 27-28C.
4. Can I tell the system not to look for IDE drives? That might decrease my boot time, eh?


What else can I do to boost performance and lower my CPU temps? Any other tips, hints?

Thanks Matt. I am really glad I got this board!


~ J

Re: .........MATT P
 

Joe,
Congrats on the new setup. If your processor is running at those temps and it is running at normal speeds I'd leave the bios alone unless you run into stability issues. It may already have the most update bios. You should be able to change your boot sequence in the bios. It is usually very easy.
I'm suspecting though if you get lower than expected results on the Davec test that your CPU is defaulting to a lower speed. I would also download Sisoft Sandra and run a diagnostic check on the entire system and then do some CPU performance tests to see how it compares to other processors of the same speed.

Allen

Re: .........MATT P
 

Very Good Allen, I shall download that utility.

I did notice that the CPU posts at 800mhz. The thing is, this is very easy to change in the K8V Bios, but there is literally nothing that obvious in the DFI Ut3 Bios. So, I wonder if flashing the Bios with the 3400 in place may help that. Hell, I don't know.

I am at another computer right now,and I have not looked to see if my Bios version is current.

Guess, I better crawl down into the studio and check it out eh/

So far Allen, this board has been top notch. Man, it is a 'puter geeks dream. Way more than I need, but it recognizes all my drives and RAID is not enabled. I even told the IDE drives to sit down in the back, because the system says they are empty! That means a much faster boot time.

(that was a PC tip/ hint in the latest SOS mag)

Talk to you later.

Joel