INTERACT FORUM
Devices => PC's and Other Hardware => Topic started by: MrC on April 18, 2012, 11:57:04 am
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If this is easy to reproduce, could you see if it lists the faulting module?
I'd really like to get this sorted.
Me too, but...
My PC died this morning after 4 years or so of service. My guesses are in this order: Motherboard's SATA controller, power supply. It started out with a disk read problem (my nightly backup disk), which I believe is an SATA controller issue and the disk is fine. The system now attempts to power-up, fans start, but it clicks off and tries again. I'm spending a few minutes thinking about how I want to solve this and move on to the next system. I was hoping to build an Ivy Bridge system...
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I was hoping to build an Ivy Bridge system...
You can.
The boards are out now, and they run Sandy Bridge processors fine. Build a Ivy Bridge system and run it with the cheapest SB CPU you can find until Ivy ships (or just wait, but that might be tough).
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You can.
The boards are out now, and they run Sandy Bridge processors fine. Build a Ivy Bridge system and run it with the cheapest SB CPU you can find until Ivy ships (or just wait, but that might be tough).
Thanks. I had just finished reading the Anandtech article and then read your post. That's probably what I'll do. I don't do this often enough; its always a chore of comparisons, reviews, spreadsheets and then holding my breath.
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I don't do this often enough; its always a chore of comparisons, reviews, spreadsheets and then holding my breath.
I know just what you mean! :P I'm looking at my computer spreadsheet right now, figuring out which parts I can recycle into the new IB machine.
FWIW, I'm going with this mATX board; based initially on a suggestion from Nevcairiel, and then my own review. I'm taking it over the cheaper alternative due to increased power management capability in this board.
ASUS P8Z77-M PRO LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 Micro ATX with DIGI+VRM, Lucid Virtu MVP, USB BIOS Flashback
About $160 at Newegg
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The boards are out now, and they run Sandy Bridge processors fine. Build a Ivy Bridge system and run it with the cheapest SB CPU you can find until Ivy ships (or just wait, but that might be tough).
First Ivys start shipping next week, unless Intel changed their mind.
Not much of a wait.
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First Ivys start shipping next week, unless Intel changed their mind.
Not much of a wait.
We'll see what they ship.
I've read it'll be June before most parts ship in volume, and they expect OEMs to eat up initial supplies of many parts. If all you can get is low-end dual-core parts, then it would probably be better to go with a (cheaper) Sandy Bridge now and wait six months.
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Have you checked the BIOS RAM battery? 4 years is about as much as you can expect from one. Not sure whether that could account for the disc problem.
Nick.
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I've read it'll be June before most parts ship in volume, and they expect OEMs to eat up initial supplies of many parts. If all you can get is low-end dual-core parts, then it would probably be better to go with a (cheaper) Sandy Bridge now and wait six months.
Actually, the low-end doesn't ship before "Holiday 2012"
First batch is the i7's and the higher i5's. Not the typical CPUs to be used by OEMs.
They actually want OEMs to use all the remaining SNB stock. Anyway.
I fully expect to get one of them as soon as they launch. Even when supplys aren't all that huge, a dedicated person can usually get one. ;)
I managed to get a GTX 680 pretty easily (could get another one now too), yet i see plenty people complain how its impossible, calling it a paper launch. :p
Where there is a will, there is a way. ;D
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I'm trying to decide if it's worth upgrading from a 2600k.
It's fun to have a toy, but since I don't use the GPU, it's a little hard to justify.
I bet somebody sets the JRMark record (http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=54396.msg483213#msg483213) with an Ivy.
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I'm not upgrading my 2600k, i would agree its not worth it.
But i'm finally replacing my old and half-broken-and-patched-back-together HTPC.
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Have you checked the BIOS RAM battery? 4 years is about as much as you can expect from one. Not sure whether that could account for the disc problem.
Thanks. Yes, its providing 3.25v. I've torn down the system, tested all outputs on the PSU, and they function correctly under load. With the PSU connected to the MB and a fan, the MB w/out memory fails to provide even the missing-memory beep. CMOS clearing has no affect. The system is old enough now that its not worth spending more time/energy trying to determine if it is the MB or the CPU.
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Actually, the low-end doesn't ship before "Holiday 2012"
First batch is the i7's and the higher i5's. Not the typical CPUs to be used by OEMs.
They actually want OEMs to use all the remaining SNB stock. Anyway.
That's what I've read too, but it's all rumors till it hits Newegg.
If they ship in suffiicient volume to avoid price gouging it'll be fine (which will be the case if they're lying about process problems and this is really a stock-clearing delay due to poorer than expected Ultrabook sales over the holidays).
If it is really process/yield issues like the TSMC stuff, then we could see some post-launch supply problems and price spikes.
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PS. And there's one high volume OEM that's been waiting to launch new products that uses all i5s and i7s that is willing and able to suck up large amounts of supply....
We'll see. Certainly worth waiting till next week, but also good to have a backup plan.
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I am using a Abacus, it's kind of slow.
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Quality From KingSparta!! :D :D
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So, they're launching Ivy today (Monday, 4/23). Reports are (http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/22/2967995/intel-ivy-bridge-dual-core-ultrabook-spring-announcement) that they intend to deliver "50 percent more units available in the first six months". However, Electronista notes (http://www.electronista.com/articles/12/04/22/intel.kicks.off.22nm.chip.line.in.earnest/):
Although Intel has promised to accommodate demand for Ivy Bridge, it may see early constraints. Its processor refresh for 2012 comes almost five months later than for Sandy Bridge in 2011 and has seen multiple manufacturers hold off on major PC revisions, including HP, Lenovo, and Samsung, until they could get the faster components. Apple is believed to be waiting on a slew of desktop and notebook updates and issued a rare second yearly round of MacBook Pro updates last fall to make sure the lineup remained relevant for the several months leading up to Ivy Bridge.
Anandtech and Tech Report don't have their reviews up yet, but I'd expect Anand's (at least) any time now. Also not showing on Newegg. But, if you're ready to buy, you might want to go for it quickly, just to be sure.
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I'm going to wait for now.
But Ivy is looking good for a HTPC upgrade for me in the next month or two (time to shift that Q9550 elsewhere and finally enable ROHQ for all my media upstairs).
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If everything goes well, i'll go pick up my i7-3770 after work. :)
More importantly, i hope the new IVB Ultrabooks from ASUS are coming out soon, too!
Edit:
Just got confirmation its sitting there waiting for me to pick it up, today is HTPC assemble day! ;D
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If everything goes well, i'll go pick up my i7-3770 after work. :)
Nice! Have fun with that!
Apparently, the NDA expires at noon today (not sure what time zone). I'd read previously 4/29 was the date (Fudzilla though, so you have to take that with a whole salt shaker), so I guess either he was wrong or they moved it up.
Still nothing on Newegg...
PS. What board did you go with? I'm thinking the ASUS boards look like the best options because they're the only ones who seem capable of designing a EFI BIOS that isn't crap. Gigabyte has made strides with their EFI implementations this gen, but they're still laggy and have poor fan controls, and the board choices I've seen from them are weird. If I jump in, that'll be the first ASUS board I've bought since my A8R32-MVP (an AMD socket 939 board, I've been all Gigabyte since then).
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Ivy Bridge review:
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/features/pc-upgrades/3352693/intel-ivy-bridge-processors-tested/
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Thread on AVSForum:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1404371
Not necessarily reliable yet.
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PS. What board did you go with? I'm thinking the ASUS boards look like the best options because they're the only ones who seem capable of designing a EFI BIOS that isn't crap. Gigabyte has made strides with their EFI implementations this gen, but they're still laggy and have poor fan controls, and the board choices I've seen from them are weird. If I jump in, that'll be the first ASUS board I've bought since my A8R32-MVP (an AMD socket 939 board, I've been all Gigabyte since then).
After my Gigabyte board failed (s775) and 3 troublesome Asus boards to follow, I went with MSI for my i7 (2600k). Seriously, one of the best boards I've ever had in every respect and personally I think the EFI is actually pretty good even though the mouse is still useless lol.
I guess everyone has his own experiences but for me, I used to exclusively get Asus boards until last year that is.
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More on Ivy Bridge at TheVerge:
http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/23/2967686/intel-launches-22nm-ivy-bridge-processors
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After my Gigabyte board failed (s775) and 3 troublesome Asus boards to follow, I went with MSI for my i7 (2600k).
I've had a few troublesome Asus boards (including that RD580 board I mentioned above), but most have been okay. The best boards I've ever owned were my two different ASUS A7N8X boards (one of which is still running today with a Barton chip).
The worst board I ever owned happened to be a MSI. Wow, that thing was f.l.a.k.e.y. But things happen. All of my Gigabyte boards have been solid, but this gen I think I'm going ASUS, unless they rev them again before I jump in.
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Anand does now have their reviews (http://www.anandtech.com/show/5771/the-intel-ivy-bridge-core-i7-3770k-review) up, including one focused on HTPC use (http://www.anandtech.com/show/5773/intels-ivy-bridge-an-htpc-perspective) which should be an interesting read.
As does TR (http://techreport.com/articles.x/22835), which is always a good read.
Still nothing on Newegg.
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PS. What board did you go with? I'm thinking the ASUS boards look like the best options because they're the only ones who seem capable of designing a EFI BIOS that isn't crap. Gigabyte has made strides with their EFI implementations this gen, but they're still laggy and have poor fan controls, and the board choices I've seen from them are weird. If I jump in, that'll be the first ASUS board I've bought since my A8R32-MVP (an AMD socket 939 board, I've been all Gigabyte since then).
I got me a ASUS P8Z77-M PRO.
Finished assembling the hardware now, in the process of building a Win7 USB Install stick thingy.
So far, it looks very shiny!
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I got me a ASUS P8Z77-M PRO.
That actually looks like one of the best of the bunch. Why do none of the reasonably priced ATX boards have eSATA on the backplane, ASUS??
Does that board have the Thunderbolt header? That's one of the biggest reasons I'm likely to go ASUS this round. Also, how is the clearance around the CPU socket? I'll need to throw my Noctua cooler on whatever I get, and it can block the DIMM slots on tightly packed motherboards. Since my HTPC case accepts full-sized ATX (and it might as well, since I'm going to stuff three hard drives and a 11" video card in there), I'll probably go with one of those.
But the ASUS P8Z77-V and the ASUS P8Z77-V PRO don't have eSATA which is annoying. I can use one of the add-in brackets, I suppose, but that's annoying. Not as annoying as having to go all the way up to the ASUS P8Z77-V DELUXE to get them though.
The Deluxe looks nice though... I just know I won't use most of that stuff. Hmmmm.... Well, I'm in no hurry.
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The worst board I ever owned happened to be a MSI. Wow, that thing was f.l.a.k.e.y.
Hahaha you're just saying that to tick me off ;D
Nah I believe you. They did make some crap in the past which is why I never bought one before.
And I'm sure all the new Asus boards are top notch too, I just had some bad luck with them. They wouldn't overclock 1 bit, were very picky on memory configuration/type (the last one took me actually an entire week to get stable memory configuration) and another one board wouldn't work in AHCI mode, my SSD kept dissapearing and woudn't be detected after a crash until I wiped the first few sectors of it. I had to do that each time. Weird stuff I tell ya. I eventually settled for regular IDE mode on that one.
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Does that board have the Thunderbolt header? That's one of the biggest reasons I'm likely to go ASUS this round. Also, how is the clearance around the CPU socket? I'll need to throw my Noctua cooler on whatever I get, and it can block the DIMM slots on tightly packed motherboards.
I have an Noctua NH-U12P and it fit just fine with the RAM and all.
This model does not have the Thunderbolt Header, not that i'll miss it.
The P8Z77-V Pro and Delux do, however, if you want fullsized.
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Oh yeah... While it is nowhere near as cool as a new Ivy, I did install my new OCZ Vertex 3 240GB drive in my HTPC yesterday (Sandforce based sync flash SSD). Fast, and more importantly, silent.
And, now that they've finally straightened out the firmware on the Sandforce controllers, they're worth owning. Plus, probably somewhat because of the black eye they got from the BSOD stuff, I got a great deal for less than $1/GB, so.... I figured it was worth a shot. I'm running it with:
1. Vertex as the C (system) drive - most applications are there.
2. WD Black 750GB as the U (users) drive - most of my user-documents are there, along with Program Files directories for some big applications and older games (mostly Adobe CS, which is huge).
3. WD Green 1.5TB as the R (recovery) drive - backs up both of the other drives with Acronis.
The U drive is LOUD. As soon as spinning disk prices fall a tad more, I'm going to grab a 1TB Spinpoint F3, or maybe a 1TB WD Black if they've come down in price. I don't really need the capacity, but the higher platter density of the newer drives will perform better, and hopefully they'll be less noisy with fewer platters.
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Finished assembling the hardware now, in the process of building a Win7 USB Install stick thingy.
Now this just plain ticks me off. I'm still waiting for the darned truck. :-)
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The P8Z77-V Pro and Delux do, however, if you want fullsized.
The "vanilla" -V (non-Pro) has it too.
I have some Thunderbolt stuff since I have a Sandy Bridge Macbook Pro, so it'd be convenient to be able to use those devices elsewhere in a pinch. There's some really slick Thunderbolt stuff coming out now.
For example, I'm getting one of these (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/842013-REG/Blackmagic_Design_BINTSSHU_THBOLT_Intensity_Shuttle_with_Thunderbolt.html) as soon as it ships (already pre-ordered).
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I have two U12P's (one the SE model, one the older "vanilla" one), but neither fit in my Lian-Li HTPC case. Instead, for the HTPC, I have a NH-C12P (I actually can't remember if it is the SE14 version or not, I'll have to look).
I love it. It cools great and it is silent, but it is a little tight over the RAM DIMMs. I'll just have to wait for them to list compatibility on their site, or get out the measuring tape.
EDIT: Should have checked. Noctua already has all of those boards listed in their compatibility lists. Looks fine.
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Is that RAM with heatsinks? If so, remove them and create yourself some more space in that already tight spot. They are BS anyways and some even cause the chips to get hotter than without the heatsinks. Does void warranty though.
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Is that RAM with heatsinks? If so, remove them and create yourself some more space in that already tight spot. They are BS anyways and some even cause the chips to get hotter than without the heatsinks. Does void warranty though.
That's what I'd do if I had to, but usually it isn't too hard to find ones that fit with the C12P, as long as the DIMM slots aren't packed right up against the CPU socket. The bigger problem is always the coolers on the VRMs. Voiding the warranty on $40 DIMMs is one thing (though I'd prefer not to do that either, as they all have lifetime warranties now), but voiding it on a brand-new $200+ motherboard is another thing entirely.
But, it was really all worry for nothing... The Noctua compatibility guide just has a happy green checkmark for all of the ASUS Z77 boards. That means the VRMs and socket clearance isn't an issue, which leaves you with just the regular DIMM height requirements, which isn't a huge issue (44mm clearance).
PS. I do have to remove the cooler (which means pulling the board out entirely) to change the DIMMs though, which is annoying. But that was the only solution that worked for a HTPC case my wife liked, which I liked too, and which would fit my video cards. Some of the big-honking Silverstone ones have the clearance for the tower-style coolers, but they're like $300+ and they're huge with LCD screens and other crap I don't want.
The Lian Li is a great case, and the C12P is a great cooler. (BTW: I checked, and I did get the fancy 140mm version.)
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Apparently, the NDA expires at noon today (not sure what time zone). I'd read previously 4/29 was the date (Fudzilla though, so you have to take that with a whole salt shaker), so I guess either he was wrong or they moved it up.
Ahhh... I see.
Today was NDA day, but expected retail (Newegg) availability is 4/29 or later. Intel just says "this month" (which usually means the last day).
So, if your wallet is on fire, your best bet is probably to have a good shop nearby and see if they have any in stock (ala Nev). I've read that lots of Microcenters and Fry's have had them in the back room for a week now, but that could be all talk and rumors.
No wide availability on launch day? Looking like the supply might be tight at first... :-\
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I called Micro Center. They said they didn't have any and didn't know when they would.
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babgvant has a review on his missingremote.com site:
http://www.missingremote.com/review/intel-core-i7-3770k-ivy-bridge-cpu-and-dz77ga-70k-motherboard
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I bet somebody sets the JRMark record (http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=54396.msg483213#msg483213) with an Ivy.
=== Running Benchmarks (please do not interrupt) ===
Running 'Math' benchmark...
Single-threaded integer math... 3.525 seconds
Single-threaded floating point math... 2.348 seconds
Multi-threaded integer math... 1.119 seconds
Multi-threaded mixed math... 0.761 seconds
Score: 2451
Running 'Image' benchmark...
Image creation / destruction... 0.771 seconds
Flood filling... 0.394 seconds
Direct copying... 0.619 seconds
Small renders... 1.147 seconds
Bilinear rendering... 0.885 seconds
Bicubic rendering... 0.763 seconds
Score: 4804
Running 'Database' benchmark...
Create database... 0.396 seconds
Populate database... 1.392 seconds
Save database... 0.247 seconds
Reload database... 0.035 seconds
Search database... 0.957 seconds
Sort database... 0.976 seconds
Group database... 0.628 seconds
Score: 4644
JRMark (version 17.0.133): 3966
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I was thinking about just pulling my i7 2600K out of the Shuttle HTPC (needs a BIOS upgrade) for a i7-3770 as I do use the iGPU and was hoping that the new 4000 would give me the option to use multi tap scalers in madVR without dropping frames but...this review indicates it still may stuggle http://www.anandtech.com/show/5773/intels-ivy-bridge-an-htpc-perspective
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I was thinking about just pulling my i7 2600K out of the Shuttle HTPC (needs a BIOS upgrade) for a i7-3770 as I do use the iGPU and was hoping that the new 4000 would give me the option to use multi tap scalers in madVR without dropping frames but...this review indicates it still may stuggle http://www.anandtech.com/show/5773/intels-ivy-bridge-an-htpc-perspective
yes, just a bit disappointing.
I'm looking forward to seeing nevcairiel's JRMark with an overclocked i7-3770 and the GTX680!
That has to be one serious speed deamon!
SBR
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If you go Ivy are you going to change you NIC?
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If you go Ivy are you going to change you NIC?
Unlikely to go for Ivy until I need a second HTPC, by which stage Haswell will probably be the one to go for. I've just upgraded my case to Full height (and full ATX capable!), so next purchase will probably be a passive Kepler card (or one with a quiet fan).
Choice of NIC was a bit dumb in terms of longevity, I do agree! I'll stick with it for posterity - I've grown to kinda like it!
SBR
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I'm looking forward to seeing nevcairiel's JRMark with an overclocked i7-3770 and the GTX680!
My 3770 is in the HTPC, no GTX680. Also, its the 3770, no "k", so no OC'ing
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I was thinking about just pulling my i7 2600K out of the Shuttle HTPC (needs a BIOS upgrade) for a i7-3770 as I do use the iGPU and was hoping that the new 4000 would give me the option to use multi tap scalers in madVR without dropping frames but...this review indicates it still may stuggle http://www.anandtech.com/show/5773/intels-ivy-bridge-an-htpc-perspective
What settings do you want to use? I've had really good results with anything that I'd actually use as long as FSE is enabled.
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I get great results using as long as I use non-tap scalers (eg Mitchell-Netravali) to prevent dropping frames (render queue issues) on 1080/50i/p or 60i material. I was thinking that the upgrade would let me use tap based scalers as well (but MV looks good to my eyes anyway).
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I get great results using as long as I use non-tap scalers (eg Mitchell-Netravali) to prevent dropping frames (render queue issues) on 1080/50i/p or 60i material. I was thinking that the upgrade would let me use tap based scalers as well (but MV looks good to my eyes anyway).
http://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-Zn7gXhukj8o/T5aiDPrCA8I/AAAAAAAAGoQ/Yb_io4qeN9o/s400/hd4000madvr1080p44FSE.jpg[/img]]https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/c9RBuxnmgknPq0iU1S8t1fMdRiUGIz_nlfA0ZRMkejg?feat=directlink(http://lh5.googleusercontent.com/-Zn7gXhukj8o/T5aiDPrCA8I/AAAAAAAAGoQ/Yb_io4qeN9o/s400/hd4000madvr1080p44FSE.jpg) (https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/c9RBuxnmgknPq0iU1S8t1fMdRiUGIz_nlfA0ZRMkejg?feat=directlink[img)
1080p60
Lanczos (4 tap) / Lanczos (4 tap)
FSE mode
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I get really confused with such MadVR stats. It reports a frame drop every 7s and yet none are visible or appear in the counter! I guess it is because VideoClock is active. It's a pretty big discrepancy between the media framerate and display framerate. I noticed this in the Anandtech review too. I guess Intel still have some clock tweaking to do!
SBR
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I get really confused with such MadVR stats. It reports a frame drop every 7s and yet none are visible or appear in the counter! I guess it is because VideoClock is active. It's a pretty big discrepancy between the media framerate and display framerate. I noticed this in the Anandtech review too. I guess Intel still have some clock tweaking to do!
SBR
Don't read too much into the screenshot. I took it on a PC monitor (@60Hz) using MPC-HC :)
The important thing is how many frames were dropped/delayed due to madVR processing.
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...
For example, I'm getting one of these (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/842013-REG/Blackmagic_Design_BINTSSHU_THBOLT_Intensity_Shuttle_with_Thunderbolt.html) as soon as it ships (already pre-ordered).
That's a pretty darn cool looking piece of hardware :)
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That's a pretty darn cool looking piece of hardware :)
It really is.
I already have one of the PCIe versions now (a bit older and less capable, but essentially the same thing). It is ultra-reliable and captures beautiful video (makes my HD-PVR look like VHS by comparison).
I'm quite excited that I'll be able to do the same thing with my laptop now. There is also a USB3 version now shipping, but it requires USB3 level bandwidth, so no running it on a USB2 port, or sharing the USB3 hub with a hard drive or anything like that.
Blackmagic Design knows what's what.
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Don't read too much into the screenshot. I took it on a PC monitor (@60Hz) using MPC-HC :)
The important thing is how many frames were dropped/delayed due to madVR processing.
Wow thanks for testing, looks good! ......so it may be worth the upgrade & great timing Shuttle just released the BIOS upgrade adding IVB support on my model but (and there is always a but), It was marked for "Rev 2 Motherboards Only" and after checking guess what I have! Rev 1 - so I'm now waiting for a response from Tech Support to see if I can even support these CPUs
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So I appear to be up and running w/a cheap i5-2500K, awaiting IVB to arrive at Newegg. This will do for now...
=== Running Benchmarks (please do not interrupt) ===
Running 'Math' benchmark...
Single-threaded integer math... 3.690 seconds
Single-threaded floating point math... 2.439 seconds
Multi-threaded integer math... 1.931 seconds
Multi-threaded mixed math... 1.235 seconds
Score: 2044
Running 'Image' benchmark...
Image creation / destruction... 0.800 seconds
Flood filling... 0.383 seconds
Direct copying... 0.606 seconds
Small renders... 1.244 seconds
Bilinear rendering... 0.852 seconds
Bicubic rendering... 0.730 seconds
Score: 4768
Running 'Database' benchmark...
Create database... 0.392 seconds
Populate database... 1.202 seconds
Save database... 0.151 seconds
Reload database... 0.033 seconds
Search database... 1.058 seconds
Sort database... 1.016 seconds
Group database... 0.713 seconds
Score: 4709
JRMark (version 17.0.134): 3840
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Here's an article with a nice set of links to sites covering Ivy Bridge:
http://www.cpu-world.com/news_2012/2012042702_Ivy_Bridge_Performance_and_Overclocking_Overview.html
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Wow thanks for testing, looks good! ......so it may be worth the upgrade & great timing Shuttle just released the BIOS upgrade adding IVB support on my model but (and there is always a but), It was marked for "Rev 2 Motherboards Only" and after checking guess what I have! Rev 1 - so I'm now waiting for a response from Tech Support to see if I can even support these CPUs
Of course the answer from Tech Support was "no" :(
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jmone - you are having a rough week. Here's hoping next week will be a better one, and that your database recovery will be a full one.
JimH's post in another thread suggested that IVB chips were available, so I checked Newegg this morning, and sure enough, they were listed. I ordered the i7-3770K, which should arrive on Wed / Thur.
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Thanks - I'll figure I will just wait to Haswell (if I got the codename right)
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Man.... I think you guys jinxed me or something. I think I'm getting an Ivy sooner than I'd thought, but replacing the "wrong" machine.
My server machine died last night. I'm pretty sure it is the CPU...
[Saga]
It has been acting up on me for the past month or so, but it seemed quite random. It would be fine all day doing its thing, recording TV and acting as a server. But when I would come home and use it at night, I was having some instability. It wouldn't bluescreen, but the video was just going black suddenly and the system's fans would all run full tilt. Nothing of relevance was showing when in the system logs. But, it typically only manifested when I was using a full screen VM, in MC's Theater View, or playing a 3D game. But it also seemed to be "getting worse". A month or two ago, the first I saw it happen, it happened once and then not again for a week or two. This week, it has been pretty much any time I did anything "demanding" with the machine though (though it did manage to survive a 2.5 hour run of Prime95 last weekend). And then, Wednesday night it did it when I wasn't doing anything fancy, just at the desktop in Firefox (on Interact, I suspect).
So for a while, I was convinced it was either my video card or my power supply. After this week and the really bad behavior, I was more suspicious of the power supply, but also having a bit of worry about the CPU. I actually brought home a replacement video card this weekend, and I was planning to swap both and test. I'd fiddled with the drivers enough that I was pretty darn sure they weren't at fault.
Then, last night I got home a bit late and put the baby to bed and came down to the living room to watch TV. I got about 5 minutes into an episode of The Daily Show, and it just froze. MC was still responding (at first), I could seek and switch out of Full Screen, but the show stopped playing and eventually MC itself locked up. Walked downstairs and the sever had a Kernel Stack Inpage Error (blue screen). Ooh, hadn't seen any of those before. Rebooted, it came back up okay, and then my wife came home and wanted to watch a show. So I didn't have time to mess with it. We got almost through one hour long episode of something, and it happened again (different bluescreen this time). So we managed to finish the show and when I put her to bed, I came down to figure out what was going on.
Now, a little background. When I first got this machine, I had it overclocked to 4.0GHz. It was rock-solid stable at that speed (could Prime95 for 24 hours straight, and run a wide array of GPU tests/game benchmarks), but it was slightly over-volted. It ran that way fine for about a year. Then, I started to notice some slight oddness, and I ran additional stability tests and found problems. So, I pulled out my notes on the system and found the speed I'd tested at stock voltage that was rock-solid stable and dropped back to that (3.75 GHz) and dropped back to stock vcore. Unfortunately, I found I couldn't get it stable at that speed and vcore. In fact, I found I had to go way back to 3.0-3.1 at stock vcore to get it as stable as I like. But, with (as before) my slight voltage bump, 3.70-3.8GHz was perfectly fine as best as I could tell. Worrying, but whatever, so I did that.
And, until about a month or two ago, it had been fine at those settings (I'd been testing it fairly regularly).
So, until last night, I had still been still more suspicious of the GPU than anything else. The server doesn't do a lot of gaming or anything, so it was an older AMD 5770, and they ran hot, so it seemed like I might be getting up against the end of its useful life. And that whole "screens going black thing, no error in the logs" seemed like a GPU crash or a driver crash (maybe power supply supplying flaky power to the GPU). But these new bluescreens, and the crash just at the desktop with Firefox open, were much more worrying. So, the first thing I did was run Prime95 on it to just kind of beat on it a bit while I said goodnight to my wife and cleaned up the disaster zone the child creates.
I came back down to check on it after about an hour, and she was locked right up solid. No mouse movement, and the Process Explorer CPU history graph on screen was locked right up. Bummer. Shut her off and rebooted. I decided to go into the BIOS and just reset back to the defaults. I'd already (when the trouble really started) pulled the CPU back to 3.2GHz, but I didn't mess with anything else. I figured I'd shoot back to the defaults, and then tweak things one at a time. I wanted to test with the CPU back at stock everything before I started testing the GPU and the power supply and everything. So, load optimized defaults, go in and turn off the stupid graphics overlay and enable the right settings for my hard drives (or else Windows won't boot) and reboot.
And that was all she wrote. Never came back alive, never passed POST again. I tried, of course, everything from resetting the CMOS/pulling the battery, to removing all the add-in cards, trying not one but two different GPUs and Power Supplies. Trying different RAM sticks and no RAM sticks at all (trying to get a no-RAM POST error beep code). Nada. Bupkus.
[/Saga]
So here's what I think happened... My CPU was burning out, slowly, probably from the over-volting, but maybe from heat? I don't remember the exact amount I bumped up on the vcore now without looking, but I was well below what people regularly report online, only a tiny couple of notches. I'm pretty conservative. But, I don't monitor the heat as well as I should. I have a very nice cooler, but the temps in the summer time in the basement can sometimes get pretty oppressive and I don't check it well then (and I think it was hot when I had those first problems way back in the day). In any case, here near the end of the death process, I'm thinking it was my over-volting that was even allowing it to POST. Once I reset the board back to defaults, it was no longer over-volting (except the little bit the board does in Auto-Mode), and so it won't POST (so I can't get it up long enough to get into the BIOS to tell it to over-volt again). And, of course, we don't have DIP switches on the boards anymore, or complex jumper settings.
But... It could be, almost as likely, part of the power supply circuitry on the motherboard. I don't think so. I looked at it for busted caps and things like that, and found nothing. No burning smell, and the BIOS had acted fine when I had used it the past few times. And the system seems to be trying to boot, and trying different settings after I reset the CMOS as it should, but it can't. But I have no way to tell without another socket 1156 CPU on-hand, which I don't have. I called around to all of the local computer shops and none of them have any on hand either.
I could buy one, but since they're discontinued, if you want a new one, you're dealing with sketchy vendors or overpriced markup. I can get a Core i7 870 on Amazon for $340, not prime, but... That's more than a brand new Ivy Bridge costs. And that's a big risk to take if I don't know if my board is good or bad. I could buy a cheap one, but the best I found for non-sketcy new 1156 CPUs was a crappy dual-core "Pentium" on Newegg for $110. I don't want to use that CPU long-term, it would just be a test, and $110 is a lot for something going on the junk pile.
So, the only choice would be to go with something I'd want to use long-term, and that would (for the server) really need to be the Core i7 870, especially if I'm not going to overclock it.
So, I think I'm getting an Ivy. I think what I'll do is grab a P8Z77-V Deluxe (since it is the server board, suddenly I care about that stuff a lot) and a Core i7 3770. I'm not going with the 3770k because I'm not going to overclock this one again, and they're otherwise essentially the same, so why pay the extra $40. Plus, the 3770k is sold-out everywhere now.
Then, I'm going to watch for a cheap Core i5 750 or 760, on eBay or something at my leisure and maybe I can get this thing going again lower-risk with a new CPU and use it to replace the HTPC (which I still want to do, but I can't afford to do both at the same time). Playing with overclocking the "toy" HTPC is one thing... If it dies, I can hook up my laptop to the TV and carry on in a pinch. But playing with the server is a bad idea. I've not liked it for a long while, but I was cheap back when I bought the Lynnfield and the i5 was a bit slow if it wasn't overclocked (but it did that like a champ). I don't think we'll do that on the server anymore...
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PS. If anyone has a spare, known-working Core i5/i7 Lynnfield chip lying around you're willing to part with, shoot me a PM right away.
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Ordered my Ivy... I luckily had some left-over Amazon gift cards. Amazon actually had the same price as Newegg for the 3770, so that worked out.
I got:
Intel Core i7 3770 (non "k")
Asus P8Z77-V Deluxe motherboard
I'll be using my existing RAM and other stuff, so that's all I needed. I'll hold onto this board and see if I can come up with a Lynnfield replacement that doesn't break the bank. If so, it'll go in the HTPC.
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I called Micro Center. They said they didn't have any and didn't know when they would.
I stopped by MN Microcenter on 4/30 and they had i7-3770k for $289 so I grabbed one.
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Sorry for the Jinx.
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Hm just read your server story Glynor, unfortunate and interesting at the same time.
Did you run coretemp/realtemp in logging mode so could see what was happening when you were not there? Did you run it during your video recordings when it would act up? Did you have an integrated video and were you using that? How hot would it run idle/normal/full load?
Did that chip/board support SpeedStep technology and was it enabled, or was it running at max speed all the time? And what about PLL/Overvoltage?
Sorry for the flood of questions but I'm very interested to know because you might be the victim of chip degradation due to the increased voltage and thermal output. Having some logging would help greatly in determining if that would be the case.
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Ordered my Ivy... I luckily had some left-over Amazon gift cards. Amazon actually had the same price as Newegg for the 3770, so that worked out.
I got:
Intel Core i7 3770 (non "k")
Asus P8Z77-V Deluxe motherboard
I'll be using my existing RAM and other stuff, so that's all I needed. I'll hold onto this board and see if I can come up with a Lynnfield replacement that doesn't break the bank. If so, it'll go in the HTPC.
That board rocks. That's the one I got for my 3770k. The first one they shipped to me was defective with 2 dead dimm slots but I got the replacement on Friday. It is a really really fast machine. Enjoy it!! And make sure to do the BIOS update first thing. Just stick it on a USB stick and upgrade it from the BIOS. It'll make your life easier.
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Hm just read your server story Glynor, unfortunate and interesting at the same time.
Did you run coretemp/realtemp in logging mode so could see what was happening when you were not there? Did you run it during your video recordings when it would act up?
Like I said... I didn't monitor temps as well as I should have. That means, really at-all except during load testing. In my current case (Corsair Obsidian 650D), it has been fine (peaking in the low 60's at full load), but I've only had that case since the holidays. I don't run CoreTemp all the time, just when I'm testing.
Before that, my case situation was much more dire, though, and I don't have clear records. When I discovered the initial issue, I remember that one core on the CPU was spiking in temps just before it would error out in Prime95 (usually 3-4 hours into testing). I don't remember the exact temps, but I think it was in the low 70s, on only one core. This was all a long while ago though (I got the CPU in September 2009, so this was probably summer 2010). I took a whole bunch of heat-related action then... I rearranged the components in the computer, removed and consolidated some drives, cleaned up wiring and filters and everything, re-gooed and reseated the CPU's HSF (a big, honking Noctua tower), and added some additional case cooling fans. (And, I started planning to replace the case when I had the money and found a good one.) Once I'd done that stuff, it was fine. It would idle in the low 40s and only barely break 60 after really running full-tilt for a good long time.
The situation improved even further once I got the Obsidian, but that was just recently.
To be clear though, until possibly this last week, I haven't had any problems with recordings or playback or anything. In fact, the recordings it made Friday night just before dying are all fine. The problems were all when I was actively using it. The first time it happened, I happened to be playing a game (Mirror's Edge, actually). And, like I said, then it didn't happen again for a couple weeks (even though I pushed on it a bit right afterwards).
While I didn't monitor my temps as well as I should have, I did have a fairly good stability testing regiment.
My backup scheme does checksumming and verification everywhere, and reports any issues, and I haven't seen any at all in years. Since the initial problems where I had to tweak my overclock, I've been doing regular stability checks every month or two (it was in my calendar for every month, but I skip them sometimes). My last thorough check was in late Feb, so I was due. But back in Feb, it was still solid (Prime95 for 12-16 hours, followed by an OCCT stress test, and 3D Mark bench run). That was probably a couple weeks before I first saw the "black screen" issue crop up (maybe mid-March). After the black screen, I did another round of tests, though these were more focused on GPU and game testing.
The next handful of times I saw the crash was always when I was using my OSX Lion VM in Fullscreen dual-monitor mode. They were sporadic, and I never saw them with other activities on the system. Sometimes I could use the VM like that all day and it'd be fine. And then the next day it would crash on me twice in an hour. I was convinced something was flaky with either my GPU, my drivers, or maybe just using the weird, hacky OSX VM. Like I mentioned, I don't play many games on the server, so most of my testing in that regard was just testing, but since that first one, I didn't see any further issues. That's why it was deceiving... It really seemed to be limited to only certain types of uses.
Then, two or three weeks ago, I got a "black screens crash" when NOT in the VM. I was in Theater View in MC (so, again, a full-screen GPU accelerated application) just navigating around. That was when I decided to run Prime on it again. I didn't have time to do a full test (I'd actually put that off till this weekend, and planned to bring home a spare GPU I had at the office), but I did put it through 2-4 hours or so of Prime without errors. I was running CoreTemp then. It was running a little hotter than before, but not much (considering clogged lint filters on the case). It maxed out at 62-65C depending on the core just before I shut the test down, and then dropped back down to around 50C at idle.
It really wasn't until this past week that the situation switched from "odd and concerning, but sporadic and hard to diagnose" to "dire". This past week, I had at least one "black screen crash" every day, sometimes 2 or 3. Still, except that one crash on Wednesday night at the desktop, these all happened while either running a fullscreen 3D accelerated application, or while in VMWare fullscreen. In fact, I did some testing where I'd run a Telestream Episode compression (an easy way to load down the OSX VM) with the VM "windowed" and it would run fine to completion. I'd do the same thing fullscreen, and it would often only take 2-3 minutes before it would "black screen crash". I really didn't have much time to play with it this week though. I was trying to get work done.
So, again, it seemed to be GPU related. And even that crash at the desktop, I had Firefox open. Maybe Flash was doing something GPU related in a background thread? That seemed less likely, and that's why I became very skeptical, but I still was focused on the GPU as the cause. Like I said, I have a 5770 and they ran hot, and it was old, and blah, blah, blah.
Until I did that Reset to Optimized Defaults and rebooted and got no POST, I really didn't think it was likely to have been a CPU problem. Possible, certainly, but that was pretty far down on my list of likely candidates. I honestly expected it was a PSU problem. My PSU is a nice one, but it is quite a few years old, and I thought it might have been running at a high-percentage of its max load for a long time. But now I've tested with additional (and brand-new) PSUs, and it still won't POST, so I think we're beyond that. The PSU seems to be stable on the voltage when not under load too. I still think I might replace it with a new one, but since I just blew $550 I think I'll wait a bit.
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Those CPU temperatures under load are not a problem at all, its just that I think the idle temps are high, which suggests you've disabled speedstep. Reading you've been conservative on the vcore with "just a couple of notches" I find it hard to believe your chip suffered from thermal and/or overvoltage degradation. The reason your fans max out is a safety measure btw. Your mobo "detects" the crash and maxes all the fans automatically.
Don't rule out the idea that you might have 2 issues too.
The reason I was so interested is that I read a lot about degradation and shortened lifespans on CPU's due to overclocking, but I've never read a real case of a chip dying prematurely, say within a few years, unless the overclock was really pushing the limits. I guess I sort of hoped (sorry I tried to find a better word :P) that yours was such a case.
I know you didn't ask and I know you know your stuff and all, but since I suspect you're disabling Speedstep, may I suggest you leave that on? Stability should not be an issue with Speedstep enabled under your circumstances. A convervative overclock is nice for the occasion a bit of speed is wanted, but 90% of the time its doing nothing. A CPU dropping to 1600MHz sucks a lot less power (mine sits at 14 watts) and generates a lot less heat. Might save you a couple of bucks on the electricity bill too ;).
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I'm not going to overclock the new one at all, hence picking a non-k CPU.
I'll save my overclock playing for the HTPC for the future... That's still on an old Q9550 (which has long-had a stable OC). I'm going to try to RMA the CPU and see what happens.
I agree that those temps shouldn't be a problem. The problems could have been, conceivably, back before I "fixed things". I was running at 4.0GHz then and it was a bit fiddly to get it stable at that speed (and actually didn't work with SpeedStep enabled). My long-term vcore was still pretty conservative, but it was higher than what I settled on after the intital problems (I wish I still had my recorded numbers, but I did it on paper then, now they're all in Dropbox, and the paper is long-gone now). But, i also went higher than that even when doing initial setup and testing. I wasn't monitoring the temps at all then either... So who knows? Maybe it ran at 80c for a while under load before I noticed trouble 9-12 months in?
Plus, I got the i5 750 literally on launch day or soon after. Maybe I just got a bit of a first-run dud?
It is certainly possible that I was seeing multiple issues. Now that it won't POST it is hard to tell, but I tried:
Booting with two separate PSUs (one brand new and known working).
Three different GPUs (including one cheapo, low-end card).
A wide variety of different RAM configs, including no RAM at all (to see if I could get a no-RAM BIOS beep code, I couldn't).
Reseating the CPU.
Nothing changed. Still no POST. You can see the board doing its "fail safe" settings thing after clearing the CMOS (multiple little short boots followed by the last, failing attempt), so I suspect that the board is still okay, but without another compatible CPU, it is impossible to be sure. I'm not getting any beep codes at all from the BIOS.
So.... We'll see. If Intel RMAs my CPU, I'll have a replacement sooner rather than later. Otherwise, I'll need to save my pennies and troll eBay I guess.
What'll be annoying now is getting the new system up and running. I'm going to boot to my existing config (I hope it'll boot), and then migrate it to a VM as a backup before I clean install Windows.
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If you haven't, I'd check the Power Supply voltages. They can go whack or get flakey without blowing caps.
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If you haven't, I'd check the Power Supply voltages. They can go whack or get flakey without blowing caps.
I did, though I don't have a tester that can apply a load.
In any case, I tried with two separate PSUs, so I don't think that's it. Unless the PSU is acting up under load and killed the board, I suppose, but that doesn't seem likely.
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I followed Glynor's advice and picked up the SBR i5-2500K for the interim while awaiting the shipment of the IVB. If anyone needs a < 2week old i5-2500K...
No promises, but...
How much you want for it?
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PM'd.
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This is a little frustrating... But in a good kind of way.
The new Ivy CPU came today, but the board won't be here until Thursday. I'll be sure to post pics.
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Hehe. Don't worry, you'll still have the entire weekend to get frustrated over migration and installation issues.
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Hehe. Don't worry, you'll still have the entire weekend to get frustrated over migration and installation issues.
Hah! I know. ::)
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Hmmm... I've been thinking about it. I wonder if it wasn't my memory vcore that might have killed it. My older RAM sticks are, as is common, 1.65v DDR3. I know that with Intel CPUs with integrated memory controllers that is the max that you're supposed to use, but I might have played with that more than I should have. I don't know without getting the board to boot and checking out my saved BIOS settings though.
If I was running at 1.66-1.7v for a long while, think that could have caused the issue? I don't think I was higher than 1.64-1.66v (my Gigabyte board doesn't let you select 1.65 on the nose) but my memory is hazy because whiskey.
Either way, we'll try to RMA it this weekend after we get the new Ivy board in, and see what happens.
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My new motherboard came today.
Also, my basement flooded this morning. We've lived here 7 years (and through much more torrential rain than we had this morning) and it never flooded. Never even got any serious water in the basement at all, so we were totally unprepared for this. I had three computers on the floor in my basement office/man-cave, including the firewall, my DMZ server, and my laptop (in my bag).
At least I caught it before I left for work (went down there to grab my laptop bag). No computers killed, but a huge mess (and some furniture ruined, but it was all "basement furniture" which means it was less-important generally). I only just now got the network back up (after blow-drying out the battery backup).
So... No playing with the new machine tonight either, probably. Darn. What a week, eh?
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When it rains, it pours. Good luck getting it all back up.
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Seeing water in your house is very traumatic. Two years ago we saw our pond grow to encompass the patio, and then our den. There were 5 separate waterfalls off the front retaining wall. Fortunately, like you, we caught it just in time to move the rug, furniture, it electronics. And we had it drying out within 24 hours. It cost over $25k in clean-up and repairs.
Hang in there.
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Damn, good luck there.
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Sorry to hear of your woes. Hope it's not caused too much damage.
SBR
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Sorry to hear of your woes. Hope it's not caused too much damage.
Thanks, guys.
It turned out not too bad, really. The cleanup is mostly done. Some drywall down there got wet, and might eventually need to be replaced, but the water never got deeper than around 3-4 inches in the worst spots (and that was all down at one end of the basement). The water did cover pretty much the entire floor, but in my office area it was no deeper than one inch or so. There was mud everywhere and it lifted the paint off of the floor (the previous owner painted the basement floor for some reason) so that was a pain to clean. All in all though... It was obnoxious, but not a disaster. Even if I replace the drywall that got wet, it probably won't be more than a grand or so of damage. I don't know if I'll replace it. It is a half-finished basement and the room that is the nicest (my office) got the least water.
I got lucky that I caught it, and discovered the cause quickly (a disconnected gutter outside that was pouring water right at the foundation). It could have been much, much worse. We also discovered that our basement drain is pretty much useless for anything more than a small puddle, and now we have a pump!
Just set me back a day on my system build, which was a bummer. I got the case stripped down last night, though, and I'm ready to proceed tonight! Wish me luck!
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Good Luck! :D
Glad to hear it turned out relatively good considering the circumstances.
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I'm posting this from the new machine.
Working pretty well. I need to get some stuff sorted still, though.
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Did you get it all straightened out? What a nightmare you went through. Makes the bad board I had and the SSD bracket problem I ran into seem small in comparison. Yikes.
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Did you get it all straightened out?
Pretty much. I'm waiting for a new PSU. After testing with the new board over the weekend, I bought a SeaSonic (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151088). I've had enough of crappy PSUs.
It is running on an Antec ECO Green 400w PSU right now, which is a bit under-powered for the full rig at load. It has been stable, but I can't get the sides of my case on because it doesn't have the right plugs and I have to rig it all weird.
My old OCZ PSU was testing fine, but the 3.3v rail was drooping under load down below 3v. It was still within the Intel spec, but... I don't know, between the failure and everything, I decided it was worth pulling it and sending it to the dump. I bought it way back in the day when I got my first-ever Athlon 64 CPU and X1900XT GPU. I think it is cool to retire it after that lifespan. ;)
I'm also having trouble with the Marvel onboard SATA 6G ports, which BSODs when I hot-swap a drive connected to them (if you troll the ASUS forums, this seems common, and the refrain is usually "don't use the Marvel SATA ports"). That's a bummer because I wanted to use those ports with my Obsidian 650D's top SATA drive dock. Now I need to rearrange a bunch of wiring.
Other than that, though, it is running rock-solid. Boots much faster than the old system, and is running great.
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Very nice! I'm glad you've got a kick butt working system now after all the stuff you went through. I just finished my machine last week with a Vertex 4 256 gb SSD and an ASUS GTX 680. That machine is just unbelievable. I haven't tried hot swapping on the marvel SATA ports although I know I'm using them for at least one of the drives. Hopefully they'll come up with a firmware fix for your issue there. Good times!