New Quad-Core build, decisions about GPU/Case/Mobo

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

So I'm now thinking that if I can't solve the problems with resuming from sleep and freezing completely with blank screen, that maybe I should try a different motherboard.

I started looking at the ASUS P5Q Deluxe ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16813131297 ), it's a little more expensive and has less USB ports, but I wonder if it's any better than the Gigabyte board I have currently. I'm just getting nervous about the system because I can't figure out these problems.

And I was connected to the system on Live Mesh yesterday and on two separate occasions I lost the connection and my roommate (who was in front of the computer) said it just froze and went to a black screen.

[+shift. MVC]

Why don't you RMA your board first and see if it helps? Did you do a BIOS update as well? The latest version for your board is F8A.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

Well I think I would rather just buy another one (it would get to me faster than an RMA) and then return the old one if the new one works better, but I am thinking about that option as well.

I didn't know there was a new BIOS version (I'm running F7), I will update that and see if it helps.

[+shift. MVC]

If you want to use additional money for a new motherboard in the mean time then it's really up to you. But I wouldn't bother buying a new one until I've exhausted all my RMA / BIOS update options etc. :p

[utdarkviper]

I don't think the resuming from sleep problem is related to your motherboard though, unless you have an operating system other than Vista. I had this same problem with my computer and I have talked to a couple other people who also had this problem. I think it is more Vista-related than motherboard-related.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

I don't think the resuming from sleep problem is related to your motherboard though, unless you have an operating system other than Vista. I had this same problem with my computer and I have talked to a couple other people who also had this problem. I think it is more Vista-related than motherboard-related.

Well I have several other Vista machines (2 other custom builds) and they didn't have this problem. I updated the BIOS (shift informed me of a newer version) and I actually haven't had it lock up since then. And it slept yesterday after 60min of inactivity and my roommate was able to bring it back out of sleep by pressing the power button. I'm guessing I disabled the awake from keyboard/mouse.

BTW, what does PME mean? It relates to using the keyboard/mouse to awake the system from a sleep state but I wasn't sure what it meant. I just assumed Power Management something...

[utdarkviper]

Maybe Power Management by External device? I think I may have fooled around in my BIOS and changed some settings in Vista to end up getting mine to work but I don't remember exactly.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

Maybe Power Management by External device? I think I may have fooled around in my BIOS and changed some settings in Vista to end up getting mine to work but I don't remember exactly.

That makes more sense than Power Management Event, which is what I was thinking. For some reason I thought it sounded familiar but I don't think it makes sense, at least not to me. I'm going to get my roommate to change the BIOS settings for me tonight to enable the wake by keyboard/mouse and see if the resume works correctly with the keyboard/mouse. I'll post once I find out .

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

I think I've changed my mind... I know the Q9450 isn't the best chip for overclocking... but if I can get RealTemp to show lower temps (- about 10C) I think I want to try overclocking my proc (with the stock cooling). What's a safe speed to get this processor to with stock cooling? Also, since I've never really done CPU overclocking, anyone know of an article that explains the the technical part of overclocking intel cpu's? Or maybe something that talks about OC'ing with the GA-EP45-DS3R.

[+shift. MVC]

There's something called Tjunction max for Intel CPU's. And as long as your core temperature (as read by RealTemp) is below that value, it is perfectly fine. I would give yourself about 10C threshold. So -10 of Tjunction max is fine.

As for overclocking intel CPU's take a look at this link: http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.as...p;enterthread=y

[gwai lo]

Don't use absolute temperatures, use the delta to tjunction max. When that delta becomes zero, the processor will think itself to be too hot and automatically take steps to change that. Another 10?C-15?C over and the chip will shut itself off. Theoretically, you can run 1?C under Tjunction Max and be fine forever...of course that's in theory. Different people like to maintain different buffers, some 15-20?C and some 10-15?C, the cooler the chip is the higher the probability of it lasting longer. Of course running 10?C from tj max v. 20?C from tj max doesn't necessarily mean that your chip will die tomorrow versus 50 years from now, these chips are pretty durable and they'll run for a while. So change your settings to "delta from tjunction max" and use those figures.

As for an overclocking guide, here:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.as...p;enterthread=y

edit: rofl, I'm on [H], AT, and XS right now and happened to pick the AT sticky to post.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

There's something called Tjunction max for Intel CPU's. And as long as your core temperature (as read by RealTemp) is below that value, it is perfectly fine. I would give yourself about 10C threshold. So -10 of Tjunction max is fine.

As for overclocking intel CPU's take a look at this link: http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.as...p;enterthread=y

Yeah, I saw that Tjunction max last night, I don't really know what it means or is, but I don't think it was too much higher than the core temps RealTemp was displaying. I'll try to get a screenshot of RealTemp and post it here in a few minutes.

So when OC'ing it I should try to keep the core temps about 10C below the tjunction max? What should I do if right now (stock settings) the core temps are not too far below the tjmax?

Don't use absolute temperatures, use the delta to tjunction max. When that delta becomes zero, the processor will think itself to be too hot and automatically take steps to change that. Another 10?C-15?C over and the chip will shut itself off. Theoretically, you can run 1?C under Tjunction Max and be fine forever...of course that's in theory. Different people like to maintain different buffers, some 15-20?C and some 10-15?C, the cooler the chip is the higher the probability of it lasting longer. Of course running 10?C from tj max v. 20?C from tj max doesn't necessarily mean that your chip will die tomorrow versus 50 years from now, these chips are pretty durable and they'll run for a while. So change your settings to "delta from tjunction max" and use those figures.

As for an overclocking guide, here:

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.as...p;enterthread=y

edit: rofl, I'm on [H], AT, and XS right now and happened to pick the AT sticky to post.

Thanks Shift and gwai lo, I'm going to look through this guide and try to get a screenshot of my RealTemp status to see what you guys think.

[gwai lo]

Here's a full explanation of all the stuff you should worry about, it's kind of long, but it'll explain everything.

http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=10...mp;postcount=31

As for what to do if you're just below tjunction max already....do the typical checks for seating, etc etc.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

Here are the stats from RealTemp, this is after the system running for about 5 minutes. I think I was mixed up with the Distance to TJ Max thing... I think I thought it was displaying the TJ Max. So what do you guys think?

[+shift. MVC]

Try putting your CPU at load with ORTHOS or Prime95 and see what your temperatures are. If your load temperatures are within acceptable limits then I don't think you should have any problems.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

Try putting your CPU at load with ORTHOS or Prime95 and see what your temperatures are. If your load temperatures are within acceptable limits then I don't think you should have any problems.

Okay, I have prime95 running, and two of the cores are jumping from a "Distance to TJ Max" of 0 to 126/127. They're the two that are circled.

[+shift. MVC]

That doesn't look too right. Are you sure your heatsink is seated properly? 96C would mean it's above your Tjunction max for that chip (which I is 95C)

I would check that your heatsink is seated on the processor correctly, those temperatures are way to high even for an non-overclocked system.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

Okay, I'm going to shut it down and reseat the heatsink... I may just throw that AS5 on it while I'm in there. I'll be back in a little while hopefully :)

Thanks a lot for the tip Shift.

[+shift. MVC]

No problem. Even with stock cooling those temperatures shouldn't be that high.

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

No problem. Even with stock cooling those temperatures shouldn't be that high.

Okay, I reseated the heatsink... I have a feeling all four pegs weren't snapped in... but RealTemp is still reporting core temps of about 44C, 39C, 44C, and 42C for the cores, plus or minus 1C.

Should I try running Prime95 again?

EDIT: Okay, after about 8 mins running Prim95 (more than I let the other test run when I saw those really high temps), this is what RealTemp is showing.

Edited July 19, 2008 by Chsoriano

[+shift. MVC]

That looks MUCH better. See the difference between a badly seated heatsink + a well seated one? -30 form Tjunction looks a lot better than 3C from Tjunction. :p

Now you can try overclocking to see how high LOAD temperatures get. Put your computer at load for at least 6 hours. And if it's stable for that long, then it's good. :)

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

That looks MUCH better. See the difference between a badly seated heatsink + a well seated one? -30 form Tjunction looks a lot better than 3C from Tjunction. :p

Now you can try overclocking to see how high LOAD temperatures get. Put your computer at load for at least 6 hours. And if it's stable for that long, then it's good. :)

Sweet, I'll jump into the BIOS later on after I read through that article you posted (I've read through it once but would like to go through it again to make sure I understand as much of it as possible).

I finally tweaked the timing for my RAM also, the mobo had the timing pretty off, so I set it at what it was supposed to be.

[+shift. MVC]

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1326875

This would also be a good thread to read if you want to know more about CPU's and their temperatures and how they are measured.

It would also explain what PROCHOT is in your RealTemp screenshot and why there are two check marks below the two cores with 96C in your first screenshot. ;)

[+Chsoriano Subscriber²]

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1326875

This would also be a good thread to read if you want to know more about CPU's and their temperatures and how they are measured.

It would also explain what PROCHOT is in your RealTemp screenshot and why there are two check marks below the two cores with 96C in your first screenshot. ;)

I read through that this morning, thanks, explained quite a bit, along with the other article you recommended to me.

I was going to try to OC it today, but I am going to put that off since I am having other problems with the system. I tried to resume it from sleep (S3) today and again it didn't work. I have hybrid sleep enabled so when I turned it off it loaded from the HDD. However, it still hung at a black screen. Also, yesterday when it was restarting once, I got a BSOD, didn't have time to get all the details but the name of the driver that caused the problem started with ati... so maybe I need to wait for the first release of drivers for my 4870 before I start messing with anything else. I want to make sure everything is working correctly first.

[CrashG]

Okay, I reseated the heatsink... I have a feeling all four pegs weren't snapped in... but RealTemp is still reporting core temps of about 44C, 39C, 44C, and 42C for the cores, plus or minus 1C.

Should I try running Prime95 again?

EDIT: Okay, after about 8 mins running Prim95 (more than I let the other test run when I saw those really high temps), this is what RealTemp is showing.

Those temps look alot better. Gotta love those push pins. :angry: