and now... for something completely different....

ASRock 775i65g Rev 2

I bring you an ASRock 775i65G REV 2. with D 805, Corsair Value PC3200 and XFX 6600GT 128MB AGP. Yes... this is the mobo that will run a Conroe. I got the CPU and board yesterday, installed, and been toying with it this morning.

3D Mark 2003

CPU running @ 3.2 Ghz. Ram @ 400 Mhz.

>>>> Notes on 9/1/06 <<<<

LGA PIN Mod <--- Found today. Attempting over the weekend.

Able to post 3.50 GHz for the CPU. Can adjust memory and chipset voltage. Windows crashing...

Dont use a cheap 400 watt power supply, the 6600GT doesn't work all that well. On-board video works fine with it.

Voodoo 2 SLI, yep... those work, too. Need to find software that allows switching between the primary card and secondary.

DOS Box runs much better on this system.

Plextor 716SA SATA DVD burner works much better. Along with the Western Digital HDD.

For a $50 motherboard and $100 CPU, I can't complain. Just wish I could use my 7600GS. But Im thinking of doing the Step Up Program from eVGA to get the AGP version. But that's only the 256mb. Like to have the 512.

Looks like my AMD 64 CPU and board are going into mothball status...

When will yet get a C2D for it? If you do will you upgrade to better RAM for possible higher clocks? Let me know, I was thinkabout doing a build with it because its so cheap. I was pricing it but I like good stuff too, to many good parts gave me a 1000 buck usd figure. I know I could use almost everything I have from older builds except good mem.

BigDan3131 said:

When will yet get a C2D for it? If you do will you upgrade to better RAM for possible higher clocks? Let me know, I was thinkabout doing a build with it because its so cheap. I was pricing it but I like good stuff too, to many good parts gave me a 1000 buck usd figure. I know I could use almost everything I have from older builds except good mem.

Click to expand...

The idea of this system build was I wanted to try out a dual core CPU. Hence the D 805 + board was about the same cost as an AMD X2 alone. Also knowing that the D 805 can overclock to 4 Ghz if needed. Faster RAM would be nice, but if I decide to go to a board that supports DDR2 then it might be a waste of money since DDR1 would be incompatable. That was on my mind when I bought this board.

What I really wanted this board for was to test my Voodoo 2's and see if those would work for a retro system I plan on building. Since some of my games have issues running on Windows XP, this system would run 98 SE instead. The 6600 GT and Audigy 2 have drivers that support 98SE. So that wont be a problem. What I will do is change the D 805 for a Celeron D.

Some more info to pass along during the month of running this setup:

1) Left the volt mod alone. I wasn't sure what the default voltage of my D 805 is. The box reads "up to 1.4 volts", which is not much help.

2) Plextor DVD drive is not getting reconized by Windows, again, and is burning coasters even with a firmware update. This drive's gonna meet a 1 lb Ball Peen hammer, soon.

Might move away from this mobo due to:

1) 775 socket nForce 590 ( Which has been renamed to a 600 version). And looking at Intel "Badaxe 2" D975XBX2 board that has the re-engineered D975XBX chipset that supports quad-core processors and DDR2 800.

2) Brings up... quad cores support for this board.

3) Windows Vista 64 RC1 seemed to run sluggish using this board. Was using an IDE drive, not SATA. Also read that Vista 64 needs 4 GB of RAM and this board only supports 2 GB, now anit that a kick in the pants!

4) Will there be a Direct X 10 AGP video card to use with Vista?

5) No onboard SATA 2 or RAID.

So these are some of my findings about this board. It's a good board for what it is. But there is that issue of Windows Vista 64. If it's true that there is a need for 4 GB of RAM, spending the money on putting a 64 Bit Core 2 Duo into this board might be a waste. Maybe alright for Linux OS with 2 GB.

I'm thinking of pushing the buy button on this mobo right now myself. I have an e6300 just sitting gathering dust presently and I have an older P4 system that is a ripe candidate for this and the e6300 as an upgrade for a dedicated folding box. This way I can put my e6300 in service for the least amount of money, since I can just reuse the ram, hard drive and AIW 9800 Pro that's in my IC7-G system. I'm not worried about any vcore adjustments as the Allendale should be able to do whatever this board can go on fsb without any vcore increase and since my ram is OCZ PC3200 Plat rev 2 (early models), I should be able to run some pretty tight ram timings with the Allendale installed, even with the crappy vdimm choices this board gives. Right now I'm at work on the wellsite, but if I order in the next few days it should be waiting for me when I get in from work next Tuesday. For cooling, I can use the retail hsf or reuse the Ninja I have on the P4 right now or I could also use a Zalman 9500 I have too.

I figure that even with no vmods, this should give a substantial boost in folding ability over the old P4 Northie/IC7-G in that box right now.

EDIT: Well, I couldn't resist it. I pressed the order button at Newegg on the board and it should be waiting for me when I get in next Tuesday a week from now. I can't wait to see how it performs with my Allendale and what kind of fsb speeds this cheap board can do.

Well, I just checked and my mobo is out for delivery. It will be ready and waiting for me when I get in from the wellsite Monday evening or Tuesday norning. I'm looking forward to seeing what this cheap mobo will do with my E6300. If it overclocks even half decently this will make a really cheap way to upgrade a secondary rig.

GL Mudd