- Joined
- Dec 14, 2010
Well, since I finally managed to get my major PITA board working (Biostar TPower I55) I thought I would start trying to overclock my i5 650.
The motherboard has a lot of weird issues. Firstly, when I first bought it the rear USB ports kept shorting out, it would run normally at first and then four or five minutes into the system running they would cut out and not come back on. I noticed corrosion around some of the tiny surface-mounted capacitors and other electronic chips at the rear of the board, which I though was related since the corroded parts were right near the ports that were shorting out. So, a few months back I stripped down the board and sent it through a wash cycle in my dishwasher to wash away the corrosion, then used an air compressor to blow all of the excess water off of the motherboard so that it wouldn't cause more corrosion. And left it sitting disassembled in my bedroom for two or three months to make sure it was thoroughly dry (actually, I could have just left it sitting for a week and it would have been thoroughly dried, I just got caught up in other projects in the meantime).
Problem number two is that the system fails to output any video if there is only one memory stick and stick is placed in slot A1, if single stick is in slot B1 then system performs normally. If two sticks are used, one in slot A1 and one in B1, then both are detected and the system runs normally. Stick in slot A1 does require occasional re-seating for system to POST if it does not POST on first try, which is a bit odd considering sometimes it will work fine on first try, but if I have to reboot the system to complete installation of updates it will sometimes fail to POST upon restart even though it was just running normally seconds earlier.
Third problem is that one pin in the CPU socket is completely broken off. A second one is bent down pretty far and the pin is quite weak, so I cannot straighten it up to where it should be. The pin that is broken off though seems to be non-essential though as the system runs normally without it.
Fourth problem is that the Primary PCI Express X16 slot only runs at X1 bandwidth no matter what video card I use. No idea what's wrong there, at first I thought it was a seating issue, so I reseated the cards multiple times, but it hasn't helped. Also thought it might have been a driver issue, so I reinstalled the video driver, didn't help.
I fired the system up three days ago, and it ran normally for two of those days. USB ports were all functioning normally, and there were no problems with the memory issue for a considerable period. Then, strangely yesterday morning all of the USB ports and the PS/2 (mini-din) port cut out while it was up and running, sitting at the desktop. I couldn't explain it, since it ran fine for two whole days before suddenly going out again. Just this morning I finally figured out the problem when I noticed a chip of some kind with noticeable corrosion on one of its pins. When I touched this chip with my finger the USB ports would come back to life, but only lasted for fifteen to twenty seconds before going back out again. So, I decided to see if I could clean away this corrosion on the one pin I noticed that did not look like the others using a small metal tool I use occasionally (you could call it a metal probe I suppose, that's the best description I can come up with for it without knowing its actual name). So I scratched away at this pin for a minute or two until it looked reasonably shiny again and was not the same dull corroded color, then flipped the power back on to my PSU and started up the system again. To my relief the USB ports came to life this time, and have been on for almost an hour and a half now. I can only speculate that this small chip is a USB controller, or a chip that feeds power to the USB controller. I hope it doesn't go out again, but at least now I have some idea of where to look if it does.
CPU: Intel Core i5 650 (3.2GHz stock 133MHz X 24x multiplier)
Motherboard: Biostar TPower i55 (P55 chipset)
Memory: G.Skill 4GB (2x2GB sticks) F3-12800CL7-4GBXM (DDR3-1600/PC3-12800) 7-8-7-24-1T
Graphics: Evga GTX 570 HD
CPU cooling: Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Black Edition with 1x Gentle Typhoon AP-15 in push and 1x Cooler Master SickleFlow 120x25mm blue LED fan in pull
HDD: Seagate 7200.9 80GB SATA II
Intel LGA1156 Core i5 650 overclock settings
Note: Biostar TPower i55 motherboard has 0.04v Vdrop, default (Auto) voltage in BIOS is 1.24v (when at this voltage 1.20v is displayed in OS and BIOS voltage monitoring software).
Core 0 40°C max temp (22°C minimum temp), Core 1 36°C max temp (20°C minimum temp)-stock temperatures
3.3GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.4GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.5GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.6GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.7GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.8GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.9GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
4.0GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
4.1GHz: 1.15-1.17v (1.24v-0.05000v) (1.175v showing in bios)
4.2GHz: 1.18-1.20v (1.24v-0.018750v) (1.207v showing in bios)
4.3GHz: 1.22v (1.24v) (1.240v showing in bios)
4.4GHz: 1.26-1.28v (1.24v+0.0625v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.289-1.305v showing in bios)
4.5GHz: 1.28-1.30v (1.24v+0.075v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.305v showing in bios)
4.6GHz: 1.33-1.34v (1.24v+0.1125v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.354v showing in bios)
4.7GHz: 1.38-1.39v (1.24v+0.1625v +1.34v VTT Voltage) (1.403v showing in bios)
4.75GHz: 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v VTT Voltage (GA-P55A-UD4P)
4.8GHz: 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v QPI/VTT, +1.580v DRAM)*not fully stable, just for benching-P55A-UD4P
4.85GHz (194x25): 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v QPI/VTT, +1.580v DRAM)*not fully stable, just for benching-P55A-UD4P
The motherboard has a lot of weird issues. Firstly, when I first bought it the rear USB ports kept shorting out, it would run normally at first and then four or five minutes into the system running they would cut out and not come back on. I noticed corrosion around some of the tiny surface-mounted capacitors and other electronic chips at the rear of the board, which I though was related since the corroded parts were right near the ports that were shorting out. So, a few months back I stripped down the board and sent it through a wash cycle in my dishwasher to wash away the corrosion, then used an air compressor to blow all of the excess water off of the motherboard so that it wouldn't cause more corrosion. And left it sitting disassembled in my bedroom for two or three months to make sure it was thoroughly dry (actually, I could have just left it sitting for a week and it would have been thoroughly dried, I just got caught up in other projects in the meantime).
Problem number two is that the system fails to output any video if there is only one memory stick and stick is placed in slot A1, if single stick is in slot B1 then system performs normally. If two sticks are used, one in slot A1 and one in B1, then both are detected and the system runs normally. Stick in slot A1 does require occasional re-seating for system to POST if it does not POST on first try, which is a bit odd considering sometimes it will work fine on first try, but if I have to reboot the system to complete installation of updates it will sometimes fail to POST upon restart even though it was just running normally seconds earlier.
Third problem is that one pin in the CPU socket is completely broken off. A second one is bent down pretty far and the pin is quite weak, so I cannot straighten it up to where it should be. The pin that is broken off though seems to be non-essential though as the system runs normally without it.
Fourth problem is that the Primary PCI Express X16 slot only runs at X1 bandwidth no matter what video card I use. No idea what's wrong there, at first I thought it was a seating issue, so I reseated the cards multiple times, but it hasn't helped. Also thought it might have been a driver issue, so I reinstalled the video driver, didn't help.
I fired the system up three days ago, and it ran normally for two of those days. USB ports were all functioning normally, and there were no problems with the memory issue for a considerable period. Then, strangely yesterday morning all of the USB ports and the PS/2 (mini-din) port cut out while it was up and running, sitting at the desktop. I couldn't explain it, since it ran fine for two whole days before suddenly going out again. Just this morning I finally figured out the problem when I noticed a chip of some kind with noticeable corrosion on one of its pins. When I touched this chip with my finger the USB ports would come back to life, but only lasted for fifteen to twenty seconds before going back out again. So, I decided to see if I could clean away this corrosion on the one pin I noticed that did not look like the others using a small metal tool I use occasionally (you could call it a metal probe I suppose, that's the best description I can come up with for it without knowing its actual name). So I scratched away at this pin for a minute or two until it looked reasonably shiny again and was not the same dull corroded color, then flipped the power back on to my PSU and started up the system again. To my relief the USB ports came to life this time, and have been on for almost an hour and a half now. I can only speculate that this small chip is a USB controller, or a chip that feeds power to the USB controller. I hope it doesn't go out again, but at least now I have some idea of where to look if it does.
CPU: Intel Core i5 650 (3.2GHz stock 133MHz X 24x multiplier)
Motherboard: Biostar TPower i55 (P55 chipset)
Memory: G.Skill 4GB (2x2GB sticks) F3-12800CL7-4GBXM (DDR3-1600/PC3-12800) 7-8-7-24-1T
Graphics: Evga GTX 570 HD
CPU cooling: Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme Black Edition with 1x Gentle Typhoon AP-15 in push and 1x Cooler Master SickleFlow 120x25mm blue LED fan in pull
HDD: Seagate 7200.9 80GB SATA II
Intel LGA1156 Core i5 650 overclock settings
Note: Biostar TPower i55 motherboard has 0.04v Vdrop, default (Auto) voltage in BIOS is 1.24v (when at this voltage 1.20v is displayed in OS and BIOS voltage monitoring software).
Core 0 40°C max temp (22°C minimum temp), Core 1 36°C max temp (20°C minimum temp)-stock temperatures
3.3GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.4GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.5GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.6GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.7GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.8GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
3.9GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
4.0GHz: 1.14-1.15v (1.24v-0.0625v) (1.158-1.175v showing in bios)
4.1GHz: 1.15-1.17v (1.24v-0.05000v) (1.175v showing in bios)
4.2GHz: 1.18-1.20v (1.24v-0.018750v) (1.207v showing in bios)
4.3GHz: 1.22v (1.24v) (1.240v showing in bios)
4.4GHz: 1.26-1.28v (1.24v+0.0625v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.289-1.305v showing in bios)
4.5GHz: 1.28-1.30v (1.24v+0.075v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.305v showing in bios)
4.6GHz: 1.33-1.34v (1.24v+0.1125v +1.325v VTT Voltage) (1.354v showing in bios)
4.7GHz: 1.38-1.39v (1.24v+0.1625v +1.34v VTT Voltage) (1.403v showing in bios)
4.75GHz: 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v VTT Voltage (GA-P55A-UD4P)
4.8GHz: 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v QPI/VTT, +1.580v DRAM)*not fully stable, just for benching-P55A-UD4P
4.85GHz (194x25): 1.424-1.44v (1.4375v +1.33v QPI/VTT, +1.580v DRAM)*not fully stable, just for benching-P55A-UD4P
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