ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 mobo questions

bourgeoisdude

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I built a system recently using my old PC case, power supply, video card, hard drive, and dvd drive. I bought the vid card and psu to be more than enough so I could upgrade...like I did.

OK to the point, my specs:

Motherboard: Duh! (ASRock 939Dual-SATA2)
Processor: AMD ATHLON X2 64 4400+
Hard drive: WDC-WD8000JB (80GB, 8MB cache--plenty of space free)
DVD-RW: unimportant (some memorex dual layer burner)
Memory: 2 GB PC3200 running in dual channel mode
Video Card: Inno3d GeForce 6600 AGP 8X (256MB)

MY OLD PC:

Motherboard: ECS K7S5A 1.1 (socket A, AGP 4X mobo)
Processor: Athlon XP 2600+ 266FSB
Hard drive: WDC-WD8000JB (80GB, 8MB cache--plenty of space free)
Memory: 512MB PC2100 DDR (only one stick no dual channel ability on mobo)
Video Card: PNY Verto GeForce4 Ti4200 64MB AGP 4X video card

What I use the machines for: Some basic stuff like any home user, plus online gaming with older Command and Conquer games.

The Problem: I play C&C Generals Zero Hour online and my *PC* lags even with graphics settings set low and all useless background processes killed. HDD is defragmented, with or without page file the game runs the same. I realise my vid card is slow for any real gamer, but my old GeForce4 Ti4200 64MB card on my old computer WORKED BETTER than in this config. All other apps seem to be faster, and many DirectX 9.0c games are definately better, but DirectX 8.1 games are slower. Why? Can I fix this? How horrible is my video card? Is it even my video card causing the issue or something else? Thanks guys.

Edit: 1 more question: Who chooses what mobo vendor categories or on the forums? I ask because ASROCK is not listed. What can I do to request it?
 

h3llscream

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Short of the obvious of making sure all your display drivers are up to date as well as your drivers for your motherboard I really couldn't tell you much else to do. You could maybe run a search through google and see if anyone has experienced the same issue with your configuration. You really shouldn't have below par performance with directx 8 content with that card as it is a fairly decent card.
 

hergieburbur

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I don't have your board (though I am looking into possibly buying it soon). But I do seem to remember seeing online that there were some BIOS settings that had to be adjusted depending on whether you are primarily using AGP or PCI-e. (Though you can use both at the same time, which is why I want to buy it). Trying looking at that or maybe updating your BIOS.
 

pat

Expert
I have this board and if you install the chipset drivers THEN the graphic card driver, it should work. you should download the last set from ULI web site. select the ULI 1565 and all the necessary drivers will be downloaded.

Reinstall graphic card driver after installing new drivers
 

roncpem

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I have also read that you have to set the card for 8x in the bios as well as the ram speed. let me know if it helps.
 

roncpem

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btw, have a non related question. i think i'm going to buy this board to upgrade my daughters computer, but she has a question, silly, as well. she wants to know if the mobo came with a case badge as she collects them to stick on the outside of her computer.
 

pat

Expert
Well, it's a board.. I mean..it is rock stable and fast. As easy to set up as any other board.. Don't have any problem yet, only a small glitch caused by OCing, which is 250 FSb.. running my 3000+ at 2.25 GHz. 1 out of 100 post, my HDD on the SATA 2 connector is not recognized. I just turn it off and on again..not a big deal to me. I could update BIOS to the latest one (still running the 1.20 that came with the board) but I don't want to mess with it and risking to cause other trouble.

I did try AGP and PCIe card. one at the time and both and everything works as it should..

I have a RAID0 array on the ULI controller and it is as fast as when it was on my nforce4 motherboard. This one has passive heat sink so it is quiet ..
 

roncpem

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good to hear, i'll be getting this board soon to upgrade my daughters system, will only be using an amd 64 3200+ venice, 1 gig corsair value select ram, 2 x 512, using her existing wd 120 gig ide hard drive & an abit x800 pro agp card flashed to xt pe configuration. hope it will work well for her.
 

pat

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It should. Just download the latest drivers from uli web site. use the package from either chipset chip, as it is the same.. integrated 213, iirc..
 

bourgeoisdude

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I have also read that you have to set the card for 8x in the bios as well as the ram speed. let me know if it helps.

I did manually set the AGP speed to 8X (it was preset to only 4X as you said though). It made no difference. I think it might be my video card/drivers. I have noticed that using any drivers other than Inno3D's drivers results in lower performance for DX9 games, but now I've discovered that using NVIDIA's drivers makes it perform better on DX8 games (WTF?) Yep, don't buy Inno3D video cards--at least not the GeForce 6600 256MB AGP one anyway.
 

bourgeoisdude

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iv read that the memory defaults to 2t in the bios and should b changed to 1t mayb that will help

AHA! My PC seems faster--but my DX 8.1 games are still stuttering.

On a side note, I did recently order a 74GB Raptor drive that should arrive Satarday, so if hdd was a bottleneck (which I doubt--I currently have ATA100 WD800JB) that might help...
 

hergieburbur

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I highly doubt your HDD is the bottleneck. however, you will notice a difference with a Raptor drive.

I think this has been addressed, but did you try disabling the PCI-E in the BIOS?