noob 975BX2 question

[SNOOZDOC]

starting to build my first system.

On the bad axe 2, there are a couple of power plug ins on the MB. One is for the 24 pin, and the other is like a square 4 pin. IS it either/or depending on your power supply, or are you expected to supply both (I have a thermaltake 850W supply). The manual doesn't really explain exactly, and I thought I once saw a poster who was using both.

anyone have experience with this ???

Thanks in advance.

snooz

 

[ProHandyman]

If the sockets are on the mobo, then you HAVE to use both. Not using the aux. power connector can lead to instability (not enough power amperage to circuits), or refusal to post.

Some boards have the new eps connector that has 8 pins. Some will work with only four, others need all 8.

Your power supply has the connector, USE IT.

 

[SNOOZDOC]

thank you very much. yeah, actually it has 8 pin, and also 24pin power hookups....i'll use both.

 

[SNOOZDOC]

Ok, another question about the Bad Axe 2.

I have a raptor 150G, and 2 500G WD sata2's. I want to hook up the 500s in raid 1, and load the OS and programs on raptor.

When attaching them to MB, I must place the raptor in the normal sata port, and place the two WD 500's in the raid sata ports ?? Does it matter WHICH ones ? And does it matter if I use matrix raid driver, or the marvell raid software. Having those two different disks is kinda confusing me. Was intel just trying to give me more than one option, or what ????

HELLLLLpppppp....the manual isn't the clearest thing i've ever seen regarding the raid set-up, and unfortunately, I can;t seem to find a forum on the intel website.

This is my first "modern" build, and have been enjoying the hell out of it !!!!

Next step is inserting Harddrives and opticals...then vid...then fire up. :twisted:

qx6700/coolermaster stacker st01/intel 975bx2/wd raptor 150g/wd caviar re 500G x2/nvid 9700GT/corsair xms 2 x 1 G 6400 c 4 dominator/thermaltake 850w psu/ 15 inch CRT (graciously borrowed from work)

 

[SNOOZDOC]

Ok, one other thing.

The intel manual says that one should place their single pcie video card in the pciE slot closest to the processor. This, I assume, is because it is the pcie 16 with electrical 16. However, in trying to do this, I cannot keep my dominator ram chip fan in place as the card would interfere with it. SO, I guess my question is, how much of a difference would it make to place the card in the second pcie (electrical 8)?

ALso, let me repeat in case anyone googles regarding the bad axe 2 and dominator fan:


In a bad axe 2 ( 975xbx2 ) you cannot fit both a 7900 gt or larger video card in pcie A (1) in conjunction with a corsair dominator ram cooler: CORSAIR CMXAF1 Fans

Square peg-round hole.

Thanks

 

[HERSHEY]

I have the BAD AXE 1 MB,but it should be very similar.If you look in your MB manual,in mine,it`s on pages 16 and 17, it explains that the 4 Blue SATA ports are 150 Gbs and the 4 Black SATA ports are 300 Gbs.You use the same ports wherther you use them in Raid or not.You should have 2 Floppy drive Disks for SATA Drivers.These disks are what allow you to set up a Raid array.I would use the Black ports 0 and 1 for the Raid setup and port Black port 2 for your other HDD.

 

[SNOOZDOC]

ok, well that help somewhat...thanks. From what I've read online, the blue sata's don't work for optical drives. So, I'm trying to save my blacks for future sata dvd/blue ray. My plan, so far,is to hook my raptor 150 (with OS and programs) to the port 0 black, and my other two 500g drives to blue raid ports in raid 1. Hopefully this'll work.

Any info regarding the pciE slots ???

 

[HERSHEY]

From what I understand,if you use the 150Gbs SATA portswith 2 HDD,it still shouldn`t be a bottleneck.You should still have enough bandwidth.My MB has 2 Floppy disks,1 for 150Gbs SATA ports and 1 for 300Gbs ports.All you have to do is make sure that you use the crrect disk.On your video card question,look in the manual that came with your card.It should tell you if you need to use 16x PCIe.ON my MB,slot G is slot 1.That`s PCIe x16,slot E is port 2,that`s PCIe x8 electrical,and PCIe x16 mechanical.Slot C is port 3 which is PCIe 16 mechanical and PCIe x4 electrical.Mechanicaly,you could use any of the PCIe slots,but your speed would be reduced.x16 would be the fastest and x4 would be the slowest.I used an Arctic Freezer 7 Pro CPU cooler and the fan mount had a little interference,but I just needed to trim the fan mount a little and then it fit fine.I`m not familiar with the Memory your using,but maybe you can do something similar to allow your card to fit in the x16 electrical slot.

 

[31computers]

The 24 pin is your main power supply to the mobo.

The square 4pin socket is auxiliary power for the CPU, and you NEED this to be connected.


Sorry ProHandyman, I just noticed you already said this

 

[SNOOZDOC]

Thanks everyone ...appreciate the help.
Worked on my system all weekend, flipped the switch, and lo and behold, everything is working like a charm.
I plugged in all 3 mb sockets. also, i nixed the memory fan and plugged the vid card in the first slot where it belongs

as far as the hard drives:
raptor 150mb on intel sata controller, and the 2 caviar 500s on marvell raid/sata controller. I'm trying to only put easily reloadable programs (ie. discs that i physically have vs. downloaded) on the raptor, as well as the OS. this way, if/when i upgrade to vista (just running xp pro 30 day trial), i can just reformat that drive and do clean install ( i know, probably won't be so simple). otherwise, i am saving all My downloaded programs to my raid 1 D: drive.

a few additional questions though:
on intel desktop utilities, AND intel desk control center, my quad core temp is displayed as a negative value (tcc -44), whereas memory is in positive numbers. is that typical?

also, my mem voltage is running around 1.8 volts (5-5-5-18), but the recomm voltage is ~2.2(4-4-4-12). my system seems pretty happy with the settings. will i gain much by correcting the values to recommended settings, or just create more heat?

finally, i'm torn between buying xp pro sp2 vs. vista in the next 30d. will definitely need one of em. i wonder how much of a price break i will get by buying xp pro now as far as upgrade price to vista pro. certainly i should get "some" discount on the future purchase.

Anyway, thanks again for your help....i'm definitely proud that she worked great on the first power-up....now i'm just stuck in software purgatory between my old computer and new one

Snooz

 

[HERSHEY]

Glad to hear everything worked out for you!
It`s a good feeling when everything fires up and runs ,especially on your first build.I looked at the Plextor web site for SATA burners and they don`t,as yet,have any that will work with our MB.I haven`t looked anywhere else yet.I see by the ratings from people that the SATA burners are considerably faster than IDE.I might look into buying one myself.
I now have my O.S. and other software on my primary drive and most of my data on a second drive.I think this is a better way to go.I don`t know exactly how the Vista upgrade works,but I think if you have XP Pro,you can upgrade to Vista premium.I have XP Pro.I waited until XP had been out for about 1 year,that way they have alot of the bugs worked out.I`ll try to do that with Vista,but it does sound pretty good though.I don`t have the Quad core unfortunately,but my E6600 reports a positive temp.On your memory question,the lower voltage you can run,the cooler it will run.If the manual says 2.2 volts,you may have to run it at that.aaaaaaaayou can leave it at 1.8 for now and see if it runs stable though.Maybe it won`t run at full speed if it`s lower than 2.2 volts,I don`t know.Let me know how things work out.

 

[HERSHEY]

I went to Intel`s site and looked up the QX6700 CPU and on page 71 under Thermal Specifications it says,The temperature reported over PECI is always a negative value and represents a delta below the onset of thermal control circuit(TCC) activation.If I understand this,as long as you read a negative number,no thermal stepping,(voltage reduction)is taking place.It sounds like if you have a positive number, the voltage is reduced to lower the temperature.On page 73,Table 26,for a 130 W. CPU,like the QX6700,the max. temp. is 64.5c
I hope this helps.

 

[SNOOZDOC]

So, if I understand correctly, the chip will protect itself. I kinda like that, but hope to never approach the point that I need to count on that.

About the max temp though....i don't know if its 65 degrees beyond cold temp (which i suppose is reported at about -45 or so to start), or is it actually 65 degrees C above 0. Does that make sense AT ALL ????

Well, either way, thanks for finding that for me. I thinks its a bit of a confusing way of reporting the temps, but it is what it is.....

I decided I will start with XP PRO, and let people work the bugs out of vista. In a year, the games will catch up, and I can get it, and a cheaper X10 card by then. I alomost learned the hard way about buying brand new tech, but read the EVGA forum first and got lucky. SO, heck with it, I don't mind being last as long as I know I can turn on my computer and it'll work every time.

Now, if I had TWO computers...........

 

[JohnJ]

i just got a bx2 and i read the intel.com specs on it. apparently it says the bx2 mobo needs 1.8-1.9 memory, and the pre sales consultant verified via phone.
I could be wrong...but check for yourself. Which brings me to a question of overclockability, first timer here, can i overclock ( and how do i if feesable) my bx2 mobo with e6600, and 2 g of mushkin mem at 5 lag @ 1.8 with a 620 watt enermax, a sata 2 seagate hd 1 dvd burner, 8800 gtx. I only want to go to 3.0 ghz what do i do

 

[HERSHEY]

If you haven`t already done so,you need to go to Intel`s web site to download the IDCC (Intel Desktop Control Center).Once you have that installed,you can change memory voltage,FSB speed(Front Side Bus),fan speed,memory speed and a few other things.The nice thing about the IDCC is you don`t have to enter the BIOS.You can do it through Windows.Just be sure NOT to restart or do anything until it`s finished or you could corrupt the BIOS.I would be careful if you don`t have a UPS(Uninteruptable Power Supply)because if you loose power for even a second,you could corrupt your BIOS.I`m not trying to scare you off from doing it,just want you to be aware of the risks.It`s not hard at all,just take your time,be careful and you will be fine.Good Luck!

 

[JohnJ]

wow man thats so cool! idcc seems like a convenient way to overclock! sweet!
do u think i should get better ram ( in case i need to change the memory voltage for whatever reason) id so what can u recomend ( board specs say 1.8-1.9v and nothing over ddr2800 supported via intel) or do u think my mushkin 1.8v ddr2 800 value ram will cut it and still remain stable to overclock my cpu to 3.0 ghz

 

[HERSHEY]

That`s what I said when I saw the IDCC.I can`t really advise you on memory as this was my first overclock,other than an Nvidia graphics card using CoolBits.If you go to the overclocking section in these forums,you can learn what you want to know from people far more knowledgeable than me.I do seem to remember people saying Mushkin being good to overclock.You can lower your memory speed and increase your FSB and the speed will go up with it.From what I understand,the memory speed has more of an impact on performance than memory timings,but as I said others here are more knowledgeable.I`m glad I could help in some small way.If I can answer any other questions I will be happy to.I just don`t want to give you wrong advise.Most of what I know about overclocking,I learned from these forums.There are alot of people here you can learn from.