Author Topic: The Nforce and simplicity ? (Read 417 times)

Pollock · « **on:** December 26, 2001, 02:58:00 PM »

Ok,

I have been reading the boards alot today at work and I am sensing a vibe on the Nforce.

As i mentioned in other posts today I am looking to dedicate a pc to gaming and playing only, keeping another to do day to day stuff. I hate overclocking, updtating, flashing etc. I love playing games and downloading music and funny video clips from the internet. I lately have been spending more time fixing and rebooting my sytem than having fun and that is why i think the Nforce is the way to go. If AH ever goes way of the XBOX then that will be nirvana on my widescreen HD TV perhaps maybe in the future.

Is anyone using the Nforce with AH, and what kind of cost am i looking at to get a killer Nforce system.

Pollock · « **Reply #1 on:** December 26, 2001, 03:06:00 PM »

Oops just to add my current specs are;

AMD tbird 850
Asus A7v133 (socket A)
Pc 133 Ram 512 (128 sticks)
Geforce3 Ti 200 64meg (visiontek 6564)
Maxtor udma 7200rpm 45gig HD
19" sylvania monitor
50x cd rom old
16X samsung cd burner (new)
Windows 98 SE (running SGE)
Saitek x36 usb and TM elite pedals

I am thinking of using the current MOBO,cpu,cd,and memory for day to day system.

bloom25 · « **Reply #2 on:** December 27, 2001, 12:06:00 AM »

Pollock, what's the problems you are having with the existing system? Those A7V series boards can be tricky to setup, but I've always managed to get them rock solid stable. (The newest VIA drivers modify some AGP timing on the KT133a boards like yours and really do seem to help in stability. The only problem is best results are obtained if they are installed right after Windows.)

Is the nForce a stable board? From firsthand experience and from reviews I've been reading; I'd say yes. It is still very new though, so issues may pop up. As you already know, it's not an overclocking board. Integrated sound, to put it mildly, is absolutely incredible. The layout of the board (at least the MSI K7N420 Pro I used) was the best I've seen in a long time.

I have a firm set of 4 rules when doing AMD Athlon based systems, if you break them you are asking for trouble:

Rule 1: 300W or greater AMD Approved power supply.

Rule 2: Top quality ram. (Crucial is good.)

Rule 3: Adequate cooling - this means an AMD approved (for the speed CPU you will be using) heatsink and fan. When you get the heatsink and fan, if it has one of those little square thermal pads on the bottom, scrape it off with a credit card and rag and replace it with some Artic Silver 2 (or Silicone heatsink grease). Those thermal pads don't work as well and they glue themselves to the CPU die, making getting the heatsink off in the future hard to do. The case must also have either (or better yet both) a spot for a rear case fan or a side panel mounted fan.

Rule 4: When building a VIA chipset based board, load the VIA drivers right after Windows. (Does not apply to nForce board, just use the driver that comes on the CD right after Windows comes up for the first time.) Violating this rule with a VIA chipset board will ALWAYS result in an unstable (in games at least) system if you load the video card drivers or Direct X before getting those VIA drivers in.

_____________________________ ________________

Pollock, if you do want to do a system with this board, private message me. The manual it comes with is pretty sparse and I can save you some trouble setting up the board. (For example, the locations of the pins to plug on the power switch connector.)

Pollock · « **Reply #3 on:** December 27, 2001, 03:44:00 PM »

Bloom,

The problems have mostly been a blue screen with yellow bar in the middle of the display.
Complete lock up and have to reboot. This problem would occurr if puter was left unattended or overnight.
I never had this until I added the GF3 card my V7700 was rock solid (Imiss it).
The card is stock (no O' clocking)

Steps taken:

1. Removed 21.83 drivers, det destroyed and loaded 14.10whql. problem still exists.

2. Loaded VIA 4 and 1 drivers auto installed newest ones for XP (OOOPS) Hosed my puter insta safe mode. Totally corrupted my IDE controllers (bigger oops) would not repair when removed from cpanel device mgr kept locking system.

3. Fresh reload on Win98 SE, loaded old 4 and 1s from last year, now sometimes burner works sometimes it dont and I still have the blue lock ups occasionaly, oh and if I disco from AH or sometimes leave I get some kind of VBB error (at work dont recall exact error)

I think after the new year I will up the cpu to 1.3 gig, get some top notch ram, and reformat system what ya think?

bloom25 · « **Reply #4 on:** December 28, 2001, 12:34:00 AM »

It almost sounds to me like that video card might be flaky. For performance reasons I'd go into the bios and set the AGP aperature to 128 MB though.

As far as the burner goes, if you reloaded windows you need to be sure you reenabled "DMA" under properties for both your CD drives under device manager. There is a little checkbox that says "DMA" under properties for you CD Rom drives, make sure it's checked. (This is a common issue with CD burners, regardless of motherboard and chipset.)