MSI P6N SLI-FI / Platinum (650i) Thread

First off, system specs:
P6N SLI-FI, 2.6 BIOS, 60mm fan blowing on NB
E6550 (65nm, G0 stepping, default speed of 7x333 for 2.33GHz)
Scythe Ninja RevB with a home built back plate and bolted to the board
2x1GB Geil DDR2 800MHz C4, supposed to be D9 chips GX22GB6400UDCA=
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820144062
8800GT 512MB
Antec TP3-650W PSU

I've had the board for over a year and did some initial overclocking putting it around 3.3GHz using 1800 QDR FSB. I finally decided to really spend some time wringing every last bit out of it. It is 24 hours OCCT stable at these settings:


500MHz FSB (2000 QDR), unlinked
900MHz memory 4-4-4-12-2T at 2.00V (10:9 FSB:DRAM ratio)
CPU volts +0.0375V
NB 1.45V
SB 1.60V
FSB VTT at 16%

I'm right on the bleeding edge of what the NB can do as bumping the bus speed up much higher always results in a quick memtest86 failure despite dropping the CPU down to the 6x multiplier. There's not much left in the CPU though either. It crashed in Vista with 0.000V in the BIOS very quickly. It failed OCCT after 1.5hours with 0.05V, so I had to back it down to 0.0375V.Idle temps run around 40C and load peaks at 63C with Core Temp 0.99.3 which lists my Tjunction as 100C (case panels off). I was getting weird messages and BSODs during reboots until I bumped the VTT all the way up to 16%. VTT becomes pretty important when you start pushing the FSB to the limits, but based on my research, I wouldn't recommend the 20% setting for anything but short benchmarking runs and even 16% might be too much for 24/7 operation.

I don't know why, but on my board with the 2.6 BIOS, I still have to press F4 to get it to show the C1E Support option in the BIOS.
 
speedfrk said:
I'm having a strange problem with my system (P6N SLI FI Q6600). Recently, it has been having brief (2-5sec) lockups when I open folders on either of the local hard drives and it is worse if it is a network drive. Very frustrating. Almost like a SATA or IDE problem. Anyone else experience this or have any idea what is causing it?
Click to expand...

I had a problem like this with another machine I have. I had a JMicron eSata card in the computer and updating the drivers with the latest solved the problem of lockups and other weirdness I was having.
 
Dees_Troy said:
I had a problem like this with another machine I have. I had a JMicron eSata card in the computer and updating the drivers with the latest solved the problem of lockups and other weirdness I was having.
Click to expand...

Turns out it is a windows problem. Windows tries to read every media file so that when you hover over the icon, it will tell you file size, type, resolution, etc. With all the large HD video files I had, windows was choking on them and explorer was using 100% cpu for a few seconds to try to read each file... and some of them are over 10GB. I had to turn off video preview to fix the problem. Slightly annoying, but not a huge loss.
 
hey everyone I have a crappy problem
with my new rig I have a p6n diamond and I need to increase the memory voltage in order to get it to run with the memory I have
no big deal I know exactly what to set it to and how to do it
but the BIG DEAL IS THAT IN THE BIOS THE MEM> VOLTAGE IS GRAYED OUT SO I CANNOT CHANGE IT
please help me I have no idea why I am having this problem and would love some assistance
thanx
 
You can still change it with the +/- keys, just select it and hit em, i know its goffy but thats msi for yah.
 
actually you cannot change them with the +/_ keys but you can change them with the page up/down keys I found that out somewhere else
 
Hey guys I originally purchased the P6N plat when building my system a year ago because I was under the impression that I'd later be able to upgrade to the newer Penryn/Yorkfield cores later on. Well, I've been reading around lately (because I plan to upgrade to an E8600, or some quad-core Yorkfield) and it turns out that the results have been a mixed bag. Could someone please answer the following questions and the summerise the situation for me?

-I've heard that sometimes after the switch of processors, the motherboard gets bricked. Is this true?

-I've heard that when the motherboard doesn't brick itself, it either doesn't post, or it boots up fine but is unstable..?

-I've heard that some people have been able to get their computers to post by "overclocking" the processor to stock speeds? Which to me is unacceptable.

-Lastly, is 400mhz fsb possible on air with this board?

Thanks
 
imjames123 said:
Hey guys I originally purchased the P6N plat when building my system a year ago because I was under the impression that I'd later be able to upgrade to the newer Penryn/Yorkfield cores later on. Well, I've been reading around lately (because I plan to upgrade to an E8600, or some quad-core Yorkfield) and it turns out that the results have been a mixed bag. Could someone please answer the following questions and the summerise the situation for me?

-I've heard that sometimes after the switch of processors, the motherboard gets bricked. Is this true?

-I've heard that when the motherboard doesn't brick itself, it either doesn't post, or it boots up fine but is unstable..?

-I've heard that some people have been able to get their computers to post by "overclocking" the processor to stock speeds? Which to me is unacceptable.

-Lastly, is 400mhz fsb possible on air with this board?

Thanks
Click to expand...

I have not heard of any motherboards getting bricked due to a processor switch.

Before you pop the new processor in, be sure to flash to the latest BIOS available at the MSI site. It is true that a lot of times it won't POST with the new processor. If this happens, you'll need to send your board in to MSI so they can fix it to be compatible with your new CPU. Even though it may not POST with the new processor, switching back to the old processor should still work.

Some people may have tried this with new processors before the new BIOSes came out. I'm not sure I've heard of this issue myself.

My P6N SLI-FI which is very similar to your P6N Diamond does 500MHz FSB. The only change I did was to add a fan to blow on the northbridge heatsink. Now, not all processors will do 400MHz FSB, but the board is certainly capable of it.
 
qlz19 said:
hey everyone I have a crappy problem
with my new rig I have a p6n diamond and I need to increase the memory voltage in order to get it to run with the memory I have
no big deal I know exactly what to set it to and how to do it
but the BIG DEAL IS THAT IN THE BIOS THE MEM> VOLTAGE IS GRAYED OUT SO I CANNOT CHANGE IT
please help me I have no idea why I am having this problem and would love some assistance
thanx
Click to expand...

Sniper_Merc said:
You can still change it with the +/- keys, just select it and hit em, i know its goffy but thats msi for yah.
Click to expand...

Grayed out with MSI just means that it's set to the default setting, not that it can't be changed. Red means you may be pushing something well past its limits.
 
Well, my computer has been running pretty well for the last year and a half but I'm now looking at upgrading the CPU. Here is my current configuration...

Core 2 Duo e6600 @ 3.150 Ghz
Scythe Infinity (Push/Pull w/ 2x Silver Stone FM121 at 1600RPMs)
4GB G.Skill PC2-6400 (F2-6400CL4-1GBPK) 5-5-5-15
MSI P6N SLI Platinum
eVGA Geforce 8800 GTX
500GB SATA WD HD
Corsair 650W PS
Gigabyte Aurora

I'm looking at upgrading the CPU and I was wondering what recommendations you all might have. Obviously I'd like something that I can get to overclock easily with my current cooling setup. Thanks!
 
Xaxius, I don't think you will see too great of a gain with only a CPU upgrade. Your [email protected] is adequate as it stands, but upgrading to a quad or 8400 (crapshoot if it works with your board, IMO) won't help immensely.
I also wouldn't recommend a GPU upgrade past a GTX260, as anything faster will be sitting there waiting on your CPU to send it some data.

You would be better served going to a Q6600/6700 and a GTX260 (192) as your best bang for the buck upgrade, but I hesitate to recommend that given the limited gains you would see for the amount it would cost to upgrade (roughly $365 for both card and CPU).
 
I just went from a q6600 core duo to a used 8400. 3300mhz to 4050. 1.45v

This is on a 4-5 year old water cooling system. Temps get up to 60 on a cool day with orthos. No issues. Easiest overclock yet. Great upgrade. Had to put a bigger blower fan on the northbridge tho. Thanks for all the advise guys!
 
I need some more help.

I decided to get a little crazy and bought two OCZ SSD 64GB drives and an Adaptec 2405. Total price after rebates... around $340.00. The question is, will the MSI P6N support the x8 PCI-E in the second slot for the Adaptec card? Also, is the Adaptec card compatible with the 65i chipset?

Anyone have any experience with these?

P.S.: I went this route as I'm planning a MB, CPU and Graphics card overhaul in the Spring. The SSD prices were also too good to pass up. :)
 
Xaxius said:
I need some more help.

I decided to get a little crazy and bought two OCZ SSD 64GB drives and an Adaptec 2405. Total price after rebates... around $340.00. The question is, will the MSI P6N support the x8 PCI-E in the second slot for the Adaptec card? Also, is the Adaptec card compatible with the 65i chipset?

Anyone have any experience with these?

P.S.: I went this route as I'm planning a MB, CPU and Graphics card overhaul in the Spring. The SSD prices were also too good to pass up. :)
Click to expand...

I asked a guy i know at Nvidia about that, to see if the second PCI-E slot would work for say an x1 - x8 slotted card and he said yes, it should work fine for any of those cards not just for video.
 
It supports the older quads (Q6600, 6700) but not the newer quads. Some people have had luck getting it to work, but I would not risk it if I were you. Just get a Q6600- or get a new board.
 
Hi there!

First off, sorry for my bad writing. But English is not my native language.

I've had a motherboard MSI P6N SLI V2 and a E4300 for almost 2 years. Everything works perfectly.

The things is that yesterday I bought an E7300 in order to replace my old E4300.

So I updated the BIOS to he last one (v1.4) from MSI, installed the processador on my rig and cleared the CMOS. But my PC dosen't boot.

I don't know what to do. According to what MSI web site says, P6N SLI V2 (BIOS 1.4) works with Intel E7300.

The processador I bought is an E7300 Wolfdale SLAPB.


PS: Of course I haven't had the opportunity to read the whole thread (100 pages)
Happy new year!:p
 
So I updated the BIOS to he last one (v1.4) from MSI
Click to expand...

I'm looking at the available BIOS updates for the P6N SLI, and altho you did not specify what board you have exactly, I will assume it was the P6N SLI, not the Platinum. The newest BIOS for that is the 2.7 AMI BIOS, so my guess is you loaded the wrong BIOS for your board ?
There is a P6N SLI, P6N SLI Platinum, P6N SLI Diamond and even an OEM P6N (found at CompGeeks) with no second PCIe slot. Looks like you are now in deep doo doo. :confused:

Edit: Added link to BIOS list for P6N SLI board:
http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=bios&maincat_no=1&prod_no=1141
 
Walkintarget said:
I'm looking at the available BIOS updates for the P6N SLI, and altho you did not specify what board you have exactly, I will assume it was the P6N SLI, not the Platinum. The newest BIOS for that is the 2.7 AMI BIOS, so my guess is you loaded the wrong BIOS for your board ?
There is a P6N SLI, P6N SLI Platinum, P6N SLI Diamond and even an OEM P6N (found at CompGeeks) with no second PCIe slot. Looks like you are now in deep doo doo. :confused:

Edit: Added link to BIOS list for P6N SLI board:
http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=bios&maincat_no=1&prod_no=1141
Click to expand...

You are looking at P6N SLI BIOS's. Buy my board is P6N SLI V2. And the lastest BIOS version for my board is v1.4.

Have a look: http://global.msi.com.tw/index.php?func=downloaddetail&type=bios&maincat_no=1&prod_no=1169

Unluckily I can't get my micro worked on mi P6N SLI V2. (OFF Topic: Is this structure correct? I'm just learning a bit of English :D)

Another suggestion? BTW, thanks.
 
318, firstly did you try and put the old CPU back in and boot with that ? That's the first thing to do in this case. I'm glad I was incorrect on your BIOS flash, as I had no idea there was yet another P6N board version out in the wild.
Try the 4300 and see what the board does. After reading dozens of posts on the inconsistencies of this board in supporting newer CPUs, I have decided its wasted effort to attempt to make it work (or even boot in your case) reliably, so I bought a Q6700 to pop into my board.
 
Walkintarget said:
318, firstly did you try and put the old CPU back in and boot with that ? That's the first thing to do in this case. I'm glad I was incorrect on your BIOS flash, as I had no idea there was yet another P6N board version out in the wild.
Try the 4300 and see what the board does. After reading dozens of posts on the inconsistencies of this board in supporting newer CPUs, I have decided its wasted effort to attempt to make it work (or even boot in your case) reliably, so I bought a Q6700 to pop into my board.
Click to expand...

When I realized E7300 wouldn't work on mi PC, I put the E4300 back and everything worked perfectly.
 
318mathias said:
When I realized E7300 wouldn't work on mi PC, I put the E4300 back and everything worked perfectly.
Click to expand...

318, if I were you, I would just overclock your 4300. Just set the FSB to run at 1066 instead of 800 and you will have a very nice, easy overclock. There is also a good chance that it will go much higher since these processors are well known to do >3Ghz.
 
Point is, he has the 7300, so given the purchase, he's most interested in getting it working. I'd want the same thing if I had the e7300 too.
Good news is, the board is OK, so its something in the BIOS that is causing the no POST condition.
 
speedfrk said:
318, if I were you, I would just overclock your 4300. Just set the FSB to run at 1066 instead of 800 and you will have a very nice, easy overclock. There is also a good chance that it will go much higher since these processors are well known to do >3Ghz.
Click to expand...

As Walkintarget says, I do have the E7300 and I just want to get it working.

Walkintarget said:
Point is, he has the 7300, so given the purchase, he's most interested in getting it working. I'd want the same thing if I had the e7300 too.
Good news is, the board is OK, so its something in the BIOS that is causing the no POST condition.
Click to expand...

I've been looking for any answer on the net and realized that I'm not the only one who has problems.
Have a look:
http://forum.msi.com.tw/index.php?topic=118340.msg892325#msg892325
http://forum.msi.com.tw/index.php?topic=122068.msg921693#msg921693

Unfortunately, P6N SLI "XX" is sometimes incompatible with E7X00.

I think I'll have to buy a newest board.
 
I bought me a E8500 CPU updated my bios on my MSi P6N SLi fi and yet the thing still will not post, no matter what I do it wont post with the E8500 in there. I have tried just about everything I can do.

It still works like a champ with the E6300 but slap the E8500 in there and it just sits there blank screen doing nothing!

Anyone have any advice? If not looks like I am on my way to a new MB...................


EDIT: I have read everything in here just curious if anyone has any new information.

If not I am going back to ASUS MB, I always used them up to this one and now I remember why!!
 
I updated my BIOS a while back to one of the ones that is supposed to work with the 45nm chips. I recently tested an E5200 in my P6N SLI FI and it POSTed just fine. Unfortunately, now that I've put it back together with my regular E6550, it will no longer overclock nearly as much as it used to. It used to do 7x500 for 3.5GHz, but now I am stuck at 3.06GHz. I may buy an E7400 and a P7N Diamond because of the good chance of getting 4+GHz since I'm stuck around 3GHz now.
 
After RMA'ing 2 boards, a platinum and a fi, both of them came back, one replaced one had been worked on, neither would run in dual channel mode with any memory i tried, they are now sitting in a box gathering dust.

Mebe i'll use em for target practice, thats all they are good for now.
 
I'm glad a lot of people have had good experiences with their boards but mine has a weird problem. Sometimes when I turn it on, it won't go to BIOS, and if it does, it tells me the CMOS is bad and needs to be reset, which is very annoying and stopping me from turning my computer off now.

If no one knows whats wrong, I might need to buy a new board. Would anyone recommend going i7 or staying with 775 but getting a Quad (have an e6750 now).

EDIT: Forgot, its a Platinum P6N
 
OK, I'm posting here to see if anyone else has experienced this problem.

I have the P6N SLI-FI. It has been running smooth since this post was begun. Recently, I've started having random lockups. It's been getting so bad lately that it was happening after only 15 minutes running. I have backed all settings to the default & the processor is no longer overclocked. I have tried 4 different sets of ram & 3 power supplies. I have even disconnected everything except for the video card & one DVD drive from it & it still does it in memtest. The one thing I have noticed is a faint hissing noise emanating somewhere from around the top PCI express slot or CPU area (hard to tell) when the lockup happens. This noise is present even if I stop all the fans. Oddly, I replaced my motherboard with a P7N Platinum (refurb which was probably stupid at this point) & it does the exact same thing, only much less frequently.
 
Vicinity said:
I'm glad a lot of people have had good experiences with their boards but mine has a weird problem. Sometimes when I turn it on, it won't go to BIOS, and if it does, it tells me the CMOS is bad and needs to be reset, which is very annoying and stopping me from turning my computer off now.

If no one knows whats wrong, I might need to buy a new board. Would anyone recommend going i7 or staying with 775 but getting a Quad (have an e6750 now).

EDIT: Forgot, its a Platinum P6N
Click to expand...

Try a new cmos battery...
 
normalicy said:
OK, I'm posting here to see if anyone else has experienced this problem.

I have the P6N SLI-FI. It has been running smooth since this post was begun. Recently, I've started having random lockups. It's been getting so bad lately that it was happening after only 15 minutes running. I have backed all settings to the default & the processor is no longer overclocked. I have tried 4 different sets of ram & 3 power supplies. I have even disconnected everything except for the video card & one DVD drive from it & it still does it in memtest. The one thing I have noticed is a faint hissing noise emanating somewhere from around the top PCI express slot or CPU area (hard to tell) when the lockup happens. This noise is present even if I stop all the fans. Oddly, I replaced my motherboard with a P7N Platinum (refurb which was probably stupid at this point) & it does the exact same thing, only much less frequently.
Click to expand...

Sounds like bad RAM. Do you have some other RAM you can use to test it?
 
im having a problem now with my wireless and I'm thinking it is a hardware issue. After reinstalling windows my wireless connection icon refuses to appear in the network connections. I've reinstalled twice, repaired, re-installed the drivers, bought a new wireless adapter, and gone through at least a half a dozen configuration/troubleshooting tutorials. Do you guys think this is an issue with the motherboard? I don't know what else to do.
 
I've reinstalled twice, repaired, re-installed the drivers, bought a new wireless adapter, and gone through at least a half a dozen configuration/troubleshooting tutorials
Click to expand...

Have you tried uninstalling TCP/IP and then reinstalling the protocol itself ? We've had some at work that would only work by doing this.
 
speedfrk said:
Sounds like bad RAM. Do you have some other RAM you can use to test it?
Click to expand...

Yes, as noted, I tried 4 different sets of RAM, all that were known working. In memtest, it will go with any of the sets for a long time. That is until the hissing sound. Then memtest starts throwing errors like crazy. I've even tried a different CPU. I've heard that it may be a capactior after some searching. That would suck.
 
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