Gigabyte GA-965P-DS3 BIOS wont "stay"

Folks,
I just put together my new box.

The specs are:
Antec P180 case
E6400
2G Ballistix (1G x 2) DDR2 PC2-6400
Gigabyte GA-965P-DS3
Radeon Z1950XT 256MB
Seagate SATAII HD
Antec True Power Trio 430W P/S
Award F9 BIOS

I heard that it had good, easy overclocking potential, so I did.

The settings I was told to adjust are:
In Advanced BIOS Features, set to disable:
Limit CPUID Max to 3
CPU Enhanced Halt (C1E)
CPU Thermal Monitor 2 (TM2)
CPU EIST Function

In PC Health Status, set to disable:
Fan Speed Control Method

In MB Intelligent Tweaker (M.I.T.):
CPU Host Clock Control to Enabled
CPU Host Frequency (MHz) to 376
PCI Express Frequency (MHz) to 100
System Memory Multiplier to 2.00
DRAM Timing Selectable to Manual
CAS Latency Time to 5
DRAM RAS# to CAS# Delay to 5
DRAM RAS# Precharge to 5
Precharge Delay (tRAS) to 12

I hit to “save settings and exit”. I then boot up fast and game the rest of the night.

Problem is, when I reboot after the machine has been off for the day, it does not boot up to the desktop. I just hear the videocard fan going at full speed. After I hit the reset switch, it boots, but some (not all) of the settings that I changed in the BIOS do not stay. They will stay if I change them again and restart, and will also stay after I do a hard restart. I have run some torture tests and RAM tests, and all are fine and temps stayed below 60C.

Can it be the mobo battery? The board? Did I not make a setting that I should set, or set one I shouldn’t have?

Also, I am not sure how to set proper voltage with my RAM sticks, since I don't see in BIOS what they are at, and which BIOS setting adjusts it. Do they NEED to be adjusted? Can I assume that it is 1.8v and that my sticks should run at 2.2v?

As always, thanks in advance for your help.

- Rob

Unfortunately I had the same problem and had to go back to my Asus P5B-E, make sure you have the latest bios F10 - many people had the same problem. The only 100% fix I know of, is to change to another motherboard.

That's the cold boot issue that plagues so many ds3 users. I see you're on F9 bios. Have you tried F7 and F10 to see if they help any?

Also, c1e and eist disabled is right. You don't need to disable tm2 and it'd be better to keep it on.

Also, try fsb400, and pcie 110. 110 is still safe and also can bring a little added performance.

For making sure of stability, set vcore to 1.375 first.

Also, make sure ram is at whatever voltage it should be at (+0.4)

Hit ctrl+f1 when you're in the bios to unhide options.

This should land you at 3.2ghz, run your ram at its rated speed (note vdimm bump of +0.4v to arrive at 2.2v) and vcore of 1.375 (might need 1.4v) to boot (and then lower vcore as you see fit while maintaining stability).

Also, what are you using to determine temps?

With new speedfan beta (need to sign up to download), you can get coretemp there. Vcore2 in speedfan would show vdimm voltage.

In any event, cold boot doesn't seem to be completely resolved. It has been dramatically improved for some depending on bios. Personally, I've found F7 to be the best for me.

Is the cold boot problem on DS3 rev1 only? Does the problem carry over to DS3 rev 2?

WickedWeasel said:

Is the cold boot problem on DS3 rev1 only? Does the problem carry over to DS3 rev 2?

Click to expand...

I've had both rev1 and rev2. Rev2 was a bit better, but still existed on slight occasion. My rev1 is also doing well now that I stopped fiddling with bios settings

Once the overclocking settings are determined and if I don't tweak those parameters again, would the DS3 be stable without any worries?


Would someone who knows nothing about computers be able to recover if the cold boot problem happened suddenly?

WickedWeasel said:

Once the overclocking settings are determined and if I don't tweak those parameters again, would the DS3 be stable without any worries?


Would someone who knows nothing about computers be able to recover if the cold boot problem happened suddenly?

Click to expand...

I can't say for you if cold boot will disappear. I wouldn't trust it to completely disappear. Also, I don't reboot frequently, but I have tried keeping the computer off to see if it's there. I've heard from some folks that it takes longer sometimes for it to surface, so I wouldn't guarantee it won't show up.

Also, would someone who knows nothing... It depends. Most times when the cold boot situation occurs, it'll start, turn off, start, turn off, start. And then it'll be at the stock fsb etc. It won't give any errors I don't think so the computer would just be running stock. However, I have also seen it cold boot where it infinitely loops start/off/start/off. Definitely would want someone who would know to turn the computer off and try again, and if it fails, to turn it off and wait for you to fix it, since harddrive up and down won't make it last long.

Sometimes if it's stuck in a cold boot loop, if you press and hold the reset button, it'll eventually boot up at stock speeds.

Overall, the ds3 is a little bit of a headache, but it can work. I guess if I could have gone without a serial port, I would have considered the asus p5b or if I could have gone without parallel, the biostar. However, that said, both of those have headers, and I'd need to just find a plug I'd imagine.

Eitherway, we're both in the same boat now it looks, so we just have to deal with it.

Ziddey
thanks for the information. I might look at the Asus P5B-E instead, but the Asus board has problems with the sound and I don't want to buy a sound card.

WickedWeasel said:

Once the overclocking settings are determined and if I don't tweak those parameters again, would the DS3 be stable without any worries?


Would someone who knows nothing about computers be able to recover if the cold boot problem happened suddenly?

Click to expand...

No, thats what we are saying. At any time when you boot up the OC would be lost forever until you reset it. Its a hassle and not worth the time. Stick with the Asus P5B series and you'll be much happier.

I have worked extensively with the DS3 rev. 1 and also am now at bios F10.

I had the cold boot problems while exploring the overclocking settings for the FSB, memory, CPU, voltage, timings, bus speeds, etc. ............. - you know the drill.

Bottom line, I believe it was never the fault of the motherboard, per se, but just getting used to the limits of the ram, cpu, memory at the various settings.

You have to be very systematic about overclocking so as not to complicate the tuning. For example, if your pushing the cpu, but at the same time, maybe it's the ram that's crapping out, it will be really, really, really, hard to figure out the root causes.



I have NO cold boot problems now, and I can jump around with the multiplier, fsb and other settings because I now Know my machine and it's hardware; the bios maybe/probably!

In particular, and for starters, loosen up the ram timings bigtime if you're still playing around with the fsb and cpu clocks; save memory tweeking for LAST.[ try 5-5-5-15 and no overclock first]

Also, run the voltage at "normal" (which actually isn't normal at all) until you don't get any cold boot problems, then once you think you have a stable overclock, then you can mess with voltages to lower temps.

This process finally worked for me.

But, I'm not discounting troubles others have had, just suggesting that hardware is rarely to blame; the bios, maybe/probably! But Giga seems good at updating the bios, compared to others, including Asus.

M

P.S. My proof of the above is that many people are now complaining about the Rev. 2!! - I'm not kidding; LOL.

dekruyter said:

I have worked extensively with the DS3 rev. 1 and also am now at bios F10.

I had the cold boot problems while exploring the overclocking settings for the FSB, memory, CPU, voltage, timings, bus speeds, etc. ............. - you know the drill.

Bottom line, I believe it was never the fault of the motherboard, per se, but just getting used to the limits of the ram, cpu, memory at the various settings.

You have to be very systematic about overclocking so as not to complicate the tuning. For example, if your pushing the cpu, but at the same time, maybe it's the ram that's crapping out, it will be really, really, really, hard to figure out the root causes.



I have NO cold boot problems now, and I can jump around with the multiplier, fsb and other settings because I now Know my machine and it's hardware; the bios maybe/probably!

In particular, and for starters, loosen up the ram timings bigtime if you're still playing around with the fsb and cpu clocks; save memory tweeking for LAST.[ try 5-5-5-15 and no overclock first]

Also, run the voltage at "normal" (which actually isn't normal at all) until you don't get any cold boot problems, then once you think you have a stable overclock, then you can mess with voltages to lower temps.

This process finally worked for me.

But, I'm not discounting troubles others have had, just suggesting that hardware is rarely to blame; the bios, maybe/probably! But Giga seems good at updating the bios, compared to others, including Asus.

M

P.S. My proof of the above is that many people are now complaining about the Rev. 2!! - I'm not kidding; LOL.

Click to expand...

I stuck with this board from F7- F10 and I always had issues with the cold boot at the same overclock that is stable on every boot up on the P5B-E. If you dont want problems, you don't want the DS3 - bottom line.

You've got some great overclocking there with the E6300 - actually astounding. I really wasn't suggesting that someone attempt that severe of an overclock with a budget DS3 motherboard.

But, I'm sure you have a good appreciation of what determined people can do with, what seems, just about any board. Coolater over at Extreme Systems was easily [< I threw this in just to encourage some flamming] able to overclock the DS3 to a FSB of 570, and without the cold boot problem (and with the difficult E6600). I can only assume, that in the right hands, amazing things can be done. For about $130, it's a good board. If I have $300+ to spend (and that's the price of higher-end gaming boards coming out by Abit, Asus, etc.), I would buy something else.

M

I did not start having any problems until F9 then I went to F10 same thing. Now reverted back to F7 BIOS and all is well again with my DS3.

WDN, you seem pretty knowledgeable, so I want to say, I don't really understand how "newer" bios versions could prevent overclocking per se. I don't understand it when people say this, because it assumes Giga is making radical changes in the bios to dum it down or limit the overclocking. I wish I knew more about how bios are designed and written.

I know, there's probably small RAM data base in them, probably also a voltage / FSB database. I just don't know.

M

dekruyter said:

WDN, you seem pretty knowledgeable, so I want to say, I don't really understand how "newer" bios versions could prevent overclocking per se. I don't understand it when people say this, because it assumes Giga is making radical changes in the bios to dum it down or limit the overclocking. I wish I knew more about how bios are designed and written.

I know, there's probably small RAM data base in them, probably also a voltage / FSB database. I just don't know.

M

Click to expand...

From my experience on the outside looking in the new BIOS does not prevent overclocking per se. It seems to have problems like something is corrupting the CMOS or something. In otherwords when it gets in the "won't cold boot" state I can always restore it to the same overclock I had previously. But to get there again I have to go through the drill of turning off the power, clearing the CMOS memory, reload the "optimum settings" by selecting that option from the BIOS menu. then re-enter all the setttings I had before assuming I wrote it all down correctly. Then F10 "save CMOS settings and exit" and yes, it will reboot. Just a pain in the neck to do that.

My understanding was the F9 BIOS was really to push the DS3 to 500 MHz and beyond and my DDR2 RAM can't be pushed to that level anyway. So just in my case, I am happier with the older BIOS. At least Gigabyte maintains their product well and frequently updates the BIOS code so you can pick & choose the one that works best for you.

I'm glad I found this post. I had no idea that this was a common problem and thought it was somehow my hardware's fault (which it kinda is). I am running the F9 bios right now so I guess I will update to the F10 bios and see what happens. This is quite annoying to say the least. I sometimes shut down my computer at night because it is somewhat noisy and every morning I have to wrestle with it to boot up again. I may have to instead just lower my fan speeds at night and just keep my computer running.