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Core2Duo (Conroe) chipsets and chipsets for OSx86

bofors

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thedguy
thedguy
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This is a choice motherboard for overclocking Conroe for only about $150: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16813128012

 

Note that it ranks high in the [H]ardForum Conroe Overclock Database: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1075792

 

Hopefully, Apple will release a 965 Mac in the next month, so we can get the IDE channel on these 965 boards working.

 

The guys on Xtremesystems are beating the junk out of this board. I've seen a couple of e6300's running on 525mhz FSB's breaking well into the 3.7ghz territory. I'm only going for 3.2. Currently at 2.1 (haven't even put real effort into my OC yet).

 

With the latest bios (F4) it seems to be rather good board, I'd almost go so far as recommending it to others.

But...

 

I have my problems with Gigabyte but this board seems to vindicate them...sorta, the Pata/Sata raid controller (all the same) just plane blows. My burner wouldn't work right (in WinXP) unless I set it to the board to "Raid/IDE" rather than just run in IDE. Don't understand why and doesn't really change the way windows see's the PATA stuff but it works now.

 

Anyway back on topic, with an SATA converter/DVD-rom I bet this board would make an excellent mac system, once I get my system sorted I'll throw 10.4.7 back on and see what I can do. Now I need to find out if I can get the X800's to work well in osx.

 

Nice, and we didn't even need device id changes!

 

So far the DVD just refuses to boot if i use the jmicron IDE controller from the P5B Deluxe, but, I'll try a PATA to SATA converter to connect my DVD drive on the ICH8. At least, we're now sure that usb dvd drives and ich8 sata does work.

 

With all 965's (even official Intel boards) running non intel ATA controllers, I don't think there's going to be much chance of PATA dvd drivers working natively. If a $15 ata/sata converter gets the job done, I'll be glad to use it and get off the Gigabyte controller.

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bofors
bofors
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The guys on Xtremesystems are beating the junk out of this board.

 

Ya, I was looking at their GA-965P-DS3 thread: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=106685

 

With all 965's (even official Intel boards) running non intel ATA controllers, I don't think there's going to be much chance of PATA dvd drivers working natively.

 

But it seems like these IDE/ATA controllers must be standardized somehow, else how do they expect people to install Windows from DVD?

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thedguy
thedguy
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But it seems like these IDE/ATA controllers must be standardized somehow, else how do they expect people to install Windows from DVD?

 

Honestly this part I'm not sure of, but I noticed the ATA chipset on my Gigabyte board is different from the Asus options. But since windows can work with them without a special driver, I guess I can see your point...why couldn't mac if apple put support for it in OSX.

 

 

Now, I am wondering about overclocking RAM for Conroe. What is the best value? Is DDR2-800 necessary? What is the story with 1:1 at DDR2-533?

 

I'm still in the process of playing, I've been busy building and toying with entirely way to many systems in my house...

 

I bought DDR2-667, it's patriot ram was 180 @ new egg (with 20$ rebate). This stuff I've heard plenty of reports of hitting 900+mhz FSB's. On the E6300 with a 7x multi that'll get me to 3.1ghz with a 1:1 ratio, by telling the system it's 533 ram then everclocking from there, the bios for some reason is weird in how they label the FSB:dram ratio.

 

Quality DDR-800 or better will overclock higher, it's all in what you want to do. The highest I know of with my ram is DDR920 or 460 FSBx7 for a total of 3.22ghz with my ram.

 

Considering this is getting a bit :offtopic: if you want any more info shoot me some PM's, I'll try to remember to check 'em :D

 

edit: here's another link to some overclock with the budget e6300 and DS3

http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=83355

 

If your planning on buying into one, I'd serously consider waiting for the e4300, same as the e6600 but runs at DDR400, and has the factory with a 9x multiplier. I'm plenty satisifed with a stock 6300 but as long as I needed new ram and mobo, why not get the overclockable good stuff right? :D

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thedguy
thedguy
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If you have a 965 Motherboard from Asus you will face a lot of problems. The JMicron works only for Windows.

 

If you have a IDE-DVDplayer... it doesnt works. With Sata-DVDplayer all works fine.

 

Look the ubuntuforum wich discuss this problem:

http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=234706

 

Identical issue with the Gigabyte boards. I couldn't get any of my *nix disk's to load with the IDE.

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passport
passport
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For what it's worth I'm running the ASRock 945G-DVI with a 6400 and haven't seen any stuttering with both cores active. I was running on a twin Xeon 2.8 system but it made too much noise for desktop use. I haven't pushed the overclocking yet, just at 295 on the fsb with the ram running 1:1. The little system buries the Xeon and an X2 4200 @ 2.6 gHZ on benchmarks and video encoding (which what I mainly use the systems for) is great. I've still got the find the time to address the sound and the network. Currently I'm running a GA311 (Netgear) PCI adapter that seems to work fine although it feels like it's only running @ 100 under OSX.

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bofors
bofors
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Considering this is getting a bit :P if you want any more info shoot me some PM's, I'll try to remember to check 'em :P

 

:P

This thread has turned into something that is a little different than I had originally intended create. But memory issues are central to my buying decisions, so I do not think they are "off-topic" and I want discuss them here. Once I actually settle on my parts, I will create a new thread to log my experience with my particular build and discuss related issues. While I have spent quite bit of time researching and pricing out the parts for a Conroe box in the last day or so, I am still pretty far away from ordering.

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thedguy
thedguy
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;)

This thread has turned into something that is a little different than I had originally intended create.

 

In that case...

 

Here's the ram I bought:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...N82E16820220095

as mentioned before I've heard of plenty of guys hitting DDR900 speeds with it. It seems to be killer memory for the money, if I was able/willing to spend more, I probably would have gone for some quality DDR-800. I just couldn't justify the added 50+ to do it for a marginal gain.

 

I tried to hit a 400mhz FSB, but couldn't do it, not sure if it's bios or cooling, but I know the hardware should do it. Once I get my home server setup and get time to finalize my current systems setup, I'm may follow your lead on a build up thread, or atleast do a mini-hijack :angel:

 

 

 

so can you buy an ide-sata converter and run your dvd rom off the sata bus? can you boot and intsall osx like that?

 

Preliminary tests on the GA-965p-DQ6 seem to say this won't work. In fact it looks as though any SATA DVD drives won't work..

http://forum.insanelymac.com/index.php?sho...id=179675

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icyderguru
icyderguru
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I was thinking about buying a External Hardware Sata Raid for 2 Drives.

Have a look at http://www.thinkcomputers.org/index.php?x=...=457&page=1

anothere interesting review http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=4817&page=1

 

Has anybody tried booting from one of these with raid 0 (of course from a hackintosh)?

 

I dont see any reason why it shouldnt work or am i missing something?

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bofors
bofors
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I dont see any reason why it shouldnt work or am i missing something?

 

I think it highly unlikely that these will work. First of all, assuming you want eSATA because USB is almost pointless here, you have to deal with the PCI card driver issue.

 

Then if you can "see' the device, I doubt that a hackintosh will be able to boot off it because the BIOS bootloader we are currently using does seem to work with Apple's software RAID and unless these devices are designed for OS X, it is not probable their hardware RAID emulates an HFS+ partition.

 

In short, using a the EFI bootloader and/or hardware RAID designed for OS X (x86) may be requried for something like this to work.

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icyderguru
icyderguru
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There are eSata to Sata Converters so you can just plug it into a Sata Port on your Mainboard (as stated in one of the reviews, they just dont recommend doing so). And as far as i understood the system will detect the drives on the sata port just like one drive so i wouldnt have to deal with the eSata PCI Card or any drivers (which caps 2 150gb raptors look at http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/04/17/the...rage/index.html )

 

As i see it the provided external eSata card was slowing things down which should be way faster (i think Thecus stated somewhere that this card is only for very old systems without eSata Connector) with one of the onboard Sata Ports.

 

For the Bootloader i have no clue, maybe i am ordering one Thecus N2050 soon together with en eSata to Sata converter, i need more disk space anyway.

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Conroe Mac
Conroe Mac
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Another member has 10.4.7 up on a Gigabyte DS4R.

 

I plan to install from DVD PATA converted to SATA next week on the Gigabyte DS3. This is an excellent board, as others have already said. I've had it since it first hit the market.

 

In a few days when I'm home again, I'll post any results I get for install to the Gigabye GA-965P-DS3. Things are looking much better for the 965 chipset. Maybe you won't have to spend $250 on a motherboard for a Conroe Macintosh.

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thedguy
thedguy
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I haven't had the chance to make any progress on mac yet but...

 

I played around a bit with my overclocking, It seems I'm hitting a Wall at 380mhz FSB's. Once in a while I'll get lucky and hit 390. temps and system are cool and stable, mobo just won't take the higher FSB's.

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Arcanis
Arcanis
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Now, I am wondering about overclocking RAM for Conroe. What is the best value? Is DDR2-800 necessary? What is the story with 1:1 at DDR2-533?

 

The lowest memory divider is 1:1, so, if you want to overclock to 400MHz FSB (400x4 = 1600 quad pumped) you must have DDR2-800 capable memory at least.

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bofors
bofors
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so can you buy an ide-sata converter and run your dvd rom off the sata bus? can you boot and intsall osx like that?

 

Since sbeehre (Simon) did not post his results here, I will for the record. He was unable to install OSx86, (I am not sure which version, but would guess JaS' 10.4.7) on his Intel DP965LT via USB or the use of an IDE/SATA convertor.

 

Simon is planning on buying an Intel "Bad Axe" board now and we are working to fully support that board with "custom" EFI firmware.

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thedguy
thedguy
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A new update, got 385 FSB 1:1 out of my board. Not a single voltage changed. can't seem to go higher no matter what hardware I change, remove or voltages. I may have to try ram...

 

Thats after I throw OSX back on this box.

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sbeehre
sbeehre
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thanks bofors! i forgot to post that info here :compress: it seems that the 965LT is a bit flaky with things like USB CD-ROM's and definitley the SATA to ide converter! it really didnt like that at all! I have just gone about ordering a 975 bad axe and should have it soon.

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