My Bits And Bobs

Matt

Bright Spark
My Intel Quad Core Q9550 has arrived. DHL really annoy me, they seem to have ripped and torn the box. Kinda defeated the whole object of asking Paul for the box version when i phoned up a week ago last saturday. The processor and fan inside were fine though. :)

Was absolutely bricking it when it came to removing my old chip and installing this one. Never done it before and although some youtube vids and meds raised my confidence, i was still worried i would botch it up.

I was planning to move my old E6750 into my girls pc, so she can beneift from the extra speed, she currently has a old P4 3.2ghz chip from PCS.

Rather than do it on mine and mess it up, i decided to remove her cpu first. I thought if worst comes worst ill only be breaking a crappy p4. ;)

Thankfully it was rather easy removing the chip. I then removed my E6750 just as easily. Then came the hard part, i was trying to make sure that i didnt touch the underside, of either the base or the cpu. This now gave me the arm shakes, which was really making things difficult as i focused on placing it down carefully into the slot.

I felt like i was heavy handed, but i think that was because i was nervous. As soon as it was slotted in i quickly connected everything and switched back on and prayed for the beep.

Beep, phew! Went perfectly. Nice low temps after adding more arctic silver to her stock intel fan and bobs your uncle.

Here is her order number 201266, detailing her motherboard. I tweaked some bios settings, but i couldn't seem to get her fsb above 300mhz in the bios, meaning the chip is only running at 2.4ghz. Any help on this? Her bios looks kinda basic (yes i flashed to the latest version before install from the asus site). Her memory is running at correct stock speed 667mhz corsair value ram 2 gig.

Another problem since the change, i cannot get vista to boot. It comes up with windows failed to start, a recent hardware or software change may have caused this.

Tried booting into safe mode, last known good config, booting from windows vista cd (working pirate version :eek:) but they all come up eventually with a bsod irq less or whatever that error is.

It says, the File >> winload.exe the selected entry could be loaded because the application is missing or corrupt.

Note, i have her pc running on a raid 64k. (0)

At a loss with that one.

Installed My Q9550 fine, trying it on the other pc raised my confidence a bit, still have the arm shakes though, damn arm shakes.

Once installed, applied the arctic silver, was not sure how to apply compound for a quad, used to doing a core so i applied a thin amount and spread it. Sat my Xigamtek s-183 on top. Defaulted bios options and got into windows and finding idle temps in a hot room sitting at 34/35/36/38.

Comments and advice welcome and appreciated.

HD 5850 should arrive tomorrow.

EDIT, added a screenshot of CPU ID, everything look ok there guys? (PS ignore the sims 3, i dont play it)

 
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Matt

Bright Spark
Just ran prime 95 for a few minutes, completed two tests and the highest temp was on core 1 at 52c. Looking good, this Xigmatek is cheap and tacky but damn it cools well for £20.
 

Matt

Bright Spark
Glad your Q9550 has installed pain free. Looking at your daughter's PC, it has the ASUS P5VD2-VM motherboard. I've checked the CPU support list here:

http://support.asus.com/cpusupport/cpusupport.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=P5VD2-VM&product=1

Although it lists the E6700, it does not list the E6750, so this may be causing the problem, and I don't think ASUS will release any new BIOS for this motherboard, since it's 3 years old now :(

I did check this before, and was worried about it. However a search of google seemed to indicate that people were using this cpu with this motherboard.

If the motherboard didn't support the cpu would bios still recognise it, and boot ok, but just not boot into windows?

Damn, i was not expecting this. :(

Oh btw she is not my daughter, its my girlfriend. :)
 

PCS

Administrator
Staff member
Sorry, must have mis-read your post.

Sometimes the PC will boot, other times it will not. If you put your old CPU back in and all is well, then it's most likely to be this issue. Also, ensure your motherboard is flashed to the 0201 BIOS and not an older version.
 

Matt

Bright Spark
Sorry, must have mis-read your post.

Sometimes the PC will boot, other times it will not. If you put your old CPU back in and all is well, then it's most likely to be this issue. Also, ensure your motherboard is flashed to the 0201 BIOS and not an older version.

Ok thanks, i did flash to the latest version before install.

I'll have to try the old P4, but its not looking good. :(
 

Matt

Bright Spark
I fitted the P4 back in her system, and sure enough it worked.

With regard to my Q9550, its amazing what it can do. Stock volts seem around 1.25 but i have got it running at 3.8ghz 1.175 and i think i could probably lower the volts even more.

I can definitely overclock it some more but my memory is holding me back so im happy with 3.8ghz for now. After 30 minutes of prime small ff's the highest core temp was 62c.
 

Matt

Bright Spark
I could do with some overclocking help from the pc specialists with regard to my memory.

Its bringing up errors in prime 95 blend test with rounding errors.

The cpu test brings up no errors in ff so i know thats fine.

I have Corsair Xms2 800mhz running at 901mhz @2.1 volts. Timings (which i know little about are at auto which is (i think) 5-5-5-15.
 

Gorman

Author Level
Tried booting into safe mode, last known good config, booting from windows vista cd (working pirate version ) but they all come up eventually with a bsod irq less or whatever that error is.

Ok first off and you should expect this. Dont use pirate software! Windows is cheap as chips nowadays and if someone has altered the kernal to bypass activation you really have no idea what else has been changed too. Pirate windows = unstable system, this is not just MS talking its from my own personal experience. If im asked to fix a machine with non-legit Windows i just walkaway nowadays :p Even if your install is legit, dont trust torrented media.

Your booting problem could be down to windows freaking out over the "significant" hardware change, not being able to tell if the install is using legit software this could cause big problems when changing core components.

What i would do is get my hands on a legit Vista dvd and run startup repair when it fails to boot. This should at least give you an indication wether the issue is hardware or software / activation related.
 

Matt

Bright Spark
Ok first off and you should expect this. Dont use pirate software! Windows is cheap as chips nowadays and if someone has altered the kernal to bypass activation you really have no idea what else has been changed too. Pirate windows = unstable system, this is not just MS talking its from my own personal experience. If im asked to fix a machine with non-legit Windows i just walkaway nowadays :p Even if your install is legit, dont trust torrented media.

Your booting problem could be down to windows freaking out over the "significant" hardware change, not being able to tell if the install is using legit software this could cause big problems when changing core components.

What i would do is get my hands on a legit Vista dvd and run startup repair when it fails to boot. This should at least give you an indication wether the issue is hardware or software / activation related.

I know I'm a bad man. I do intend to get a legal copy for the other machine when i can afford it.

I came to the conclusion that its probably more to do with the fact that the motherboard does not support the E6750 CPU, even though it supports the E6600 and E6700.

I dropped PCS a PM in the hope that he could order one in for me (ideally a lower spec CPU) from this list http://support.asus.com/cpusupport/cpusupport.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=P5VD2-VM&product=1

Having a hard job finding any reputable sellers selling them. Don't really want to buy off ebay if i can afford.

With regard to my own, i have currently settled on a Cpu overclock @ 3.7ghz and a slight memory overclock at 870mhz. No errors in prime, think that's as far as this memory can go stable.
 

Matt

Bright Spark
Look what just arrived...





She's pretty ain't she?:eek:

I have to say i was not expecting the after market cooling version of the 5850, absolutely chuffed with this, and with the price i paid. You guys rock. :cool:

Now to install it and get my 4890 on ebay! ;)
 

Gorman

Author Level
oi u shush!

Steve

Im sorry, ATI cards are good stuff too.

Did you see the reference cooler for that series? Heres a stock photo.

batman.jpg
 

Matt

Bright Spark
Uh Oh. Pc is not booting, however i think ive just pulled out a led by mistake as i plugged one of the leds in and when i switched the power on the pc automatically booted up.

Its weird, they look the same as before, but i must have one wrong somewhere. What shall i do? Its very fiddly :(

Edit, the only two that aren't plugged in are the black and white power sw and white and blue powe led, the other half of this led (white and blue) is a three pin and that is plugged in as far as i can see.
 
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Gorman

Author Level
Uh Oh. Pc is not booting, however i think ive just pulled out a led by mistake as i plugged one of the leds in and when i switched the power on the pc automatically booted up.

Its weird, they look the same as before, but i must have one wrong somewhere. What shall i do? Its very fiddly :(

Edit, the only two that aren't plugged in are the black and white power sw and white and blue powe led, the other half of this led (white and blue) is a three pin and that is plugged in as far as i can see.

If i read that right its not booting as the power switch isnt attached. Motherboard manual time, get that one sorted and see if the switch works.
 
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