XFX 790i Ultra...are there actually any success stories

[Grimmwor]

I bought an XFX 790i Ultra at compusa the other day and I am getting ready to build a system. I will be running 4gb Patriot DDR3 (2x2gb), QX9650 cpu, two 8800GTX video cards in SLI and Windows Vista x64.

Reading these forums and others on the internet, I have read nothing but post after post after post of people having problems. Does this thing even work!?

Is there anyone out there that has a similar setup as my that is not having any problems?

[Scott]

They work. You have remember that people post when they have an issue, they usually do not post saying my machine works the way it should.

I personally do not have one but Gregg has one and reviewed it and did so without any issues that I am aware of.

[Eclipsedwraith]

The 790i is now working for me. Granted I am not using a quad core, but I did have some issues at first. Make sure to have the latest BIOS and I am using the 175.80 Drivers which finally made my SLI work. Also just pay attention to what your memory settings are and make sure bios is displaying them correctly or even the install of an OS can be a challange.




E8400 C2D 3.0 (Wolfdale/45nm)
OCZ ReaperX 4Gig (2x2) 1333mhz 8-7-7-22 2T 1.7v
XFX 790i MB
FSB 1.2v
Mem 1.7v
SPP 1.4v
GTLVref -55/Auto/Auto/Auto
2 SATA 150 Raptor Drives (Raided)
1 SATA 1TB Drive
PNY 9800 GTX OC Edition x2 (SLI)
800 Taj PSU
P60 Armor Lian LI Case
40" Sony Bravo (Monitor)

[XFX Tech]

Most of the time people are having problems it is memory related. If you make sure your timings and voltages are set correctly you should be fine. DDR3 is very new and seems to have some growing pains. If you need help setting your timings manually your memory manufacturer can help or we can help you do that if you have what the timings are supposed to be. Something I see commonly is SPDs set with a 1T command rate which is usually too aggressive for the sticks, especially with four sticks. I would always run 2T unless you plan on pushing very high voltage.

[Fidler]

Mine posted first time. Installed P05 Bios update first and set corsair ram voltage and timing before trying to install Vista 64X. System running right now OC'd to 3.19 GHz without a problem. Ram came up to rated timing and have not tried to OC yet. System installed and is running smooth without problems. Only minor think I noticed is that the Northbridge heatsink fan makes too much noise. But, all-in-all a very good motherboard.

['Amp!']

I use a 790i with a QX9650 and 4GB DDR3 (4x1GB)

No problems what so ever.

Just don't expect to hit 500MHZ FSB with your CPU.

Tuning will take some time and this board doesn't have as many adjustments as other boards do.

You are going to LOVE the SLI performance on this board though. It is friggin awesome.

[Chaohsiang]

I had it put together for a week, and I had some problem with Vista 64 initially, but all were resolved now. Overclocked E8200 to 3.33GHz and it runs fine at 1.2V. Did 3dmark06 test continuously and heat problem kicked in after a few test cycle. FSB runs at 1.666GHz without a fuss. I don't have all the cooling capacity I need so I run it at 3.16GHz instead and at stock when speed is not needed. The Patriot 2x1GB was set to 1.5V 9-9-9-24 and I can't get it cranked up beyond stock speed. I don't run SATA RAID so I don't know about the corrupted hard drive problem. P05 update seems to work fine now for me.

[0nAir]

Gotta say mighty encouraging to hear some success stories.
Was a little worried their momentarily.

[Methious]

High end boards just take a little more effort to run buy the pay off is sweet.

Most times it's a BIOS or memory problem, and some of the DDR3 really has to be tuned to run right.

It's kinda like driving a manual transmission VS an Automatic. The automatic will get you there with less effort but it's not nearly as satisfying.

[Desarts]

Well,

I have still tickets outstanding with the tech support for ages. They closed the first, opened now a second. The problem I have is with the fact that I have problems with the raid. Occassionally not recognising the stripe during startup but mainly within the windows.

I thought for a long time that it were the nvidia drivers, but since I removed those I still get frequent OS problems.

This is what I am running:
CPU Type DualCore Intel Core 2 Duo E8500, 3166 MHz (9.5 x 333)
Motherboard Name XFX MB-N790-IUL9 (2 PCI, 2 PCI-E x1, 3 PCI-E x16, 4 DDR3 DIMM, Audio, Dual Gigabit LAN, IEEE-1394)
Motherboard Chipset nVIDIA nForce 790i Ultra SLI
System Memory 4096 MB (DDR3-1066 DDR3 SDRAM)
DIMM3: Micron OCZ3RPX1333EB2G 2 GB DDR3-1066 DDR3 SDRAM (6-5-5-20 @ 533 MHz)
DIMM4: Micron OCZ3RPX1333EB2G 2 GB DDR3-1066 DDR3 SDRAM (6-5-5-20 @ 533 MHz)
BIOS Type Award (05/16/08)

Video Adapter NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT (512 MB)

Disk Drive NVIDIA STRIPE 596.18G (596 GB)

My system is not overclocked.

Running CPU at stockspeed.
Mem voltage at 1.85v
Mem is synched and linked

Error messages are:
A parity error was detected on \Device\RaidPort1. (error)
Reset to device, \Device\RaidPort1, was issued. (warning)

They always come one after the error. Get between 4 to 20 in a row and then it is fine again for a bit. System is locked / acts slow during that time.

I have 2 Seagate 320GB drives in RAID0 setup.

Using Bios P05.

Only answers / help I get online is to move my memory to even slower settings.

I have low level tested the drives with Seagate tools and no problems. Already returned this XFX board once for another problem and got a new one. Both boards had the same problem.

Ordered 2 more disks which will arive tomorrow different brand and 160GB in size and will set them up as RAID1 to test and see if the problems were with the drives.

Anyone, any ideas?

[Methious]

Yes I have an idea.

Start your own thread so it gets the proper attention.

Then have you tried reloading windows, updating all drivers to the latest, making sure to load the latest raid drivers available for the motherboard when you load windows?

Given that it happened across two boards it might be some thing your setup is doing and not the board. If your not over clocked unlink the memory and set it at factory timings. Almost every thing you do runs through the ram, if it's over clocked, under or over volted it can cause you problems but run right 98% of the time. Even running to tight a timings can cause problems.

Have you run memtest 86 on the ram from a boot disk to verify it's good? Have you run prime 95 or Orthos to make sure the system is stable? Even if it's not over clocked that can help to isolate the problem.

[Methious]

Oh I almost forgot, since that's an almost totally new Mobo on the market it might just need time for the bios and drivers to mature and bugs to get fixed.

[Chaohsiang]

Set FSB:RAM ratio 5:4 and see if it works. 1333/5*4=1066. In this way you run your RAM at stock speed and it should work fine with Ram voltage set to 1.7V. If not, than there's a problem. Mine system with E8200 @ 3.16GHz (FSB 1583 5:4 RAM @1333) doesn't seem to run properly all the time. I am still trying to figure out what is the cause of instability under OC.

[ciaina]

After problems coming from a faulty Vista64 DVD...
:keepfolding:

Now...after 2 days of Drivers install...Sandra and 3DMark06 everything it seems workin fine :) :smile:

My rig:
CPU Q9450 @3200 (8 x 400)
Mobo XFX N790i P05
4gb G.Skill DDR3 1600 PI TT Series 7-7-7-18-trc30-1.900 V
SLI XFX 9800 GTX Black Edition
Amacrox 1000w Freestyle
Raid0 Raptor 280gb

Bios Manual settings are only 1,900v and timings on the Great Skills, FSB at Sync 1600.
All the others are at AUTO.
CPU says 1,29 (gray)
All the volt Auto setting are grey apart from:
SPP -> green, should be 1,30v if I remember well. GTVLREF are -50 first 2 (gray).
Should I enable P1 & P2 ?

No lockups, no freeze, no BSODS.
I plan to stress tonight with Prime and Super PI and OCCT.
Also some Memtest.

Anyway, I found that:
To install O.S. ONLY 1 stick and at 1333 Jedec timings.
After installing, before last boot change to 1600 at Jedec timings or Vista will not boot at all.
In order to Bench or play games, needs to run at 1600 and with G.Skill timings, 7-7-7-18.

I dunno if I'm lucky or... :lol:
But this board at AUTO settings ROCKS!!!:-D

Hope to help who have troubles with this black/greenie piece of art!!! :wink: