The New AMD Building Thread

I wouldn't really call removing the parallel port a major redesign, besides a lot of the DS boards have already done away with it.
The main feature of UD4 though is better chipst heatsinks, well, better than the standard boards anyway.
You don't need hardware acceleration to play DVDs. If that's the problem you've got, your DVD decoder isn't working and it's nothing to do with the graphics chip, as the CPU renders DVDs perfectly smoothly, even on an old Athlon XP.

Have you considered the bugs you're experiencing may be limited to ATI's integrated offerings?

 

I'm sure of it! the HD-3200 was magnificent to watch even on a cheapie no name monitor that came from a tire store in LA! Now the graphics are there, but no smoothness to the DVDs and the digital doesn't pick it up at all. Just a black screen! Tomorrow I'll pull the Lite-On out of Oxi and try it and see how it plays. I just tried playing direct from the hard drive and it's the same thing! Both Pioneers played about the same, on the old nVidia 64MB PCI card from the Dell Workstation. I even tried it on that for three days, and while it struggled with the high resolution, it did work, though painfully slow. I even tried VLC Player, which will work on darn near any computer. It has it's own decoder and it plays the same. Something in the video drivers or bios, and I'm not sending it back again! It doesn't fair any better with the big 19" Dell Flatscreen CRT either at 1280x1024. I know they'll get the bugs out, but I don't want to wait!

I'm short on memory right now as the Dell only has 512MB and only one 1GHz P-III CPU at the moment. Two of my Rambus 256's died! Originally we were going to put 2GB in it, but I think we've grown well past the old Dell. It just can't hold it's own anymore, it's no longer a viable computer, and isn't going to get much better than it was with a gig and two 1GHz CPUs. It's just too old and too slow! It's officially become a semi-retired emergency computer!

Russ

 

Perhaps consider an HD3450? By all means buy something like an 8400GS, but I see that more as avoiding the problem than solving it...

 

Any know where I can pick-up some reasonable priced PC2700 DIMM CL2.5 Memory. At a better price then this
Also will this replace the PC2700
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...escription=&Ntk=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=
G.SKILL Value 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit $56.99

 

It's not a problem that's up to me to solve. At least they are moving the right direction as it now shows my monitor as a Sceptre in Catalyst.

BTW when I said Parallel port, I meant the header for it on the motherboard isn't there, not the physical port. I have the break-out for it, but no internal plug on the motherboard to plug it into.

Russ

 

sam,
Here's what display properties showed originally.



Here's what it showed after installing the latest drivers!



Notice that #1 is now shown as a widescreen, where when it was the default monitor, it was 4:3 and there was no 1680x1050 listed in the resolution. It jumped from 1600x1200 to 1792x1344.

I didn't take any screen shots of CCC before because it was the same in display properties. This is what it shows now!



Again, note the #1 display. It shows a widescreen, and it shows it as a Sceptre. If you try and adjust any of the display settings in CCC, it will switch the screen to 1600x1200, and you have to pan both sides of the screen as it's too wide to fit the monitor. It may say 1680x1050, but it's not what you get. The funny thing is if you change the resolution to something less, and re-boot, it comes up in a proper 1680x1050! I don't have the time to wait for ATi to get it right!

BTW, you mentioned a 3450 or an 8400. Is the 8400 a better card than the 9500 GT I linked to? I chose the Biostar because of the GDDR3 memory, and the faster memory speed. It was the only nVidia, at that price with decent specs! Is that a mistake on my part?

Best Regards,
Russ

 

Fair enough. To be honest, keeping Parallel on a board is a bit of an anachronism these days.

As for the problem with your card, it's specific to that GPU, not all ATIs, as I've never seen anyone else with that problem, I certainly don't have it. Dropping a brand due to one bad product is fair enough, but don't push that on anyone else. One GPU isn't enough evidence to condemn ATIs as a whole. Remembering that is all that separates real users from the nvidia fan club.

For ref, The 9500 is much better than the 8400, but the 8400 is much cheaper and uses less power (and is on par with the HD3300 in terms of performance)

 

Sam,
I'm not condemning anything, it's just my luck with ATi. I just don't want to spend the next couple of months fiddling with it, so I'll get the 9500GT. I didn't see anything better for $75 or less total cost. I would love to be able to afford the MSI HD-4850 that I like so much, but just don't have the dollars to afford it! LOL!!

Power is not a problem, and I don't think heat will be either as the case cools real well, plus the side lower intake fan will blow cool air right on the video card, and do something useful for a change.

Russ

 

My hunch is that you wouldn't have to spend more than 10 minutes fiddling if you bought a dedicated ATI card, but I can totally empathise with forgetting about lengthy diagnostics and extra expense. I'm up to my eyeballs in really expensive hardware with Crossfire X and am no closer to getting it working.

 

I've experienced all types of PC problems over the years but I've never had one with a Video card that affected my decision to purchase a competing product except for performance. Although I admittedly have more Nvidia cards than I do ATI cards (they're better for folding), dollar for dollar ATI cards at this time are ahead of Nvidia cards where it counts. Whether I choose a Nvidia card or an ATI card, they always work to their specs for me.

 

Sophocles,
Since it's OBG, and the problems are obviously in the software, I just don't want to waste the next couple of months waiting for ATi to get it right. The Video chip is the same on the 780GX as it is on the 790GX, and all the HD-3200 graphics I've seen so far, have wowed me! I'm just "snake bit" when it comes to ATi. The best ATi I've had to date was the Sapphire X800-GTO I had, and even it gave me a couple of problems, although nothing serious like this. There doesn't seem to be hardly any video acceleration at all. The computer runs fine, except for the video. I don't feel that I want to waste the time waiting for ATi to get whatever the problem is cured, and I have a good use for the 9500 GT, once they do cure it! If it worked OK with a different monitor, that would be one thing, but the video suffers the same problem with every monitor I've tried on it, be it CRT or LCD! The Graphics are stunning, as long as they don't move! LOL!! Even dragging a window around on the desktop, the edges of the window fracture when you try to move the window fast. There's just no speed!

Best Regards,
Russ

 

So it's integrated graphics at fault, but since you're buying a dedicated card, you still can't use an ATi, just because their integrated graphics specifically have issues... Doesn't make much sense to me.

 

Sam,
I don't think it's the hardware, because it worked magnificently with the 780GX chipset, and the video portion of the NB is the same. It's not that I can't use an ATi card, it's the fact that I've had so many problems in the past with ATi video cards, I feel snake bit by them! I could well put a 3850 in it or even a 4850 if I had the money. I'm just so much more comfortable with nVidia cards. The only issues I ever had with all the ones I've owned over the years have been minimal and usually were resolved with different drivers. It also disturbs me that ATi has no answer at the moment for these problems! Then again, most enthusiasts, gamers and so on, don't use the OBG anyway!

I went to AMD's site as instructed and downloaded the latest HD-3300 drivers and Avivo, and the only improvements I got was it sometimes shows the monitor as a Sceptre and it does render 1680x1050 properly, but only if I don't let CCC load. Otherwise there is no 1680x1050 listed at all, as a choice. With the 9500 GT, I know it will work with DVI, as I tried it on several other computers with other various nVidia cards, including the 9500 GT! It also worked on several older ATi cards as well! Unless I was going to do HyBrid CrossFire, the 3450 is a lot less video card than I want!

I just ordered this!
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127373
Less money, free shipping and comes with a free Far Cry 2 PC Game. It also has a DVI and an HDMI port instead of a VGA Port. Outstanding!

Russ

 

Well, you've made your decision and that's fair enough. Obviously I feel compelled to find things like this. Overall the HD4650 is maybe around 10% faster than the 9500GT.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814140096

At the cheaper end, there's this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125250

Not only VGA, DVI and HDMI, but fanless as well.

 

Well, I'm still having problems with optical drives. I just sent back the two Pioneers and replaced them with two AD-7220s drives. At first only the first one (Drive "H") would see a blank DVD and the second one (Drive "I") wouldn't. I was able to burn on each drive although I got 12 errors with Drive "I". Now it will no longer sees blank DVD media on drive "G", only Drive "I". There is no way that you could possibly get 7 bad drives in a row!

Another thing is it rarely boots on the first try any longer. It usually takes two or three tries to get it to boot. I've downloaded the latest chipset drivers that I got from AMD for the 790GX chipset, and upgraded the bios to the latest. I can finally set my memory to dual channel, and there's a few more adjustments added to the setup.

All I know is that it's driving me crazy! LOL!!

Russ

 

SUBSCRIBED!!! LOL.

So...are intel fanboys allowed in here LOL. Just teasing.

Way to go russ. You know im smiling about this thread! This thread may just come in handy for my next build. My sister is gonna need a new computer, as well as my mother before too long. And since they dont have a lot of money to spend, I have a feeling AMD is gonna be the way to go. $$$/Power ratio is VERY good!

 

Are all the bad drives SATA or are there some IDE mixed in ther also?
My machine absolutely would not run right if I tried changing BIOS settings, OC and the sort, if using SATA ODD's

 

Bad interface controller perhaps?

 

My hard drives have been sata for years, but my Opticals have always been IDE. Never had a problem before. I pulled the two Sata's and tested them on Oxi. Burned a DVD with each by different methods with no problems. Each disk finalized and finished. Playback was perfect with no jumping of the picture. On mine, it doesn't play any better playing from the hard drive. Since both Sata and IDE are controlled by the Southbridge, I think it's a Southbridge problem. The computer is certainly fast enough at everything else. Time to RMA the Motherboard! I've changed everything else but it and the CPU, and I can't see the CPU causing this problem!

Best Regards,
Russ

 

And this is the UD4H? The one with the S-ata re-placement? You told me, and I recall seeing the sata ports arranged in a different manor. I wonder how many other people are experiencing this issue.