X58 chipset problems, QPI problems, GreenPower II caused crashes: info here!

Question

Hi,
I've just solved some of the mysteries I've experienced with my Eclipse SLI which does use X58 Chipset and which appear to be also problems other boards with X58 chipset show. Here's my findings:
1) If XMP profile is enabled, the QPI speed is locked at 4800. Higher values may be selected but do not become effective. After reboot, the BIOS shows 4800 as QPI setting. Disable XMP profile as workaround. Manual setting of non SPD speed settings like 1600 still works!
2) When resuming from S3 sleep the BIOS ignores the RAM timings and uses different RAM timings, including massive undertiming of RAM. This may prevent systems from waking up, cause instability or (in case of slower timings) slow down the machine. Workarounds: Either select a RAM frequency where the changed settings after S3 won't do any harm or configure the system not to sleep but hibernate instead. From hibernate, the system resumes with proper RAM timings!
3) When setting RAM frequencies that require more than 1.5v it may crash the computer to launch GreenPower II as GreenPower II does reduce RAM voltage to 1.5 even if it's in 1600 mode where the RAM info reads 1.65 volt (mine runs stable at 1.55 and almost stable at 1.5 but most RAM will fail instantly when values below 1.65 are selected at 1600 speed). GPII simply ignores manually set RAM voltage and undervolts. Hurry to advance mode after launching GPII and select (or re-select) proper voltage. GPII may show proper voltage for a short period of time and then reduce it to 1.5 (especially after S3/hibernate / change to default and back to optimize). Re-selecting the proper voltage (even if it's shown correctly for a short period of time) prevents GPII from reducing voltage and thus crashing the system.
Tech support is notified, but it seems that it requires many more reports of other users for something to happen, thus, if you have an X58 chipset board and experience some of those problems above, REPORT IT TO TECH SUPPORT!
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Answer 1

Quote from: NovJoe on 08-March-10, 00:02:21
So mainly you need the GPII for the fan speed regulation, right? But without it, the system works fine or will still have problems?
Well, problems remaining without GPII:
1) XMP profile disables QPI settings above 4800 (harmless once I found it out, as I can set speeds without enabling XMP profile). This seems to be a BIOS problem.
2) When resuming from S3 the RAM timings are incorrect (I'm using hibernate now, but would love to be able to use sleep from time to time without faulty RAM timings as a result). This seems to be a X58 problem.
Thus yes, GPII mainly is for fan speed regulation and other problems can be worked around. I basically wrote those observations here in case other people might run into those problems, as I've seen reports from other users with X58 boards here who cannot even wake from S3 and my guess is that their RAM is underclocked after resume from S3. Others might also have crashes when running @1.65v and enabling GPII, so I also did write that. My RAM typically will allow to fix voltage even when GPII goes down to 1.5 - those Corsair sticks really are impressive.
To make it complete: since the last BIOS update I've had some instability with Crysis and overheat-freezes by GPU heat when running Kombustor. I never tried Kombustor before, only tried it after those new crysis problems. It looks like the new instability can be resolved easily (some BIOS value adjustment for the Crysis thing) and the GPU heat problem with Kombustor is already written in VGA section, but it appears it's only happening with Kombustor and caused by VGA fan speed not going high enough combined with the GPU causing system freeze at 96-97C although GTX295 should work until 105C...but if normal operation won't ever cause such heat, it shouldn't be a problem.
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