Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7 Excessive DPC Latency

[eastley]

Woot, I worked out one thing that can make the DPC rise!

Playing FLAC files, uncompressed music, epic fail on this motherboard, yet I have no issues playing FLAC with my ASUS.

More confused now, how is there a difference?

[Dark Mantis]

I can understand that having to decompress a complicated file could have an effect on the latency but why it should effect one motherboard as opposed to another is difficult to understand.

[eastley]

Beats me, I have been playing that particular FLAC album for god knows how long, way before I got this board, yet the issue has been ever since I got this board.

It MAY be coincidence. Going to take some testing. However I still do get the odd DPC spike with no FLAC files running, which I still can not reproduce no matter what I try, seems to be random.

[buzzard]

eastley, try watching the temperature LED's on the motherboard while running DPC latency tester on your screen.  Do this at night when it is dark in the room so that the LED's on the motherboard are easily seen.  Put some load on your computer (playing FLAC files).  The north bridge temp or the cpu temp can cause latency.  As soon as either one of them reach a certain point (the temp LED on the board illuminates), the latency hits.  I mounted an active fan over my north bridge heatsink and the problem has disappeared.

[Dark Mantis]

Well that would fit with my observations. My latency readings are always low and I can't get them to rise but my Northbridge is watercooled along with the rest of my motherboard.

[nanpan]

Today,I got a new GA-X58A-UD7(REV:1.0) beta BIOS from GigaByte(ver:F7s). The DPC Latency's problem can be solved by the BIOS file.

The BIOS file has solved the BUG that motherboard's TEMP LED of CPU and Northbridge when they change with DPC latency time increased.

it's a beta bios, so just could solve the DPC Latency BUG only.

[Dark Mantis]

That's a good step forward for anyone suffering from that problem, as I say it's not something that affected me but I can understand that it would have atremendous impact on some people. Let's just hope the BIOS is stable and doesn't cause any other bugs.

[eastley]

Today,I got a new GA-X58A-UD7(REV:1.0) beta BIOS from GigaByte(ver:F7s). The DPC Latency's problem can be solved by the BIOS file.

The BIOS file has solved the BUG that motherboard's TEMP LED of CPU and Northbridge when they change with DPC latency time increased.

it's a beta bios, so just could solve the DPC Latency BUG only.

Going to try this now.

Got massive issues tonight, heat building up, heater on. Have to take the front of the case off, let more air get in there to stop it.

Case is well air'd as it is, temps are fine with front on, just needs to be cooler.

[Dark Mantis]

What exactly are you trying to say? That the ambient room temperature is too high?

[cc2iscool]

eastley, try watching the temperature LED's on the motherboard while running DPC latency tester on your screen.  Do this at night when it is dark in the room so that the LED's on the motherboard are easily seen.  Put some load on your computer (playing FLAC files).  The north bridge temp or the cpu temp can cause latency.  As soon as either one of them reach a certain point (the temp LED on the board illuminates), the latency hits.  I mounted an active fan over my north bridge heatsink and the problem has disappeared.

Which fan did you get for your northbridge? I am having the same problem with my GA-X58A-UD3R rev2 board when it hits a certain temperature after long periods of gaming/load and it's driving me insane. I've got a support ticket in with Gigabyte but it's not been answered yet.

Maybe we'll get a BIOS update or something out of it.

[Dark Mantis]

Going to try this now.

Got massive issues tonight, heat building up, heater on. Have to take the front of the case off, let more air get in there to stop it.

Case is well air'd as it is, temps are fine with front on, just needs to be cooler.

That is what you said in your post. It sounded like the room was too hot that's what prompted me to ask about the ambient temperature.

What about putting a dedicated fan on the Northbridge to cool it?

[cc2iscool]

That is what you said in your post. It sounded like the room was too hot that's what prompted me to ask about the ambient temperature.

What about putting a dedicated fan on the Northbridge to cool it?

It is not very hot in the room my computer is in, and I actually bought a new case with better airflow, which helps a lot, but the northbridge still gets hot and causes the DPC latency to shoot through the roof, around 30,000 until it cools back down, then it runs normally, where it sits around 100-120 for DPC latency.

What fan would you recommend?

[Dark Mantis]

More or less any small fan would do to just keep the temperture of the nothbridge down. Fixing it down would be the difficult bit so look for one that isn't going to be much trouble to fit. I take it that you have already fitted the "Silent Heatpipe Module" that is supplied to cool the Northbridge and used heatsink paste?

[cc2iscool]

More or less any small fan would do to just keep the temperture of the nothbridge down. Fixing it down would be the difficult bit so look for one that isn't going to be much trouble to fit. I take it that you have already fitted the "Silent Heatpipe Module" that is supplied to cool the Northbridge and used heatsink paste?

The northbridge heatsink was pre-installed. I'll probably wait for buzzard's reply so I know what he used, unless I get an updated response from Gigabyte on my support ticket with a fix.

[Dark Mantis]

Sorry my mistake, because you posted in the UD7 thread I was assuming that is what you had but i now see that you have a UD3. That doesn't come with the heatpipe module. Looking at the picture of your motherboard it shouldn't be difficult to fix a fan to the Northbridge heatsink.