GA-H61M-USB3-B3

[gpholman]

Hi,

I've recently purchased a GA-H61M-USB3-B3 (rev 1.1)  which I use with a i3-2100.  It's developed a high pitched piercing whine which I'm certain now is coming from a capacitor on the board itself (changed PSU, checked/unplugged all fans & peripherals etc).  A few questions:

1) I read on the forum thatthe  BIOS versions can sometimes cause this - anyone care to comment? (I'm using F5 latest)
2) It will often BSOD coming out of Sleep - could this be connected to the whine or BIOS?
3) There's a rev 1.1 of this board out now which has a newer BIOS - worth trying or would it be incompatible?
4) If I do RMA I no longer have the box and I can't see the serial number on the boards top side - would it be on the back?

Many Thanks

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome to the Gigabyte Forum.

To answer your question in the order you asked them

1) Yes BIOS versions can make a difference to the coil whine that occurs on occasion.

2) This could be caused by very many things. BIOS being one of them but also instability, wrong settings etc

3) Even though they are very simialr the chances are that the BIOS versions are not compatible.

4) There should be a sticker on the side of the 24 pin socket on the motherboard.

[gpholman]

Hi Dark Mantis, many thanks for the reply.  I'll experiment with the BIOS tonight.

[Dark Mantis]

I would advise contacting GGTS and letting them know of you coil whine issue as they might have a BIOS update that can help.

Just enter your email address and click on the language of choice.
GGTS   http://ggts.gigabyte.com/

Please expect several days for a reply.

[gpholman]

Cheers, I've done that and will post back if they have anything to say.

Had a hairy moment yesterday.  Reset the BIOS back to Fail-Safe defaults and rebooted.  Windows 7 failed to boot with BSOD and immediate reboot.  Tried a few more times with the same problem.  Finally let Windows go into startup recovery mode which reported it was unable to find any solution.  One last reboot and the system came up fine.  No idea what was going on there!  Anyway, still getting noise with BIOS defaults set so it's starting to look like an RMA.

[gpholman]

Hi Dark Matter - question for you about the serial number sticker:

It's got '4719331807122' then 'sn111440051318' printed on it but the place I bought it form is telling me this is not valid.  Is it both numbers they need or just the 'sn' one?

Thanks

[ex58]

1) I read on the forum thatthe  BIOS versions can sometimes cause this - anyone care to comment? (I'm using F5 latest)

F5 latest?!  
Are you have Rev 1.0 or 1.1 ?
Rev 1.0:
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3794#bios
Rev 1.1:
http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3905#bios

Btw,I just check and BIOS is same for both,you can use F6,F7 or F8d (TouchBIOS support)
Even I have F8f if you need.

[Dark Mantis]

Hi Dark Matter - question for you about the serial number sticker:

It's got '4719331807122' then 'sn111440051318' printed on it but the place I bought it form is telling me this is not valid.  Is it both numbers they need or just the 'sn' one?

Thanks

I would imagine the sn one is the important one as sn stands for Serial Number. I would have thought though that if you gave the shop both they would have enough savvy to check against both numbers!

[gpholman]

Hi ex58 - sorry, that was a typo in my original post.  It's Rev 1.0 I have.

Possibly Gigabyte have only updated rev 1.0 on their server as being F8 compatible?  I checked the BIOS page you gave and also ran @BIOS a couple of days ago and both said F5 was latest.  Thanks for the heads up - I'll try that out.

DM - yes, they are being pretty dumb there.  I'll just have to try again.

[gpholman]

"Possibly Gigabyte have only RECENTLY updated rev 1.0..." - is what I meant to type 

[gpholman]

This is *really* weird.  I've arranged an RMA on my board (not sent it off yet) and in the meantime bought a replacement identical model board to use while waiting for repair.  This board has the SAME issue!  This tells me that the problem must lie with the components so I stripped my pc down to the bare minimum: all fans disabled, and nothing connected except one stick ram, boot SSD.  I  even removed the fan off the CPU heatsink and this helped me listen much closer to the real issue - the whine is coming from the CPU not the mobo!

I used a thin tube to isolated the sound and it is coming from all round the CPU area.  This sounds mad to me but I really think this is the problem.  Can anyone comment here?  I've never heard of this issue before.  Any input very much appreciated before I take the plunge and change RMA to the CPU (i3-2100).

Cheers

[Dark Mantis]

Hi I think you will find it actually comes from the motherboard. There was an issue with it on the X58 boards when they first came out and in the end it was fixed by a BIOS update and in some cases a hardware fix also. You can read about it here:

http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,1426.0.html

[gpholman]

Cheers Dark Matter, that thread describes exactly what I'm getting.  I can't see this 'C1E' option someone suggests disabling - will it be in my BIOS?  Other than that I can't think of anything else than returning it.

[gpholman]

Ok, found that setting now.  I'll have a little play tonight and see how I get on.

[Dark Mantis]

Cheers Dark Matter, that thread describes exactly what I'm getting.  I can't see this 'C1E' option someone suggests disabling - will it be in my BIOS?  Other than that I can't think of anything else than returning it.

You will probably find it (C1E) as CPU Enhanced Halt under Advanced CPU Core Features in the MIT section of the BIOS.