Gigabyte Z77M-D3H (16GB RAM and NB Heatsink issues)

[Liam]

Hi all,

I was wondering if someone could shed some light on these 2 issues for me ;

1) I'm running 8GB (2x4GB) 1333Mhz RAM fine with no problems, no crashes, Prime95 stable etc. I got another 2x4GB RAM today, same stuff, all brand new. PC booted fine first time, just came back to use it and it loops/restarts on just after the POST screen. I've tried each pair of RAM in each pair of slots and this doesn't cause any problems.

Any suggestions?

2) The NB/SB heatsink (Don't know which one it is) is REALLY, REALLY hot to touch. I can only leave my fingers on this for about 2-3 seconds. At the moment, I've not finished building it yet so the case is off. I'm doing nothing so the PC is pretty much idle.

Should this be like this?

Thanks for any help given,

Liam

[zerowing]

If the chipset heatsink is overheating it could be a defective board.
With that stock heatsink with no added fan it shouldn't go beyond 40C to 45C.
if it's really ho above 60C it might be defective.

You might try adding a small fan to it, or just directing a huge fan on it and see if the tempeature lowers and the system works correctly.
If with an added fan the temperature doesn't go down then the chipset is defective indeed.
If instead the fan lowers the temperature it might be two case scenarios:

1) The board got out of Gigabyte factory without enough thermal paste between the chipset and the heatsink. So it's overheating.
2) The thermal paste was correctly applied but the chipset on that board is defective and slipped thru quality control checks.

Removing the heatsink and adding the thermal paste it's highly likely going to break the guarantee, you might ask Gigabyte customers support about this but I doubt they would allow you to do that. So if adding the thermal paste yourself wouldn't solve anything and you would still need to RMA the board at that point you would have lost the guarantee and buying a new board would become cheaper than getting that repaired.

[Liam]

Do you know if there is a way of measuring the heat of this?

[zerowing]

Do you know if there is a way of measuring the heat of this?

You could use one of these:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Silverline-633726-Infrared-Thermometer/dp/B000LFTEC4/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1363113206&sr=8-2

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Infrared-Digital-Thermometer-Laser-Sight/dp/B003CIA6Y2/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1363113206&sr=8-3

[Liam]

Thanks for the reply.

I directed a small 80mm fan blowing over the heatsink (mounted inside my case) and it's made the headsink cold to touch. I'm still having the issue with the RAM though.

Maybe I'll RMA the board?

[zerowing]

Thanks for the reply.

I directed a small 80mm fan blowing over the heatsink (mounted inside my case) and it's made the headsink cold to touch. I'm still having the issue with the RAM though.

Maybe I'll RMA the board?

Check the new RAM on another motheboard with MemTest86 3.5b to ensure that it's defective free.
If it passes MemTest86 3.5b with no errors on another motherboard then your board might be unable to use all DIMM sockets at the same time, which would still mean the chipset would be defective and then you would have to RMA it.
Overheating for that chipset is not normal anyway. If it's caused by a lack of thermal paste between the heatsink and the chipset it's impossible to say without removing the heatsink itself.
But if the new RAM modules do work and pass MemTest86 3.5b with no errors on another motherboard then I'd say that the chipset on your motherboard would be defective if now that it's cold still has issues using defective free RAM modules.
Anyway you need to check those modules first.
Or you could RMA it anyway due to overheating, clearly tell to Gigabyte that the heatsink on the chipset gets hot as hell and they should change it for a new one with no question asked I think. That motherboard heatsink just shouldn't overheat in any case.

[Liam]

Thanks for your help mate.

I will try the things suggested and see how it goes.

Not got another motherboard to try the sticks on, I can test them 2 at a time as it boots fine with 2/4 sticks.

[Liam]

Ran MEMTEST overnight and woke up to 4 passes and 0 fails so the RAM is fine!

Could it be my motherboard BIOS?

I could flash to a released one and not a BETA?

Thanks again,

Liam

[zerowing]

Ran MEMTEST overnight and woke up to 4 passes and 0 fails so the RAM is fine!

Could it be my motherboard BIOS?

I could flash to a released one and not a BETA?

Thanks again,

Liam

Maybe the beta BIOS might have compatibility issues or bugs.

However I doubt that overheating could be related to the Beta BIOS unless Gigabyte programmers did something really bad up to the point to overclock  the chipset but if that was the case it should have been reported by hundreds if not thousands of customers on forums on the 'net.

[dmdilks]

You can try this but the board sound like it has a bad chip-set. That chip-set should be between 30c to 40c.

Try and run it at normal. And make sure you are not running any profiles. 

Advanced Memory Settings

Performance Enhance

Allows the system to operate at three different performance levels.
Normal: Lets the system operate at its basic performance level.
Turbo: Lets the system operate at its good performance level. (Default)
Extreme: Lets the system operate at its best performance level

I know that EVGA had a problem on their Z77 board where if you put 4 sticks of memory in it would put a load on the memory controller.

I know that when you had  2 sticks of memory everything was fine. I know that these are two different companies but it sounds like the same problem.

It is maybe to late that you can run 4 sticks of memory. It might have screw up the chip-set.

Plus one other thing you can try is take off that fan and see how hot the heat-sink gets. With two sticks of memory installed.

If it just gets warm than that is telling you that 4 sticks installed it putting a load on it.

Yes you should be able to run 4 sticks of memory. There could have been something wrong with the board from day one, but when you put in the 4 sticks in it showed up.

[Liam]

Thanks again for the replies.

I can only run 2 sticks of RAM in Windows, I can only run 4 in the BIOS and just before the Windows splash screen. When I don't have the case fan pointing at the heatsink, it's too hot to touch so it's way above the 35-40 marker for sure!

I'll have a look at the profile but I'm almost certain, like you guys, it shouldn't be running this hot!

I have put a RMA request in with www.scan.co.uk where I got my parts from but I'm waiting for them to get back to me. If I don't hear anything in a day or two, I will call them up.

[Liam]

RAM issue SOLVED - I flashed my firmware to an official release (f13) and it booted fine without a problem. I restarted PC 6-7 times without any issues!