GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3 advice

[Digivolution]

Good evening.
I am building a new PC and have purchased a Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3 motherboard. I read the manual and was made a little apprehensive by the dizzying number of Bios settings. I will be building it in a few days and wanted to proactively ask if there are any settings in the bios I need to set based on the hardware below:

Below are my components:
 
Mobo: GA-Z68X-UD3H-B3 Rev. 1.3
Proc: Core i7 2600k w/Intel liquid cooling
Memory: Corsair Vengence 16gb (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9B, timing 9-9-9-24, 1.5 volt
OS: Win 7 Ultimate 64bit
Drive: Corsair sata3 180Gb SSD for the Win 7 OS on Intel Sata3 controller
           2 regular hard drives in raid 1 for data on Marvel controller.
Video: EVGA GT 440
PS: Corsair Gold Pro AX 850 watt

My goal is to build a solid, stable PC that will run 24/7.

Any and all advice is welcome. Also is it wise to try and overclock a system that runs 24/7 ?  Does OCing decrease the life of the components?

Thanks in advance,
~Duncan

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome.

If I can deal with your last question first, overclocking does indeed have an impact on the life of your components. It is mainly the heat that is the killer  so make sure that everything remains as cool as possible. It is a case of the further you push the limits the more detrimental the effect on the components.

Ok, back to the BIOS. Make sure that you load the Optimised BIOS Default settings and then you can also make any other changes that you require, like the boot sequence and hard drive priority etc. One thing you wiol need to do is to disable many of your fan alarms like the CPU because you are using water cooling. Then just press F10 to save and exit.

[Lsdmeasap]

Well the first thing you should do is install the latest BIOS for the board, here is the latest beta BIOS for your board, please flash using DOS or Qflash, then enter the BIOS and load optimized defaults and save/apply/reboot BACK to the BIOS.   Once in the BIOS again set your SATA settings, and then any other changes you need such as XMP or memory voltages, ect.  Then save/apply/reboot and backup the backup BIOS to match the main BIOS, directions below on how to do that.
http://www.fileden.com/files/2009/12/20/2696817/Z68XUD3H.11j.zip

Beta is fine, it's all I ever use and suggest, they always have the latest improvements and fixes.

How to flash the backup BIOS, you may need to use a PS/2 keyboard, or USB to PS/2 adapter
http://gigabytedaily.blogspot.com/2011/02/video-guide-how-to-update-your-backup.html

If you have good cooling 24/7 overclock should be fine, as long as temps are reasonable, and since you have a water cooler it's only ok as long as you are also around to check to be sure it didn't leak or run out of water on you   You might not want to overclock it super high (Like 5Ghz), but a reasonable overclock should be fine (Like 4.2-4.5Ghz) as long as temps are good.

As long as temps are good and extreme voltage are not used overclock isn't going to damage anything.  That CPU will long outlast your desire to own and use it as long as you don't abuse it with high temps or high voltages

Post back if you need anymore help once you get all setup and going!

[Digivolution]

Gents,

Thank you for your ongoing help.

Got the new system up and running tonight. I have a snag and a question:

Snag:
In the bios, I have an SSD on the Intel sata 3 port , intel is set ahci in the bios.

I installed Windows with just the SSD and optical drive installed and everything works great.

Now I installed the 2 regular 500gb hd's on to the marvel controller. In the bios I set GSATA3 Ctrl Mode (Marvel controller) to Raid, then hit F10 to save and while posting hit CTRL+M to enter the Marvell raid utility, it recognized both drives and let me create a new array. I save and exit, and --Windows never boots.. It just hangs at "Loading the Operating System"

If I unplug the regular HD's, from the Marvell contoler, it boots from the SSD fine.  Any ideas?

Question: I understand what he Lucid Logic deal does, but how do you physically connect it in a 2 monitor setup? One to your GPU and One to your motherboard?

Thanks again for all your help.

[Lsdmeasap]

Nice to hear the setup went smoothly!

After you created the RAID, did you go back into the BIOS and change the hard disk boot priority to the drive on your Intel controller?   You need to set that back, anytime you change SATA drive modes or enable new ones, as it will often change this setting when you do that.  The setting I mean is not the 1, 2, 3 boot order, it is the setting called Hard Disk Boot Priority, and it's at the top of the page in Advanced BIOS Features page.

You need a splitter to connect to two monitors, or connect both to the back of your graphics card.

[Digivolution]

Nice to hear the setup went smoothly!

After you created the RAID, did you go back into the BIOS and change the hard disk boot priority to the drive on your Intel controller?   You need to set that back, anytime you change SATA drive modes or enable new ones, as it will often change this setting when you do that.  The setting I mean is not the 1, 2, 3 boot order, it is the setting called Hard Disk Boot Priority, and it's at the top of the page in Advanced BIOS Features page.

You need a splitter to connect to two monitors, or connect both to the back of your graphics card.

Thanks, it was the boot order in the Bios on the Raid drives on the Marvel controller. Odd that it wouldn't just drop to the next device on the list to try and boot off of. But I made the SSD number one and it worked.

So if I plug in both monitors to my graphics card I can still take advantage of the Virtu software?

One odd thing I noticed, I wanted to monitor the processor temp. I used the windows gadget and one other. The temp changes drastically from second to second; example: 26, 41, 28, 41, 27, 41, 30, 41.  I noticed that every other second it says 41c for the temp while idling. Bios is running stock after 'loading optimized' with everything on auto. It also appears the processor is cycling down to about 1700mhz. I ran Prime 95 for half an hour and the temps stopped bouncing to 41 and staying in the 50's for all 8 cores with no bouncing. And the mhz jumped to 3755.  Is that normal? Part of the turbo mode or power saving settings?

[Lsdmeasap]

Nice to see that was indeed the issue and you were able to easily fix it!

Here's some info I've posted not long ago about Virtu, hopefully this will help you decide which mode you want to use and how to connect your monitor.
http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,8095.msg65694.html#msg65694

Yes, the processor temps will vary with CPU load, and if speedstep is enabled then the CPU freq and voltage will go up and down as the CPU bounces between idle and load, this is normal and is part of the turbo modes and power saving features you mentioned.

[Digivolution]

Yes, the processor temps will vary with CPU load, and if speedstep is enabled then the CPU freq and voltage will go up and down as the CPU bounces between idle and load, this is normal and is part of the turbo modes and power saving features you mentioned.

Thank you for the issue on Virtu.

Odd about the CPU, so speedstep is like non-destructive spiking? So if I disable SpeedStep, C1E, and all CStates settings, will I see the true cpu temp? As only one can be right. It can't have constant 25 degree F temperature changes literally every second, 41c (105.F) to 27c (80.F) in under 1 second.

[Lsdmeasap]

If you disbale those you will see solid CPU speed and voltages, and yes the temp will be more stable and possibly warmer too.  And no, they shouldn't jump from 25 to 40 in one second, that is way to fast so it's probably the software reading something incorrectly.

What are you using to look at temps anyway (sorry, not sure what you mean by gadgets ), that might just be the problem, try using AIDA64 instead (Look in computer, sensor on the left)
http://www.aida64.com/downloads

Or if you do not like the trial version of that, as it does hide some things, you can use Core Temp or Realtemp
http://www.techpowerup.com/realtemp/
http://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/

[Digivolution]

If you disbale those you will see solid CPU speed and voltages, and yes the temp will be more stable and possibly warmer too.  And no, they shouldn't jump from 25 to 40 in one second, that is way to fast so it's probably the software reading something incorrectly.

I am using both core temp and the core temp windows gadget from the page you linked. They both bounce by 10-12 degrees C literally each second. In the bios main screen, the 'CPU Temperature" fluxes between 32c and 34c but no further.

I do have another odd thing occurring. The PC will be powered off, Windows, Shutdown, Off. And at least once a day it will power itself on. It's happened 3x so far since the build on saturday. The first time I thought I had forgotten to shut down. So last night I shutdown and waited to make sure everything was off. When I got up this morning it was powered on again. According to the system log, it powered up at 5:30am this morning on it's own. No programs were running and no error messages were present, it just started up. There were no tasks scheduled in Windows, and i would like to think powered off it wouldn't matter. I checked the 'Power Management Setup' in the Bios and it is set as follows:

ACPI Suspend: S3
Soft Off: Instant Off
PME Wakeup event: Enabled
Power of Ring: Disabled (no modem installed anyway)
Resume by Alarm: Disabled
HPet: Enabled
HPet mode: 64bit
Power on by mouse: disabled
Power on by Keyboard: disabled
AC Back Function: Softoff
Erp Support: Diabled

The only PCI card in the PC is the graphic card. Have you ever seen anything like this? It doesn't hurt anything, but my PC powering itself on is a little too HAL 9000 for me. In my half awake state this morning when I saw the orange glow coming from the case I customized, as I murmured 'Why wont you stay off?' to no one in particular, I half expected to here, "I'm sorry Duncan. I can't do that" come from the PC as a reply.

[Lsdmeasap]

Sounds like you need to install the Intel ME drivers, please install this and reboot, then check your temps again and see if they are stilla cting creazy.

First install INF drivers again, just to be sure you have the latest, first link (EXE)
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Product_Filter.aspx?ProductID=816

Then install these drivers, and reboot before you check the temps again
http://download.gigabyte.us/FileList/Driver/mb_driver_intel_me_6series.exe

If the issue remains, please try Realtemp and AIDA64 instead and to confirm if they act the same way

As for your automatic powering up, you need to disable PME wake event, and disable any LAN adapters from being able to wake the machine in device manager properties for any network controller or LAN card.

Haha, I love the HAL 9000 movie!   "What are you doing Dave?"