New PC Build: mATX?

Wow this sounds like a nightmare!! I thought that the CMOS jumper had to be left open, and if you closed it then it would reset the CMOS?? Why would you have to put a "cap" on it? I've never seen this before!
 
Wow this sounds like a nightmare!! I thought that the CMOS jumper had to be left open, and if you closed it then it would reset the CMOS?? Why would you have to put a "cap" on it? I've never seen this before!

I've seen it set up so that there are 3 pins. Jumping pins 1+2 does nothing (default position of jumper). Jumping pins 2+3 resets the CMOS.
 
My Sabertooth p67 board is rev. 1.xx, but the southbridge is rev. B3. I think Asus also put a sticker on the Motherboard indicating it is B3 revision .. that is, the motherboard revision number doesn't correspond necessarily to the southbridge revision number. Have to agree with the others though, this sounds like a nightmare.
 
Technology is a bitch sometimes. GL and always remember to KISS.
 
Oh man I'm sorry to hear about all of these shenanigans you've been having. That's just a douchebag move that either the place you bought it made or Asus themselves did. (I've heard of tampering issues happening with EVGA mobos too, so it's not just you or that mobo.)

I hope your new mobo you hopefully get will actually work.
 
I'm up and running! However, it wasn't as simple as just popping in the replacement board and being on my way...

First of all, I found the jumper on the jumper cap on my floor. I suppose the case being so small and the CMOS jumper being right next to the PCIe slot, I knocked it out while trying to force the GPU in there first time around. So the reason there was no power whatsoever at first was the missing jumper cap which was my fault.

When I went to exchange the motherboard the guy showed me that the serial number on the board itself matches the one on the box, so it was indeed a B3 version I had and was not tampered with... GerFix is correct, the rev. 2 I saw printed on the motherboard itself refers to something else. But the motherboard was definitely faulty... the guy wasted 45 minutes of my time so he could test the old board on a test bench, but he just ended up exchanging it without testing the old one (he didn't have any 204-pin memory) and thus leaving me uncertain if the motherboard was actually the culprit. So I bought some Arctic Clean and Arctic Silver to reseat the CPU and HSF on the new mobo and drove back.

I cleaned the CPU and HSF real good with the Arctic Clean which I had never bought before, always used alcohol. It works really well, it bonds to the old thermal paste and turns into a gel that you wipe off... leaves a lemony fresh scent in the case too! Then I applied some good old Arctic Silver 5 and put everything back together. But before putting it in the case I plugged everything in and tested it, it turned on by me shorting the power pins and I got the POST screen saying a new CPU had been detected and I should go in and configure it.

So I turned it off so I could put the case back together and then go through the setup. I did that and then I went to install Windows. About a minute into the installation the machine reboots and I get a CPU over temperature warning (it was at about 86C). So I think maybe I've put too much thermal paste on... I clean some of the paste off but I still get the same message. I knew there was no longer too much paste on the surface so I figured maybe the HSF isn't seated properly due to those stupid four pins Intel uses. I reinstall the HSF, but now the computer is turning on and shutting off within a half second which is new.

A while later I see that I had forgotten to unplug a molex connector when removing the PSU at some point, so the molex that connects to the GPU had all the metal contacts forced out of the plastic and therefore the video card was not getting power. I forced the metal contacts back into the plastic with some tweezers. At this point I really couldn't see anything else possibly going wrong, so I went ahead and plugged in the front panel (minus the stupid 4-pin power LED one) into the motherboard and put the case together once again.

Guess what? It still didn't start... looking around I found out that in the three days I spent rummaging around this tiny case I had inadvertently severed a few of the cables going to the front panel. So basically the power button is dormant now and I have no clue about wiring stuff, so for the time being I hooked the reset button up to the power connector so I don't have to short it out every time. I'm hoping LianLi can send me a replacement front panel so I don't have to resort to any ugly DIY stuff for it.


About a million things went wrong independently of one another, including a totally DOA motherboard. but it's up and running now and it's quite nice. To be honest it's not blazing fast but I'm not coming from an especially slow computer, this thing isn't overclocked and I haven't really done anything intensive yet.

Certain issues still remain though. I still haven't put the PSU back in the case... the CPU already looks to be running pretty hot; I haven't installed any programs to monitor the temperature yet but the case feels really warm even though the PSU opening is wide open and one side panel is still off. The wire for the front USB 2.0 connector is also way too short so I had to remove it which leaves two open holes, but I guess some black tape will take care of that.

I have some pictures from earlier in the build, mostly showing off the tiny-ness of the case. I'll post those up when I've messed around with Le Sandy Bridge for a bit.

Thanks for all your help fellas, I'll make it worth your while... :wicked: Teehee, that's not what I mean perverts, I'm talking about spreading some reputation.
 
I thought that the CMOS jumper had to be left open, and if you closed it then it would reset the CMOS?? Why would you have to put a "cap" on it? I've never seen this before!

I've seen it set up so that there are 3 pins. Jumping pins 1+2 does nothing (default position of jumper). Jumping pins 2+3 resets the CMOS.

Yeah, he's exactly right. It's the same 3-pin setup.

I had only ever seen the type where you only need the cap to reset the CMOS, which I suppose is why I didn't think to check it when I initially was getting no power whatsoever.
 
So I let the Arctic Silver 'break in' for a few days and these are my temperatures.

This isn't exactly idle, but I only had Firefox 4 open with two tabs:

https://pic.armedcats.net/s/sh/shawn/2011/04/15/cputemps.png

It seems high for the chip it is, right? The case is still half open and the room is pretty cool, so it will probably go up a little to a lot when I put the PSU in there and close all sides of the case.
 
^ Looks OK to me. At Idle, my 2600K is also around mid 40 degrees C - which disturbed me too initially.

Loading is the test though (obviously); and at full (100% all cores) load (as it is atm doing an MKV conversion) mine gets to mid 50 degrees C (with an entry level Corsair water cooling HSF).

I presume you are using the stock Intel cooler?
 
Mine is about the same too, and it's not Sandy Bridge.
https://pic.armedcats.net/m/mo/mooglebunny/2011/04/15/cpustats.png
https://pic.armedcats.net/m/mo/mooglebunny/2011/04/15/cputemp.png

(Stock Intel cooler, I have a different compound than what it originally came with since the cpu got lost in UPS cold hell and dried up. I forget which one, it's not an Arctic thermal paste.)
 
I looked at some threads really briefly and that's why I thought my temperatures were high... someone actually reported an idle temperature of 18C on a 2600K. I don't even know how it's possible for it to be at basically room temperature.

Anyway, I guess I should get a program that reports the main CPU temp. as opposed to all four cores, because going by mooglebunny's screenshots it looks like the overall CPU reading is considerably lower than each core's (I guess this is obvious).

I'm not sure what the readings are like under heavy load, but I remember seeing it a lot hotter than mid 50 degrees (I think it was around mid to high 60s) but then again it is just the basic stock HSF.

I suppose I'll have to put the case together and then see how much they change. Do you guys recommend any better programs to monitor my temperature readings?
 
The Eleet that came for my Mobo is semi-based on CPU-Z (I think it's mainly accurate). But on my laptop I use Hardware Monitor (Since I'm still settling in on my desktop).

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

I seem to recall that it gives full readings on ACPI, GPU (if it's been added), hard drive, and CPU cores. I actually might download that on this one.
 
CPU-Z doesn't give temp. readings, does it? Been using it for years and never saw any temperatures.

Does the EVGA program work on any motherboard? Previously I had Lavalys Everest installed but I didn't install it this time since it seems to have been replaced by another app, I guess I should look into that.

By the way, I said before I would give out +1s and I did but I think I may have missed some people or gave some people a whole bunch. If I missed you and you care, let me know. :)
 
I use coretemp because of the widget.
 
No, CPUZ doesn't give temps. EVGA added a lot to the core, which are all the panels and so forth.

It only works on EVGA motherboards, as far as I know (I have the X58 FTW3).

Oh yeah I remember Everest, that's a good way to see who manufactured your screen on a laptop, along with all sorts of other items.

Personally, I like HWMonitor out of other ones I've seen. They have a no-install version (which is what I usually do) and the free one seems good enough.

edit: They are a bit slow at updating the program, so I am not sure if they will display the exact CPU on your board. For a while HWMonitor didn't show my GPU because it was a newer one at the time (and they are slow.)

Edit 2: Here's what the newest version looks like on my laptop *doesn't quite apply, but the CPU on my laptop does operate cooler because it's a 25W heat rated CPU with better than average laptop cooling (they put in at least 3-4 fans). =P
https://pic.armedcats.net/m/mo/mooglebunny/2011/04/15/laptopcpuid.png
 
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I suppose I'll have to put the case together and then see how much they change. Do you guys recommend any better programs to monitor my temperature readings?

The Asus AI suite II ... which I assume would work with your MB will give you temps from all the sensors and an overall CPU temp.

You may find things are a little better with everything packed back in the case. Since your case has no fan, the power supply fan may get a bit of airflow happening and prevent the processor from stewing in its own heatsink wash.
 
The Asus AI suite II ... which I assume would work with your MB will give you temps from all the sensors and an overall CPU temp.

You may find things are a little better with everything packed back in the case. Since your case has no fan, the power supply fan may get a bit of airflow happening and prevent the processor from stewing in its own heatsink wash.

I haven't gotten around to popping the Asus disc in the machine yet... honestly, I was without a full working computer for so long and then this build turned out a slight headache, so for now I'm just enjoying my stable Firefox. :p

I need to buy a few adapters and stuff to remove as many PSU cables as I can before I put the case together, and an external enclosure for my Sammy HDD as right now it's just hooked up to the motherboard despite being out of the case.
 
My 2600k idles at 27-29 :)
 
Cosmos 1000 and the big fucking Noctuna NH-D14.

With the stock HSF I had nearly the same temps as yours. A few degrees cooler, maybe.
 
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