So I have a couple of Gigabyte GA-6BA motherboards which are revision 3.0. Rev 3.0 allows up to a 1.1GHz CPU, but it also has this jumper setting for Voodoo 3 cards. The manual mentions the jumper casually, but never explains what it is for. Any ideas? I figured some of you Voodoo card collectors and users might know what this actually does. Thanks for any info.
It bypasses the onboard 3.3v regulators for the AGP port and uses the ATX power supplied 3.3v lines directly.
My understanding is that, at the time the Voodoo cards were most likely the most power hungry 3.3v AGP cards available and caused issues with VRMs.
You'll notice the jumpers are right near the ATX/AT power connectors.
wrote:It bypasses the onboard 3.3v regulators for the AGP port and uses the ATX power supplied 3.3v lines directly.
My understanding is that, at the time the Voodoo cards were most likely the most power hungry 3.3v AGP cards available and caused issues with VRMs.You'll notice the jumpers are right near the ATX/AT power connectors.
Thanks for the info. Yes, I did notice that and had a suspicion it may have something to do with power, but no idea what. Good to know.
tpowell.ca wrote on 2019-03-29, 18:04:It bypasses the onboard 3.3v regulators for the AGP port and uses the ATX power supplied 3.3v lines directly.
My understanding is that, at the time the Voodoo cards were most likely the most power hungry 3.3v AGP cards available and caused issues with VRMs.You'll notice the jumpers are right near the ATX/AT power connectors.
what happens with older revisions? older revisions can´t be used with a voodoo3 card?
it was hard to understand the bios for this motherboard because the last 2 bios bios say for pcb 3.0 but if you got revision 2.9 you need to use an older bios update?
bios_ga-6ba_f1.exe
Support up to Pentium III & Celeron 1.1G CPU (only FC-PGA CPU & PCB revision : 3.0 or above)
Support 75GB HDD
Enablie IR device under Win98 win2000.
FIX Kloicom communicmation card conflict with sensor chip.
Fixed will show!when 1.6Vcore CPU is plugged
I have tried using these jumpers to run a Voodoo 3 3000 AGP on a GA-BX2000 board in the past and it was still not stable. I've had better luck with a GA-BX2000+ but it was still not completely stable.
My advice for Gigabyte boards from this era would be to skip them for Voodoo 3 builds.
My GA-6OXT works fine with a Voodoo 3, but that board has no ISA being an i815 board.
Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.
appiah4 wrote on 2021-04-20, 18:59:I have tried using these jumpers to run a Voodoo 3 3000 AGP on a GA-BX2000 board in the past and it was still not stable. I've had better luck with a GA-BX2000+ but it was still not completely stable.
My advice for Gigabyte boards from this era would be to skip them for Voodoo 3 builds.
My GA-6OXT works fine with a Voodoo 3, but that board has no ISA being an i815 board.
thats really bad, GA-BX2000+ is a good looking board. ga-6ba is also a compact nice board, but the fact that the boards are not even good to be used with a voodoo3 card, something so common on the pentium3 era, is just terrible
Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware when I got into the hobby. (The board had no special significance to me so I didn't care wether I damaged it by testing a faulty part.)
Anyway, the system was always completely stable. The jumpers were always set. I ran benchmark loops on it to stress the cards a little and it never crashed. No complaints.
Could it be you used a Coppermine CPU in a non-Coppermine revision of the board or that your boards just have aging capacitors?
Edit: Or could it be the PSU may just have had a bit of an unclean +3.3V rail that caused issues?
Doornkaat wrote on 2021-04-20, 19:50:Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware wh […]
Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware when I got into the hobby. (The board had no special significance to me so I didn't care wether I damaged it by testing a faulty part.)
Anyway, the system was always completely stable. The jumpers were always set. I ran benchmark loops on it to stress the cards a little and it never crashed. No complaints.
Could it be you used a Coppermine CPU in a non-Coppermine revision of the board or that your boards just have aging capacitors?Edit: Or could it be the PSU may just have had a bit of an unclean +3.3V rail that caused issues?
It was not a CPU issue, the system ran incredibly stable after replacing the Voodoo 3 with a GeForce 2 Ti. I am not surprised that your board worked. These P2/P3 era Gigabyte boards have a million revisions, and compatibility with Voodoo 3 must have gotten fixed at some point for sure, but the revisions I had were simply not stable even with the 3.3V AGP jumpers (ie. Voodoo 3 jumpers) set. The Voodoo 3 simply draws A LOT of power over that 3.3V rail, something many Gigabyte boards were not well equipped to deliver until after several revisions.
Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.
appiah4 wrote on 2021-04-20, 21:05:Doornkaat wrote on 2021-04-20, 19:50:Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware wh […]
Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware when I got into the hobby. (The board had no special significance to me so I didn't care wether I damaged it by testing a faulty part.)
Anyway, the system was always completely stable. The jumpers were always set. I ran benchmark loops on it to stress the cards a little and it never crashed. No complaints.
Could it be you used a Coppermine CPU in a non-Coppermine revision of the board or that your boards just have aging capacitors?Edit: Or could it be the PSU may just have had a bit of an unclean +3.3V rail that caused issues?
It was not a CPU issue, the system ran incredibly stable after replacing the Voodoo 3 with a GeForce 2 Ti. I am not surprised that your board worked. These P2/P3 era Gigabyte boards have a million revisions, and compatibility with Voodoo 3 must have gotten fixed at some point for sure, but the revisions I had were simply not stable even with the 3.3V AGP jumpers (ie. Voodoo 3 jumpers) set. The Voodoo 3 simply draws A LOT of power over that 3.3V rail, something many Gigabyte boards were not well equipped to deliver until after several revisions.
do you know if SOYO 6BB board(very similar to gigabyte) also fails with a voodoo3 card?
appiah4 wrote on 2021-04-20, 21:05:Doornkaat wrote on 2021-04-20, 19:50:Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware wh […]
Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware when I got into the hobby. (The board had no special significance to me so I didn't care wether I damaged it by testing a faulty part.)
Anyway, the system was always completely stable. The jumpers were always set. I ran benchmark loops on it to stress the cards a little and it never crashed. No complaints.
Could it be you used a Coppermine CPU in a non-Coppermine revision of the board or that your boards just have aging capacitors?Edit: Or could it be the PSU may just have had a bit of an unclean +3.3V rail that caused issues?
It was not a CPU issue, the system ran incredibly stable after replacing the Voodoo 3 with a GeForce 2 Ti. I am not surprised that your board worked. These P2/P3 era Gigabyte boards have a million revisions, and compatibility with Voodoo 3 must have gotten fixed at some point for sure, but the revisions I had were simply not stable even with the 3.3V AGP jumpers (ie. Voodoo 3 jumpers) set. The Voodoo 3 simply draws A LOT of power over that 3.3V rail, something many Gigabyte boards were not well equipped to deliver until after several revisions.
That's curious. Doesn't the GF2Ti draw more power on 3.3Vcc than the V3?
And since setting the jumpers just hooks the slot up straight to the PSU there shouldn't be a problem with power draw unless the PSU is flaky.
Btw. I'm not implying your experience was invalid. I'm interested in finding out why that happened because mine was so different.
Doornkaat wrote on 2021-04-20, 19:50:Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware wh […]
Incidentially I had been using a Gigabyte board, either a GA-6BXC or GA-6BXE with the Voodoo jumpers for testing new hardware when I got into the hobby. (The board had no special significance to me so I didn't care wether I damaged it by testing a faulty part.)
Anyway, the system was always completely stable. The jumpers were always set. I ran benchmark loops on it to stress the cards a little and it never crashed. No complaints.
Could it be you used a Coppermine CPU in a non-Coppermine revision of the board or that your boards just have aging capacitors?Edit: Or could it be the PSU may just have had a bit of an unclean +3.3V rail that caused issues?
I use a GA-6BXE REV 1.9 with a Voodoo 3 3000 and didn't encouter any issues
