supercordo wrote on 2026-07-07, 01:44:

NM they are EK Quantum Torque black nickel.

Thanks for that!

Tzk wrote on 2026-07-10, 04:58:

Yes, you can use SPDTool and disable the second rank on 512mb TCCD sticks. Also yes, the board will detect it as 256mb stick afterwards. I tried this with Corsair XL sticks (0538 and 0542), worked but i didn't gain any additional FSB. I never tested why this was the case, two reasons came to mind: a) the disabled rank still causes load on the dram controller in the chipset and the vdimm power stage or b) the sticks just had avarage chips on both sides and maybe the weakest chip on the first rank.

Thanks for that. I decided not to do it and just wait for the PCB's to arrive.

Tzk wrote on 2026-07-10, 04:58:

Going for 250Mhz 2.5-3-3 with 512mb Hynix DT-D43 or or 2.5-4-4 with Hynix 256mb BT-D43 is waaaay easier and those are also a lot cheaper with good availability. Still king of NF2 is the mighty Hynix ETR, >275MHz 2.5-3-3 works. Or Winbond at 255-260MHz 2-2-2-5.

I found some super cheap Hynix 256mb BT-D43's so I'm going to play with those as well.

Going to do this mod with a simple POT to get the voltage up to 3.2v for my Winbond sticks https://warp9-systems.proboards.com/thread/7/nf7-rev-2-mods

tehsiggi wrote on 2026-07-10, 12:54:

Hoping for some time next week to get some new scores. Also have to mod the other board as well. But here's my take on the 12V P […]
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Hoping for some time next week to get some new scores. Also have to mod the other board as well.
But here's my take on the 12V PWR mod for the A7N8X. Files and stuff will land on github this weekend, so anybody can do the mod themselves.

See you around (hopefully with a score to kick zuldan out of the top 5 again 😁)

The attachment vrm_complete.jpeg is no longer available

Very impressive. I didn't realize the ASUS boards didn't have a 12v input.. I so wish I could make my own PCB's. I've got to take time to sit down and go through the links you gave me.

Well done with the higher score!

supercordo wrote on Yesterday, 21:36:

OC the video card!!!!!

Don't help him! I'm going to have a hard enough time getting to 23k 🤣 😉

zuldan wrote on Today, 03:21:

supercordo wrote on Yesterday, 21:36:

OC the video card!!!!!

Don't help him! I'm going to have a hard enough time getting to 23k 🤣 😉

Hahaha, but he's right. I didn't take the time to properly check out the max clock of that HD3850. However I'm impressed to see the performance of the 7900GS as well, seems like it really loves 3Dmark2001.

zuldan wrote on Today, 03:21:

Very impressive. I didn't realize the ASUS boards didn't have a 12v input.. I so wish I could make my own PCB's. I've got to take time to sit down and go through the links you gave me.

Yeah I didn't think too much about it until my PSU shut off. Then I started to do what I usually do: measure. Turns out the board with 2V VCore + 3,5V VDimm was pulling around 36A on the 5V rail from the power supply.
Over four 5V wires of the ATX connector. Not only is the voltage drop a nightmare, but also the ripple etc will be just bad. That makes life for the VRM of CPU and memory even harder. So I knew there was no away around the 12V mod.
Now under load, with 2,4GHz @ 2.0V (which is a very ugly overclock) the CPU VRM pull 11A on 12V - which is 132W - assuming 80% efficiency for the VRM we're at 105W for the CPU and the rest is losses in the VRM.

So power matters very much. At least for my board 1 (calling it phoenix now) it really did a difference.

Great scores! At this point i'd probably check drivers, as some may simply run faster. Also OCing the gpu and maybe tweaking the alphatimings of the ram. 24K is the goal i guess 😀

zuldan wrote on Today, 03:21:

Very impressive. I didn't realize the ASUS boards didn't have a 12v input..

No need to make some PCBs, here's how i mostly do it. Simply pull the primary coil, as it connects the 5V rail to the cpu VRM. Then bend one leg upwards and solder a 4pin 12V plug onto it and resolder onto the board. Also replace the primary cpu caps with 12V tolerant ones (usually 16V types). Plug PSU and go! The mod shown was done on an A7V600-X, but does also work on A7N8X, Tyan S2460, K7NF2-RAID, A7N8X-XE and several other boards.

Of course the PCB is way cleaner, still this works better than i initially expected.

Tzk wrote on 45 minutes ago:

Great scores! At this point i'd probably check drivers, as some may simply run faster. Also OCing the gpu and maybe tweaking the alphatimings of the ram. 24K is the goal i guess 😀

Hmm.. time time time.. 😁
I'll see what I can do in today's lunch break. But yeah, I'm trying to go as far as possible. After vacation I'll have both boards fully modded with properly attached Vmods + 12V. Perhaps I just design a VTT+VDIMM piggyback for the kicks.. not sure yet.. I kind of interests me to see what (if anything) it does. Even if it just gives me better efficiency, I'd be happy. We're in hot territory already 😀

Tzk wrote on 45 minutes ago:

No need to make some PCBs, here's how i mostly do it. Simply pull the primary coil, as it connects the 5V rail to the cpu VRM

Yeah, that's exactly how I'd have done it as well. Because it's nice and simple. I was intrigued by the thought of having the connector "solidly" attached to the PCB and also to provide a shorter GND path of the returning current. Just for that: measurements have shown that out of 11A going in to the CPU VRM, around 6-7A go back through the 12V connectors GND, rest through the ATX plug.

And also, I wanted to have the INA226 to measure the CPU power in realtime without a current clamp meter - I'm a sucker for telemetry data on hardware 😀

In the end I want to have the boards to be as "clean as possible" so I can put them into a nice and clean tower as a real retro gaming machine (with a lot of OC potential 😁) - that's why I also went for the AIO water cooling route. But that one has it's flaws as well..