[Official] Gigabyte GA-990XA/970A-Series Owners' Club & Help Thread - FX-8350 support added

xd_1771 · Jun 18, 2011

UPDATE - 22 Oct. 2012
The latest beta BIOS versions should add support for the new Vishera FX processor! See below for information
The boards without VRM cooling (970A-D3 rev 1.0/1.1/1.2, 970A-DS3) have NOT been updated for 125W 8-core Vishera FX processors

Blue rules!

Gigabyte 990X and 970 chipset board owners, here you may discuss your experiences, problems, or whatever you see fit for discussion, as well as find out the latest news and information about your board. For everyone else, you are welcome to join us too!! Without further ado, I would like to now welcome everyone to the GA-990XA/970A-Series Owners Thread/Club.

This owners thread/club concerns the Gigabyte 990X and 970 chipset boards board released so far: the Gigabyte GA-990XA-UD3, the GA-970A-UD3, the GA-970A-D3 and the GA-970A-DS3.

[CLICK HERE] for the Gigabyte GA-990XA-UD3 CPU model support list
[CLICK HERE] for the Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3 CPU model support list
[CLICK HERE] for the Gigabyte GA-970A-D3 CPU model support list
[CLICK HERE] for the Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3 CPU model support list

Board specifications:

Gigabyte GA-990XA-UD3

AM3+ socket
- Support for 32nm AMD FX-Series 4-core, 6-core and 8-core processors (Bulldozer and Piledriver core)
- Support for AM3 Phenom II and Athlon II processors
8+2 phase power/VRM with heatsink cooling, and 140W CPU TDP support
4x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32GB of dual channel memory
Native support for DDR3 at 1066, 1333, 1600 and 1866 Mhz; can support higher mhz through overclocking
AMD 990X northbridge chipset and AMD SB950 southbridge chipset
- Support for AMD CrossfireX and nVidia SLI at 8x-8x using PCIEX16 and PCIEX8 slots
- Support for 6 SATA6GB/s devices, as well as RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10 and JBOD
- Up to 14 USB 2.0/1.1 ports (8 ports on back panel, and up to 6 through internal USB)
- Up to 4 USB 3.0/2.0 ports (2 on back panel, 2 through internal header)
Integrated Realtek RTL8111E LAN
Integrated Realtek ALC889 HD audio
- Up to 7.1 channels
- Support for S/PDIF out
- Support for Dolby Home Theatre
Expansion slots:
- All PCI-E Express slots conform to the PCI-E 2.0 standard
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x16 (reverts to x8 in CrossfireX/SLI mode)
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x8 (when used)
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x4
- 2x PCI-E x1 slots
- 2x PCI slots
ATX Form Factor; 30.5CM x 24.4CM
Rev 3.0 boards have UEFI support with dual UEFI BIOS

Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3

AM3+ socket
- Support for 32nm AMD FX-Series 4-core, 6-core and 8-core processors (Bulldozer and Piledriver core)
- Support for existing AM3 Phenom II and Athlon II processors
8+2 phase power/VRM with heatsink cooling, and 140W CPU TDP support
4x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32GB of dual channel memory
Native support for DDR3 at 1066, 1333, 1600 and 1866 Mhz; can support higher mhz through overclocking
AMD 970 northbridge chipset and AMD SB950 southbridge chipset
- Support for AMD CrossfireX at 16X and 4X using PCIEX16 and PCIEX4 slots**
- Support for 6 SATA6GB/s devices, as well as RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10 and JBOD
- Up to 14 USB 2.0/1.1 ports (8 ports on back panel, and up to 6 through internal USB)
- Up to 4 USB 3.0/2.0 ports (2 on back panel, 2 through internal header)
- Please note that a 4x PCI-E link will bottleneck graphics cards more powerful than an HD 5770/6770
Integrated Realtek RTL8111E LAN
Integrated Realtek ALC889 HD audio
- Up to 7.1 channels
- Support for S/PDIF out
- Support for Dolby Home Theatre
Expansion slots:
- All PCI-E Express slots conform to the PCI-E 2.0 standard
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x16
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x4
- 2x PCI-E x1 slots
- 2x PCI slots
ATX Form Factor; 30.5CM x 24.4CM
Rev 3.0 boards have UEFI support with dual UEFI BIOS

Gigabyte GA-970A-D3

AM3+ socket
- Support for 32nm AMD FX-Series 4-core, 6-core and 8-core processors (Bulldozer and Piledriver core)
- Support for AM3 Phenom II and Athlon II processors
4+1 phase power/VRM with no cooling, and 140W CPU TDP support except FX-83XX (a notice about VRMs: it is highly recommended you ensure VRMs are cooled when overclocking any high wattage processor. For more info see here and the notation in the questions & answers section below)
NEW - Rev 1.3, 1.4, 3.0 GA-970-D3 have VRM heatsink cooling installed
4x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32GB of dual channel memory
Native support for DDR3 at 1066, 1333, 1600 and 1866 Mhz; can support higher mhz through overclocking
AMD 970 northbridge chipset and AMD SB950 southbridge chipset
- Support for AMD CrossfireX at 16X and 4X using PCIEX16 and PCIEX4 slots**
- Support for 6 SATA6GB/s devices, as well as RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10 and JBOD
- Up to 14 USB 2.0/1.1 ports (8 ports on back panel, and up to 6 through internal USB)
- Up to 4 USB 3.0/2.0 ports (2 on back panel, 2 through internal header)
- Please note that a 4x PCI-E link will bottleneck graphics cards more powerful than an HD 5770/6770
Integrated Realtek RTL8111E LAN
Integrated Realtek ALC889 HD audio
- Up to 7.1 channels
- Support for S/PDIF out
- Support for Dolby Home Theatre
Expansion slots:
- All PCI-E Express slots conform to the PCI-E 2.0 standard
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x16
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x4
- 2x PCI-E x1 slots
- 2x PCI slots
ATX Form Factor; 30.5CM x 24.4CM
Rev 3.0 boards have UEFI support with dual UEFI BIOS

Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3

AM3+ socket
- Support for 32nm AMD FX-Series 4-core, 6-core and 8-core processors (Bulldozer and Piledriver core)
- Support for existing AM3 Phenom II and Athlon II processors
4+1 phase power/VRM with no cooling, and 140W CPU TDP support except FX-83XX (a notice about VRMs: it is highly recommended you ensure VRMs are cooled when overclocking any high wattage processor. For more info see here and the notation in the questions & answers section below)
Gigabyte Ultra Durable 4 Classic PCB

4x 1.5V DDR3 DIMM sockets supporting up to 32GB of dual channel memory
Native support for DDR3 at 1066, 1333, 1600 and 1866 Mhz; can support higher mhz through overclocking
AMD 970 northbridge chipset and AMD SB950 southbridge chipset
- Support for AMD CrossfireX at 16X and 4X using PCIEX16 and PCIEX4 slots**
- Support for 6 SATA6GB/s devices, as well as RAID0, RAID1, RAID5, RAID10 and JBOD
- Up to 14 USB 2.0/1.1 ports (8 ports on back panel, and up to 6 through internal USB)
- Up to 4 USB 3.0/2.0 ports (2 on back panel, 2 through internal header)
- Please note that a 4x PCI-E link will bottleneck graphics cards more powerful than an HD 5770/6770
Integrated Realtek RTL8111E LAN
Integrated Realtek ALC889 HD audio
- Up to 7.1 channels
- Support for S/PDIF out
- Support for Dolby Home Theatre
Expansion slots:
- All PCI-E Express slots conform to the PCI-E 2.0 standard
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x16
- 1x PCI-E x16 slot running at x4
- 2x PCI-E x1 slots
- 2x PCI slots
ATX Form Factor; 30.5CM x 24.4CM
Rev 3.0 boards have UEFI support with dual UEFI BIOS

Members list

People who want to submit for membership to the GA-990XA/970A-Series Owners Thread/Club may do so at [CLICK HERE] to visit the submit form. To be a verified owner (highlighted in orange), you must have a CPU-Z validation link, and must prove that your validation is stable (if overclocked) by providing a screenshot regarding stability in the thread. The screenshot may feature either Prime95 after minimum 3 hours, IntelBurn or LinX after 20 passes on high, or OCCT for 30 minutes.

As a unique feature of this club, we are allowing you to submit your info as a "future" owner, in case you have upgrade plans to a GA-990XA or GA-970A Series motherboard.. However, we ask that all "future" owners ask for inclusion into the spreadsheet by posting in the main thread and not using the submit form.

GA-970A-UD3 unboxing on privatepinky channel

Useful tools & tweaks
Overclocking and monitoring tools

AMD Overdrive - Software overclocking and monitoring. NOTICE: It is recommend that permanent overclocking be done in the BIOS, not with software!

Monitoring tools

HWiNFO - A free, fully featured, and all around useful tool for viewing and monitoring system information. It has similar features as CPU-Z, HWMonitor, and EVEREST/AIDA64. It shows detailed information about motherboard, CPU, GPU, RAM, BIOS, hard disk drives, etc. It can be used in any Windows version above Windows 2000 or DOS, and comes in a portable version.
CPU-Z - View important system specs such as CPU speed/details, motherboard, memory, graphics.. etc
HWMonitor - View voltages, temperatures, and control your PWM fans.
CoreTemp - Accurate CPU temperature monitor. Also download the CoreTemp desktop gadget for Windows!
SpeedFan - Tool to control PWM fans - can also monitor temperatures.

Stability testing tools

IntelBurnTest/LinX - Short, stressful linpack-based tools - great for testing CPU stability. Notice: Usually runs hotter than other stability tests.
Prime95 - A well-accepted stress testing tool, runs a prime number calculation as a stress test over multiple hours to determine stability.
OCCT - A stability testing tool with many different programs. Uses a prime number test for the CPU and a Linpack-based test for the memory. It also tests GPUs with a Furmark-style test, and the power supply with a combination of the above.
SuperPi Mod V1.5 - Great tool for testing memory stability (at 32M setting). This single-threaded benchmark calculates the value of Pi to millions of digits.

Performance testing tools

GeekBench - well known tool that tests CPU performance and memory bandwidth with a number of quick tests
MaxxMEM² - Memory bandiwdth and latency testing tool
SuperPi Mod V1.5 - This tool also responds fairly well to changes in clock speed and memory. Notice that due to code optimizations it is not to be used for cross-platform comparisons.

Other Information

If you are not on the members list, you may add yourself by visiting this link.
If a change would like to be made in your membership information (i.e. from future owner to current owner), PM me (xd_1771) so I can change your information in the spreadsheet.
Feel free to PM me (xd_1771) if there are any concerns about the thread, or if there are any improvements/additions you wish for me to make.

For more information about all other Gigabyte AM3+ socket motherboards, [CLICK HERE]!

Matas · Jun 18, 2011

Using it for two days. Not happy with CPU fan smart fan control, as my Gelid cooler was spinning 700-1500rpm on old Gigabyte MA-790X-UD4P, and now it starts running at 1500rpm, although the CPU temperatures are the same

Matas · Jun 18, 2011

F3 BIOS fixed an issue, now it runs at 900-1000rpm. Anyway, there is headroom for improvement.

Dromihetes · Jun 18, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matas;13916441
F3 BIOS fixed an issue, now it runs at 900-1000rpm. Anyway, there is headroom for improvement.

I hope the BIOS update is made via the USB as on older Gigabyte mobos and that i m not forced to flash from Windows or via some DOS commands ?!
Asking this because i ve saw that this EFI Gigabyte mobos seem to need flashing from Windows or DOS mode.
Is it the case with this board ?!

Matas · Jun 18, 2011

Flashing was done through Qflash utility in BIOS via USB.

m_jones_ · Jun 18, 2011

No need for another thread when there is this one http://www.overclock.net/amd-motherboards/1023100-gigabyte-ga-990fxa-series-owners-thread.html

JunkoXan · Jun 18, 2011

umm thats for the FXA's not XA's it shouldn't be a problem to do a FXA and XA on seperate threads

Matas · Jun 18, 2011

Sadly, I can't validate my 990XA-UD3 in 990FX thread, as there is ne 990XA-UD3 option.

Dromihetes · Jun 18, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matas;13917221
Flashing was done through Qflash utility in BIOS via USB.

Thanks for the feedback , thanks God Q-Flash is in it s place

xd_1771 · Jun 18, 2011

I'm planning on a direct jump from my 790XT-UD4P to this board once the price is lower

Quote:

and now it starts running at 1500rpm, although the CPU temperatures are the same

This might have been the mount on your CPU cooler, the thermal paste may not have spread as well.

v3dgames · Jun 18, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matas;13916441
F3 BIOS fixed an issue, now it runs at 900-1000rpm. Anyway, there is headroom for improvement.

thanks for the heads up

Matas · Jun 18, 2011

I'm pretty sure that thermal paste spread correctly (checked it) and fan rotation's direction is the same. I just think that BIOS isn't mature yet, as F3 shows great improvement

Talking about mosfet temp, if HWMonitor Pro shows correctly it is ~45C in idle. (TMPIN2 sensor).

jprovido · Jun 18, 2011

im planning to get this myself. ive always been a gigabyte fanboy with amd motherboards

v3dgames · Jun 18, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matas;13920812
I'm pretty sure that thermal paste spread correctly (checked it) and fan rotation's direction is the same. I just think that BIOS isn't mature yet, as F3 shows great improvement
Talking about mosfet temp, if HWMonitor Pro shows correctly it is ~45C in idle. (TMPIN2 sensor).

I am sure a lot of these new boards will have bios updates to fine tune stuff.

xd_1771 · Jun 18, 2011

The VRMs on my 790XT are idling at 36C right now, in the same range as other things on my mobo. Considering my case airflow is predominantly front-back and focused more around the CPU and GPU than mobo, that's not that bad. Then again, the VRM heatsink on mine is way more hefty and includes a heatsink to connect to the northbridge which may actually assist some of that transfer (both NB & VRMs are stable).

Anyways 45C at idle is nothing to worry about for sure, what is the load temperature?

Erper · Jun 19, 2011

since i was planing to go for i5, this mobo and buldo make me confused...
i would take this path of amd, but i dont know how much would cpu be on its own...
for now, i can take this mobo and vengance 1600mhz for 175e...
which is comparing to i5 bit expensive... for p8p67 and same memory i would have to spend around 220e

Quantium40 · Jun 19, 2011

Hello all fellow Gigabyte 990XA-UD3'ers. I have a problem and I think this is a decent place to put it.

So my brother and I bought a couple of 990XA's in anticipation for bulldozer, but we both seem to have this same problem.

I put a Phenom II 550 in my board, and my brother has a 555 in his. In my old board (790X-UD4P) as well as my bros (some MSI board, idk) we were able to unlock to quad cores. I was even able to OC mine to around 3.7 max stable. In these new 990XA boards, unlocking cpus always results in unstable systems, can't pass prime95 or do anything intensive. Any idea as to why this is the case?

Unlocking only to three cores seems to fix the issue, but I hate being gimped so badly until BD releases. Maybe I should've gone with a 990fx board instead.

v3dgames · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quantium40;13923454
Hello all fellow Gigabyte 990XA-UD3'ers. I have a problem and I think this is a decent place to put it.

So my brother and I bought a couple of 990XA's in anticipation for bulldozer, but we both seem to have this same problem.

I put a Phenom II 550 in my board, and my brother has a 555 in his. In my old board (790X-UD4P) as well as my bros (some MSI board, idk) we were able to unlock to quad cores. I was even able to OC mine to around 3.7 max stable. In these new 990XA boards, unlocking cpus always results in unstable systems, can't pass prime95 or do anything intensive. Any idea as to why this is the case?

Unlocking only to three cores seems to fix the issue, but I hate being gimped so badly until BD releases. Maybe I should've gone with a 990fx board instead.

Are you sure all the voltages are set the same on your new board as on your old board? Are you using the latest bios? you where using a 790X before so I don't see why you would have trouble on the 990X.

Quantium40 · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by v3dgames;13923667
Are you sure all the voltages are set the same on your new board as on your old board? Are you using the latest bios? you where using a 790X before so I don't see why you would have trouble on the 990X.

First tried similar settings, then tried just about everything else. It seems that no matter how much I or my brother tweak the settings (adding voltage, changing multipliers, messing with ht and fsb etc) prime95, heaven bench, and crysis all crash almost immediately upon running. If we lower the core count we both can always achieve stability quickly. Btw, updating sig rig. Also, BIOS is flashed to F3, no fix

v3dgames · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quantium40;13923762
First tried similar settings, then tried just about everything else. It seems that no matter how much I or my brother tweak the settings (adding voltage, changing multipliers, messing with ht and fsb etc) prime95, heaven bench, and crysis all crash almost immediately upon running. If we lower the core count we both can always achieve stability quickly. Btw, updating sig rig. Also, BIOS is flashed to F3, no fix

You would have to ask Gigabyte. If you say it was passing prime 95 on your older 790X then I don't know... I never got a CPU with locked cores because it's never guaranteed to work unlocked. A 990FX would probably not have helped because they are about the same it's just the 990FX has 16x 16x Crossfire/SLI support.

Could it be possible something they changed with AM3+ is making your unlocked cores less stable?

look at this the GA-890GPA-UD3H will have AM3+ support but there is a catch...

"Description:

1. Beta BIOS
2. Add AM3+ CPU support

Note: Remove boot PXE ROM & unlock CPU core function, please use previous BIOS version for full functionality."

I saw that over on the AMD CPU forum..
http://www.overclock.net/amd-cpus/1044124-am3-physically-different-am3-2.html
Quote:

Originally Posted by CDub07;13916067
That might be a feature AMD is trying to get away from with AM3+ and is why why there only doing the mid to high boards.

Quantium40 · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by v3dgames;13924152
You would have to ask Gigabyte. If you say it was passing prime 95 on your older 790X then I don't know I never got a CPU with locked cores because it's never guaranteed to work unlocked. A 990FX would probably not helped because they are about the same it's just the 990FX as 16x 16x Crossfire/SLI support.

Could it be possible something they changed with AM3+ is making your unlocked cores less stable?

Idk. Not a huge deal I guess. I'm willing to endure hell for a couple of months just to get to the Bulldozer

v3dgames · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quantium40;13924200
Idk. Not a huge deal I guess. I'm willing to endure hell for a couple of months just to get to the Bulldozer

You should see what I am going through I got 16GB of ram over a month ago
I started having BOSD just found out with memtest86+ that 1 of the 4 sticks was bad they where 2 - 8GB kits so now I am using only 8GB again while waiting to ship the bad kit back corsair so they can replace it and now it seems I can't do anything without running out of ram.. hard drive keeps locking solid ram at 98% full once you get used to 16GB there is no going back lol

I updated my last post did not see a new post because of the new page you might want to read it.

Quantium40 · Jun 19, 2011

Aha. Interesting. So it looks like AMD doesn't care a whole lot about the unlock feature anymore. I wonder if it is a problem that am3+ has and that is why it is being removed from bioses.

Thanks for the info. I think unlocking will be dead in a couple of months anyhow. It sure was fun turning a cheap proc into a quad monster though.

Matas · Jun 19, 2011

VRM temp. at Prime95 smallFFTs test 58-60C. I think I can improve it by adding rear exhaust fan, cause now my Bitfenix case has only 2x230mm at front and at top.
Yeah, my old 790X-UD4P also had better VRM temps, just in case of having a more beafy radiator + heatpipes.

Dromihetes · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by v3dgames;13924152
You would have to ask Gigabyte. If you say it was passing prime 95 on your older 790X then I don't know... I never got a CPU with locked cores because it's never guaranteed to work unlocked. A 990FX would probably not have helped because they are about the same it's just the 990FX has 16x 16x Crossfire/SLI support.

Could it be possible something they changed with AM3+ is making your unlocked cores less stable?

look at this the GA-890GPA-UD3H will have AM3+ support but there is a catch...

"Description:

1. Beta BIOS
2. Add AM3+ CPU support

Note: Remove boot PXE ROM & unlock CPU core function, please use previous BIOS version for full functionality."

I saw that over on the AMD CPU forum..
http://www.overclock.net/amd-cpus/1044124-am3-physically-different-am3-2.html

It s only for version 2.1 from what i see.
It would be nice to have the support for this mobo ,but it s a little more price wise in my case than the 990XA-UD3.

Nice find , +rep for you.

v3dgames · Jun 19, 2011

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matas;13925394
VRM temp. at Prime95 smallFFTs test 58-60C. I think I can improve it by adding rear exhaust fan, cause now my Bitfenix case has only 2x230mm at front and at top.
Yeah, my old 790X-UD4P also had better VRM temps, just in case of having a more beafy radiator + heatpipes.

I don't think I will have a problem with that.. My case is loaded with fans 2x120mm on the front 1x120mm on the top and 1x120mm on the back

With the fan on the top I did a test with and found the CPU and system temp to be lower with it pulling air in. The only exhaust fan in the case now is the back fan and the GPU exhaust fan if you want to count that.

I bet these fans are the only thing that has kept my current MSI-870A-G54 board from blowing lol
but I don't want to keep pushing my luck so I ordered the GA-990XA-UD3

[Official] Gigabyte GA-990XA/970A-Series Owners' Club & Help Thread - FX-8350 support added

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