MSI X58 Pro-E

[Sliver Victor]

Hello I just got this mobo: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/310431381...84.m1497.l2649

it is to replace my rampage ii extreme board which is getting old and because I recently bought a new 965 EE chip as well.

I have 3 580's I want to use on it. tho only with a Enermax platinum Platimax 850W PSU. So I will only probably end up running 2-way SLI for the moment until I get a Corsair HX1050W PSU.

it is a good board? No?

does anyon eles have this board or used that can tell me what to expect? I have never used MSI before.

[lordjohn]

I think it should be good, MSI is a good brand, X58 is the top on 1366. I have a gigabyte x58 it is very nice. however MSI tends to have vrm temp problems, not sure is it also on x58, but the temp problem is on my MSI 990fx

[Sliver Victor]

refresh my memory, what is vrm?

[Sliver Victor]

just curious would vrm be NB temp? because BIOS on the new board (NB) says 71*c?

[TheLaughingMan]

No where near that high. The NB temp should be about what your CPU is at idle 30 to 45C depending on the ambient in your room. The NB would have explode if it was at that temp.....to my knowledge.

[Sliver Victor]

what is IOH? I though NB was this then SB was ICH? I'm sry I did not learn english very well in school, it was my second language pref.

[TheLaughingMan]

IOH I believe means Input/Output Hub and ICH is I/O Control Hub. I believe on a motherboard they would be referring to the same thing. Just different acronyms for different standards.

As far as that being normal, you will have to ask someone with more experience. I am not sure what software you are using, but I don't think it is properly labelling what it got that temp from. The three standard temps to display are CPU, GPU, and motherboard (usually the NB). Considering the label of IOH and that last statement, I am going to guess that display is actually your graphics card and that temp is probably within normal specs.

[Sliver Victor]

it can't gpu because it shows ioh in bios. plus if it was gpu in bios readout is different to windows which changes the whole thing. because in windows evga precision shows my gpus within more respectable range. - again sry for my english, I learnt italian very well and got all A's for it.

[lordjohn]

Originally Posted by Sliver Victor

refresh my memory, what is vrm?

VRMs are the chips that hands power to your cpu, it converts 12v from power supply to 1.2v-1.5v to your cpu. those chip are hot when cpu is under load. they are designed to go 100c. but some post say MSI have a high possibility of failing VRMs, you may consider put a fan on the top of those VRMs.

[lordjohn]

Originally Posted by Sliver Victor

it can't gpu because it shows ioh in bios. plus if it was gpu in bios readout is different to windows which changes the whole thing. because in windows evga precision shows my gpus within more respectable range. - again sry for my english, I learnt italian very well and got all A's for it.

I think you are using cpuid HW monitor? so it is usually cpu, vrm, NB. so second one is VRM. top end boards have sensor on VRM so it will show, most boards will just show 2, cpu and NB.

[Sliver Victor]

so the mosfet then? those square plugs around and lined up around the cpu socket? there is one line of them underneith the socket and it has a heatsink attached. I would prolly put a fan on there if I oc some time, but I'm happy with my setup right now. vrm readout is - prolly ok considering when I was using the asus rampage Ii ex board that sucker would push 90*c under load and it never failed me unless you call overheating a gpu and losing a power supply while at it, but VRM on that board was generally well reserved.

[Aquinus]

How do your caps near the processor on the motherboard look? You also have a heat sink on your VRMs, is that heat sink warm at all when the machine is running? I don't think it is the VRMs. 65 degrees sounds very high for the IOH. Maybe a cooler on the motherboard isn't on all the way or the paste has dried up on the IOH.

Also for everone's knowledg, the ICH and IOH are two different things. Wikipedia actually has a decent explanation:

Originally Posted by Wikipedia

The X58 is not a memory controller hub (MCH), because it has no memory interface, so Intel calls it an I/O hub. This should not be confused with the similar term I/O controller hub (ICH) which has traditionally been used to refer to the southbridge chips. Intel documentation now refers to the southbridge as the Legacy I/O Controller Hub.

[Sliver Victor]

the capacitors? are next to the socket on the left also lined together. it has only one row of mosfets.

[Aquinus]

Originally Posted by Sliver Victor

the capacitors? are next to the socket on the left also lined together. it has only one row of mosfets.

That's great but I already know where they are. I asked about what kind of condition that they're in. Can you take pictures if you have a decent camera?

[Sliver Victor]

I shouldn't need photos, I will tell you condition. The board I got on ebay from a trusted seller. They sold to me refurbished condition the board. As a warranty return item, still in working order. The board was spotless when I got it plus it is under the refurbished seller condition. I have only used it a bit more than a week and never any probs.

[Sliver Victor]

heere is a photo for your amusement:

[Sliver Victor]

sry wrong pic, here it is:

[AstroRetro]

G'day SV,

Congrats on the new board and processor. Should be great.

I have had the same board in my main desktop system for two years and it is rock stable and has great performance. I use it for gaming, photo editing, video conversion and of course a bit of work now and then (environmental simulation & statistics). I always get stuck hosting the Arma2 game server for my friends because my system never skips a beat under full load and never crashes (unlike theirs).

On my MSI X58 Pro-E, I have my i7 920 D0 permanently overclocked to 4GHz with the FSB at 200MHz, uncore at 3.2GHz and RAM at its stock 1600MHz. In bios I enable all CPU features except TurboBoost (because it boosts the voltage up so high every time it activates). I enable all power saving features and spread spectrum (I don't like EMI in my audio system). I set the memory timings manually to those specified my the manufacturer. Don't use AUTO - it set my timings too fast and was not stable (1T instead of 2T). Also I set the voltages manually in the bios because the MSI AUTO settings tend to overvolt a fair bit, leading to unwanted heat and power draw. For my CPU, I needed CPU core +0.14V (1.249V), CPU PLL=1.80, QPI/VTT=1.20, DRAM=1.60 (as per RAM specs), NB =1.1V, ICH=1.5V.

Make sure you get the latest bios and drivers for it (http://www.msi.com/product/mb/X58-Pro-E.html#/?div=BIOS)

These X58 boards do get hot. The northbridge is designed by Intel to run happily up to 100 deg! Many users of this board were worried by noticing load temps of 90 deg for the NB even though few noticed any instability or performance issues. The issue is well documented online with various suggestions on what to do about it. The leading suggestion is do nothing - it is probably fine to run hot. But more fussy users like me, or who planned to overclock, decided we could improve the temps by swapping the original thermal glue pad for thermal paste and tighter screws (for example http://mattgadient.com/2009/09/06/re...e-motherboard/). I also screwed on a spare fan I had lying around from an old AthlonXP cooler (see pic attached). Make sure you can control the speed of any little fan you put in there, if you go that way, because they can be noisy. The bios lets you undervolt a fan to slow it down, if you don't have a fan controller.

The only bad things to say about the board are firstly I cannot get S3 sleep to work when the FSB is clocked over 167MHz. It works fine at all lower clocks, but since I am running at 200MHz FSB, its no dice. This has not been resolved by bios updates and probably can't be fixed. But with an SSD on board, boot times are not a big deal and hey, I save a bit of power by not leaving it in sleep all the time.

Also, like all X58 boards it lacks modern interfaces like USB3 and SATA6. You can always add these yourself with PCIE cards, but they wont be quite as good as having an onboard solution like newer chipsets for Sandy and Ivy Bridge CPUs. Having said that though I'm happily running my OCZ Vertex3 SSD on the ICH10R (SATA3) and it is blazingly fast. The bandwidth limitation does not impact small file read/writes so much, which is the true HDD bottleneck.

I don't currently have a crossfire or SLI setup but may do in the future. One hesitation I have is that the board does not have much breathing room between graphics cards, so the suffocated ones tend to run hotter and their fans get noisy trying to such air down the narrow gap between the cards. This issue is not specific to this board and seems to be the case for almost all SLI motherboards.

Good luck with it.

[Sliver Victor]

thanks astroretro. that was very informative and it sounds like you have your PC locked down the way you like it. i am exactly the same and fussy about it as well. before this board I was using a rampage II extreme board only because of the ocing potential and control Asus ROG boards. I was happy to find this board has very similar settings and lots of ocing options which is what I want in a MB. so far it has been great. no probs at all. I will post some screenies when I get around to doing some ocing. I look forward to it and have 3dmark 11 ready to go anytime.

I started building my current PC in december 2010 and since then every part in it has been changed for something new so it just goes on and on. so far I am confident with MSI and they seem like a good brand to use. I am happy with the AMI BIOS and all the variations of available settings. the more the better.

on a conclusion as long as windows 8 doesn't bring any new terra of problems I don't forsee any prblems with my current setup. thanks.