The Ultimate Motherboard: Initial design V15

Port 80 POST codes provide a much better picture of what os going on in a system rather than beep codes. Unlike beep codes, the port 80 codes are not error codes, they are checkpoints that the BIOS issues as it moves through the boot process. A beep code is an error code and is only issued when an error is detected. Not all errors will be detected so they will not be reported by a beep code. Anoter important difference is that port 80 needs nothing to begin working at boot. The PC speaker requires at least some initalization on an on board system timer used to generate the waveforms for its tone generation. It also takes more code to run the speaker where you can display codes on a port 80 card like this:
mov al,b1h
out 80h,al

Note I also specified 4 digits. There are codes that use 4 digits but the user normally does not get to see all them. But the extra information can be invaluable. In order to make the codes useful, the MB manufacturer needs to actually publish the codes. Since we are the manufacturer in this case, we can publish the codes.

As for size, there are 5mm displays that are very readable. These can be tucked away in any number of places. And besides diagnostics, you could use these for some other 'fun' with a windowed case like displaying CPU temp. It's not a replacement for an LCD of VFD, but it is a little added bonus for having diagnostics.

 

Precisely. Anyone who has ever had to troubleshoot a system with serious problems knows how incredibly handy a motherboard with a port 80h POST display and a table of progress values can be. For example, I'd like to see a beep code that can convey any single point in the POST down to a procedure (clearing an error flag, for instance).

Also, you cannot convey anywhere near as much information in just a series of beep codes - how many can you have before it just gets ridiculous? Practically, you can only have "short" and "long"; assuming that you can remember up to 5 beeps, you only have 32 points to log. On a two-digit LED display, 256 different values can be displayed with much more clarity.

On top of that, as said above, the port can be directly interfaced with using a very basic routine that requires almost no initialisation at all - the command is simply sent along the bus, addressed to a port, and is then picked up by the appropriate device. Information can be sent here without the CMOS being readable or before any registers are even set.

 

Ohh, sory I misunderstood. I thought you were refering to a cheap'o POST card that gives you a two digit error number.

I've never actualy dealt with the system you're describing but I'm for it.

 

I know this is much later than I said it would be. I said I'd see if I had access to the specs for the RD580 chipset. It does not look like my company is working with that chipset at all. As such, I can't say anything about it. I can't find anyplace ATI would have datasheets on their web site either.

 

its a shame you cant conjure those sheets up on google. but then again its nVidia that has open source drivers for linux, not ATI. It doesn't sound like they would be the company to release their chip specs without a contract to a manufacturer.

 

The company I work for deal with a lot of chipsets and if we have dealt with it, we will have a record of it somwhee in our systems. We have nothing dealing with this northbridge or the southbridge. In contrast, we have plenty of nVidia info. It could be due to market penetration, availability, or that the customers we supply are not interested in this chipset yet.

I was hoping to be able to share information about what is on the chips and how they are interconnected. For example, it is pretty typicaly in a southbridge to have all yor devices linked through PCI on bus number 0. I was curious if this was the case for ATI's chipset, if that PCI bus has available pins on the southbridge to use for those PCI slots in the drawing. There is a lot of other specs I'd have like to seen, I always end up feeling cheated when I buy a MB, look at the specs, and see that the manufacturer had only used a fraction of the total capabilities of the chipset. The chipset costs the same money, and often times, the same PCB is used between models. IT all has to do with saving pennies on a few connectors and headers.

 

Dont worry Splynncryth, Im going to put everything I can onto this board, and push the chipset to its plausible limits.

 

were you going to work the drawups with the proposed color schemes so we can have a look at them? (If you dont have anything better to do of course)

 

Version 0.15 now posted

 

Just some questions:
(and, I did look through the whole thread looking, but I didn't find the answers. Perhaps I didn't look hard enough.)

1. is there an AM2 chipset that supports 48 lanes of PCI Express?
2. 4*8x = 32 ----- What about the other 16 lanes? (I read where some of them are being used, but not all of them.)
3. wouldn't it be better (especially when considering the size of heatsinks these days,) to have the first and third PCI Express slots be 16x and the second and forth slots be 1x or 4x depending on what else was using them? That way, you could have 2 pci express 16x slots for your video cards. (Yes, I have seen the benchmarks showing that there isn't much performance difference between 8x and 16x, that's not my point.) I imagine that it is more likely that people would be using 2 cards instead of the possibility of 4 cards. As you said, the slots would be configurable - why not configure them to the way that most users would be using them and make the few (4 card users) go through the extra steps of configuring?
- 3a. If that change was made, you would want to change the color coding on the slots to reflect which were 8x and which were 16x...
4. What happened to your audio riser?
5. Will the firewire (IEEE1494) b port fit where you put it on the backplane? It looks too crowded.
6. Why have 1 firewire a header and 1 firewire b header instead of just having 2 firewire a headers? Firewire b is just 4 of the 6 pins of firewire a if I remember correctly. Users could just not use the extra 2 pins of the header if they wanted firewire b.


Not along the same lines as my other questions, but I wanted to point out that if some MOBO maker did pick this design up, (and I'm hoping that bit-tech would not ask for any money for the design...) then it could be marketed as something along the lines of "The Bit-Tech.net Enthusiast Motherboard" similar to how the Fatal1ty motherboard is marketed associated to a particular gamer. Bit-tech has become a big enough destination for modders and hardware enthusiasts that I believe this would generate sales.

Perhaps gigabyte or asus could give RotoSequence a call and then run this board as competition against the Lanparty and the Fatal1ty.......

 

Here are the answers:

1. is there an AM2 chipset that supports 48 lanes of PCI Express?
- I don't think roto or anybody else has found out any information about the particular chipset we plan to use. But I'm sure there is one.

2. 4*8x = 32 ----- What about the other 16 lanes? (I read where some of them are being used, but not all of them.)
- No, wrong idea. Any slot can be any speed (IE: rather than using a 16x card in slot 1 and slot 4, they can be used in, say, slot 3 and 4). Think 4*16x at the max (future proofing) with the remainder being used up by onboard devices (gigabit ethernet anybody?)

3. wouldn't it be better (especially when considering the size of heatsinks these days,) to have the first and third PCI Express slots be 16x and the second and forth slots be 1x or 4x depending on what else was using them? That way, you could have 2 pci express 16x slots for your video cards. (Yes, I have seen the benchmarks showing that there isn't much performance difference between 8x and 16x, that's not my point.) I imagine that it is more likely that people would be using 2 cards instead of the possibility of 4 cards. As you said, the slots would be configurable - why not configure them to the way that most users would be using them and make the few (4 card users) go through the extra steps of configuring?
- No. Again, read my answer to the above. By default the board will be setup as slot 1 and 4 are 16x, with the other two at 3x (correct me if I'm wrong roto). This is so that you can just "insert and go".

- 3a. If that change was made, you would want to change the color coding on the slots to reflect which were 8x and which were 16x...
- Look again. Slot 1 and 4 are black, while slot 2 and 3 are blue

4. What happened to your audio riser?
- I'm taking a guess here: it's left off for now while it gets a re-vamp. The port is still there, just not the card.

5. Will the firewire (IEEE1494) b port fit where you put it on the backplane? It looks too crowded.
- Although I don't trust roto's measurements (I'm the one who corrected him on the SATA ports ), I don't doubt it'll fit, but next time I get him on messenger I'll remind him to double check (and actually measure!)

6. Why have 1 firewire a header and 1 firewire b header instead of just having 2 firewire a headers? Firewire b is just 4 of the 6 pins of firewire a if I remember correctly. Users could just not use the extra 2 pins of the header if they wanted firewire b.
- Simplicity and complication are not easy things to do, but roto has found a way to do it

 

In addition, Dream, you're wrong. There are three basic types of firewire in this world. 6-pin A, 4-pin A, and 9-pin B.
-Firewire A is a 400mbps standard, relying on its own processing unit to do data transfer rather than the CPU (in theory). Firewire A has two formats: 6-pin, and 4-pin. The actual data in Firewire A is transmitted over 4 pins, and the other 2 are power. 6-pin carries power, 4-pin does not. Otherwise, the only other difference is the shape.
-Firewire B is a 800mbps standard, again relying on its own processing unit. The 9 pins are broken down as such: 2 power+4 A standard+3 B standard. This allows B to be down-converted to A, but not the other way around. Right now the available back-panel ports are A 6-pin and A 4-pin. No B. Glad I could clear that up.

 

Gah, I forgot that the specs were out of date ATI finally posted the lane configurations, and there are actually 40 lanes on the chipset; as such, some things had to be re-configured to compensate. with 4x x8 slots, 32 lanes are occupied. One is used up by gigabit ethernet, and another one by a decent quality SATA controller.

 

I knew that - I was sticking to the terminology used in this thread.

Roto was not refering to Firewire 800 - He was refering to 6 pin firewire and 4 pin firewire. - With that, what I had to say about it is completely correct.

 

Ah. Touche. I must have missed that. I am now thoroughly humbled! /me is prostrate

In reference to the extra 8 lanes, 1 is allocated to Gig-e and another to SATA. I read somewhere that either onboard or discrete chip for Gig-e is faster. Does anyone know which is generally faster/better overall for system performance? Oh, and what is the X-Fi (?) card running on? The one with the flipped x1 slot? Is it on the PCI bus or PCI-E bus? Also, is it all on the riser or is only some of it on the riser? If all of an X-Fi is on the riser, it'll be larger than before, right?
Thanks, Roto. This motherboard is looking a-freaking-mazing. I showed a mac-head friend, and he said, "If this was made, I would ditch my mac and run OSX86 on this." That's an amazing compliment, considering this guy has things like a 20th anniversary mac and a cube simply for the aesthetic value (the cube sits on his coffee table). Keep up the awesome!

 

think for this thread i will go back to my last signature, I wanna see that motherboard.

 

may i make a suggestion that may work with this board

drop the caps and use the digital voltage regulators that iwill use on there server board and foxconn is just now looking at building?

 

I was thinking the same thing, would provide alot more room for elaborate heatsink designs.
If this does come out I will probably get one, depending souly on how much money I have.

 

What about a Coffee Machine on i. i mean come on how awesome would that be.

 

Might you be able to point out where you found the info on the chipset? Are there any boards currently based on this chipset? I would like to know if any use both the northbridge and southbridge.