D201gly2: product and SPCR review discussion

pixelhack · Post by **pixelhack** » Fri Feb 29, 2008 8:03 am

zistu wrote:
tuneable wrote:On the poweroff thing in Ubuntu... ACPI/ACPID re-installed, changed scripts, but still no 'real' poweroff.. After "# poweroff" and the normal shutdown sequence everything just stays powered on, including screen, disk and fan and the power-switch has no effect, only reset works.

Just from a mechanical point of view: the powerswitch on a ATX works with a momentary closure of the motherboards "front panel on/off" header pins, right?
What happens if you do a "sudo shutdown now -h" ?

In my case Ubuntu nicely closes down, and the machine powers off as soon as that finishes. This same command is used by the ACPID if I remember correct.

As for the PSU, I do believe the PSU has to have some kind of support for this feature. I'm using a Corsair HX450 for the system myself. I've got no clue what standard would cover this behavior though, sorry.

I am running Ubuntu 7.10 and have no problems with shutdown. According to the manuals I read, your power supply is supposed to be ATX compliant so it should be shutting off. I would try a different power supply if you have one available.

tuneable · Post by **tuneable** » Sun Mar 02, 2008 3:48 pm

What happens if you do a "sudo shutdown now -h" ?

This same command is used by the ACPID if I remember correct.

Yes, this should be in the ACPI scipts. I feared my ACPI was not configured to do this, but that was not the case. Manual shutdown (as you suggest) does not give the correct result and neither does "sudo poweroff".

According to the manuals I read, your power supply is supposed to be ATX compliant so it should be shutting off.

Based on your experiences (zistu, pixelhack - thanks!), I at least know it Ubuntu should poweroff normally. I'll contact the vendor of my PSU (they also sell this board) and ask if this "new" model PICO psu behaves as it should. I have no spare PSU to test with.

dougz · Post by **dougz** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 5:32 am

Also info about Silverthorne being formally named "Atom." --
[quote]Intelâ€™s press release also mentions the processor codenamed â€œDiamondvilleâ€

dougz · Post by **dougz** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 6:07 am

http://www.dailytech.com/Thinking+Small ... e10930.htm

Shade00 · Post by **Shade00** » Mon Mar 03, 2008 9:38 am

Very interesting articles. The size of those processors is astounding. I just wish we could get a low-power dual core, even if it's ~1.0ghz, on an ITX board with a PCI-express slot. Oh, and for less than $100.

tuneable · Post by **tuneable** » Wed Mar 05, 2008 1:16 pm

So it was the picoPSU-WI I used that caused the power off/on issues. Just tested the D201GLY2 with another ATX PSU and all worked fine. I keep you posted if this is just a bad sample, or if there is more to mention about this PSU. In any case, the shop I got it from (CarTFT) have so far been pretty responsive with advise.. we'll see.

I seriously hope this is just a single drop-out. Such a PSU is a perfect match for a motherboard like this. I'll post the eventual solution/explanation.

Thanks for the helpful suggestions!

Captain John · Post by **Captain John** » Wed Mar 05, 2008 8:46 pm

Hi everyone,

Well, I got one of these (d201gly2) for xmas from my wife, and it had problems displaying any resolution above 640x480 in linux, I'd get vertical lines on the screen that kinda "shimmer" at higher resolutions.

I tried a few different things, removing the board from the case, different power supply, different ram (3 sticks actually), updated BIOS, changed all of the few display settings in BIOS, even tried loading windows...

None of these things cured the issue, and XP won't take (I can't even get to the blue screen that says what drivers are loading).

I RMAed the first one, and... low and behold, the second one has precisely the same issues.

If anyone has a miracle solution, I'd really love to hear it. I don't want to waste any more money mailing a $60 board back to intel for another RMA, I'd rather just buy something different. I'm so pissed at Intel right now I can barely see straight.

-John P.

pixelhack · Post by **pixelhack** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 12:38 am

Which version of linux? I haven't tried XP, but Vista runs fine.

I have had great success with Ubuntu 7.10, all that I did was replace the video driver with the one recently published on Intel's site. Prior to that I had the same video issues that you experienced and had to use a third party driver for a solution.

Captain John wrote:Hi everyone,

Well, I got one of these (d201gly2) for xmas from my wife, and it had problems displaying any resolution above 640x480 in linux, I'd get vertical lines on the screen that kinda "shimmer" at higher resolutions.

I tried a few different things, removing the board from the case, different power supply, different ram (3 sticks actually), updated BIOS, changed all of the few display settings in BIOS, even tried loading windows...

None of these things cured the issue, and XP won't take (I can't even get to the blue screen that says what drivers are loading).

I RMAed the first one, and... low and behold, the second one has precisely the same issues.

If anyone has a miracle solution, I'd really love to hear it. I don't want to waste any more money mailing a $60 board back to intel for another RMA, I'd rather just buy something different. I'm so pissed at Intel right now I can barely see straight.

-John P.

Captain John · Post by **Captain John** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 5:07 am

Ubuntu 7.10, Fedora 8, and knoppix.

What driver did you use and where did you get it from?

Thanks,
-John P.

pixelhack · Post by **pixelhack** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 8:24 am

http://www.intel.com/products/motherboa ... /index.htm

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/filter_ ... bmit=Go%21

Captain John wrote:Ubuntu 7.10, Fedora 8, and knoppix.

What driver did you use and where did you get it from?

Thanks,
-John P.

Captain John · Post by **Captain John** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 8:27 am

Sorry, I must've been half asleep when reading your message, I didn't spot that you said the intel site.

Thanks for the info, I'll give it a try and let everyone know.

-John P.

zistu · Post by **zistu** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 8:47 am

There are indeed some issues with this mainboards video and Ubuntu and other Linux flavours, but some people have found fixes for it.

I'm running the server version myself so I haven't actually tried any of the solutions, but some digging on Google may solve the issue.

Edit: I know "overkill" will be the main word coming to mind, but here's a pic of my setup

Captain John · Post by **Captain John** » Thu Mar 06, 2008 7:57 pm

drivers on intel's site did work, but it was kinda annoying that the "install.sh" script didn't install, and the precompiled drivers didn't come with a short readme as to where to put them (I have to install network drivers every day at work, but video drivers under Linux are new to me). The Ubuntu forums were helpful, even with centos.

Thanks for your help guys. I appreciate it.

While at Intel's site, looking for documentation, I did notice that Linux is not a supported OS for this mobo... kinda small market they are aiming at.

And, I tried again, windows xp wouldn't take, pressed media and all (2 different optical drives).

Happy anyway,
-John P.

pixelhack · Post by **pixelhack** » Fri Mar 07, 2008 8:15 am

Here are my CPU temps for the D201GLY2:

no fan - 92C (I stopped the test)
case fan at 5V - 76C
case fan at 12V - 57C (too noisy)
case fan at 5V, 40mm cpu fan at 5V - 47C
case fan at 5V, 40mm cpu fan at 12V - 34C

I also wasn't happy with the Northbridge temp so I cut down a heatsink from my junkbox as a replacement. It is about 55x40x18mm. While I couldn't leave my finger on the stock heatsink, it is now comfortably hot to the touch using the "new" heatsink.

I'm going to run a case and cpu fan at 5V. All I have to figure out now is a better way to stick a fan on the CPU heatsink than masking tape. I might replace the cpu heatsink with something that is more fan-friendly than the stock heatsink is.

pixelhack wrote:Hi all,

This is my first time running a low power motherboard and I'm curious about what a "normal" temperature would be for this kind of rig. Also, at what temperature should I become worried. I notice that in this thread that some people have tested the D201GLY2 at very high temperatures.

At idle I am at a system and CPU temperature are 34C and 44C. Under load the system and CPU temperatures are 38C and 55C.

I just bought a D201GLY2, so I'll have some observations on that board soon too.

Cheers, Jeff

speedemon105 · Post by **speedemon105** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 6:42 am

Ok, what ram do people have here running in these boards?

I've had 2 different sticks of KVR533D2N4/1G, and can't get it to boot anything. After reading this thread it seems the Kingston ram might not be the best choice.

zistu · Post by **zistu** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 8:10 am

I'm running mine with KVR533D2N4/1G without any problems. I've considered upgrading it to a 2GB stick but not sure there really is a need.

If you hooked up the power led lead, does the led flash any of the error codes when you start it? The codes are described in the manual if I remember correct.

speedemon105 · Post by **speedemon105** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 8:22 am

zistu wrote:I'm running mine with KVR533D2N4/1G without any problems. I've considered upgrading it to a 2GB stick but not sure there really is a need.

If you hooked up the power led lead, does the led flash any of the error codes when you start it? The codes are described in the manual if I remember correct.

Thats the thing. I've run memtest on this stick (first one failed) and it passed, quite a few times. I left it running for around 8 hours. Yet on both boards I've had (I RMAd the first), Im still getting kernel panics and can't boot anything. I've tried half a dozen different livecd's, they all fail to boot. All with kernel panics.

I've updated the BIOS to the newest version, still does it. Since both boards did the same thing with the same stick of RAM, Im leaning towards that being the problem, even though it passed memtest. That being said, 2 out of 2 were both duds for me, so Im NOT buying KVR again.

pixelhack · Post by **pixelhack** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 2:56 pm

I am using Corsair VS1GB667D2 and Kingston KVR667D2N5 without problems.

KVR533D2 (which Kingston tells me is the same as KVR533D2N4) would not work for me. Kingston told me to ask for an RMA, which I have not done yet.

speedemon105 wrote:
zistu wrote:I'm running mine with KVR533D2N4/1G without any problems. I've considered upgrading it to a 2GB stick but not sure there really is a need.

If you hooked up the power led lead, does the led flash any of the error codes when you start it? The codes are described in the manual if I remember correct.
Thats the thing. I've run memtest on this stick (first one failed) and it passed, quite a few times. I left it running for around 8 hours. Yet on both boards I've had (I RMAd the first), Im still getting kernel panics and can't boot anything. I've tried half a dozen different livecd's, they all fail to boot. All with kernel panics.

I've updated the BIOS to the newest version, still does it. Since both boards did the same thing with the same stick of RAM, Im leaning towards that being the problem, even though it passed memtest. That being said, 2 out of 2 were both duds for me, so Im NOT buying KVR again.

cbutters · Post by **cbutters** » Mon Mar 10, 2008 4:54 pm

Hello Everyone.
I have a couple D201GLY2's for use in various situations, NAS and also as a CarPC. I figured out how to undervolt the D201GLY2 to 1.1volts vs the 1.35 volts.
I also have done some mods to the heatsink. You can check out my results here:

http://www.exoid.com/?page_id=155

Hope this helps some people out.

a9db0 · Post by **a9db0** » Tue Mar 18, 2008 9:51 pm

I've been playing with a D201GLY2 for a couple of weeks now, and here are some notes that may help:

Ram can be tricky. The first 1GB ddr2-533 dimm I tried didn't work. I'm using an Super Talent 2GB DDR2-667 dimm which works fine. YMMV.

The stock fanless cooling is insufficient. I was seeing temps in excess of 60c during normal use. My first step was to simply drop a 40mm fan onto the top of the stock heatsink. That brought the cpu temp down about 10c, but left the northbridge running hotter than the cpu. I then swapped out the Intel heatsinks for a pair of SilenX HSFs. These are essentially copper versions of the NorthQ heatsinks referenced elsewhere (see link below). I fitted a fan to the CPU HS but not the northbridge one - I didn't have a 3pin splitter handy. The result is that I'm running temps in the 45c range on both cpu and northbridge now.

The drawback to these is that the included fans are a little tall and glow blue, and could interfere with the PCI riser card in my case. It is quite quiet though. I have a slimmer fan I may swap in, especially if I ever need a PCI card. In retrospect I should have simply installed the SilenX on the cpu and moved the stock cpu heatsink to the northbridge. That probably would have proven adequate.

For Linux users of Debian or Ubuntu flavors, the video driver information posted here
is very useful. I recommend reading the entire post, though the driver downloadable from the bottom of page 4 works great for me. (Kubuntu 7.10)

Links:
Memory: http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=T6UB2GC5&x=20&y=3
Heatsink: http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6835226019
Case: http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6811165041

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 4:41 am

a9db0 wrote:The stock fanless cooling is insufficient. I was seeing temps in excess of 60c during normal use.

That is an ok temp for this CPU. Remember, this is not a standard desktop part, but is intended for embedded and super low-end applications where poor cooling is expected. As long as the load temp doesn't get much above 80C, you should be fine. I think the CPU is actually rated at 100C, like a mobile part . . .

a9db0 · Post by **a9db0** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 8:02 am

That is an ok temp for this CPU

The problem was that "normal use" was web browsing and a half-dozen terminals. DVD playback pushed those temperatures up significantly. I also had the system reboot a couple of times after having been running for 48 hours or so at 60c. Better cooling has eliminated that. I suspect, though I cannot prove, that the higher overall temperatures inside the case contributed to that problem. The D201 may be happy at those temperatures, but I'm not convinced the rest of the system components were. Either way, better cooling will doubtless contribute to better longevity of the system. And as impressed as I am with this little box, I don't see it going anywhere any time soon.

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 9:59 am

a9db0 wrote: The problem was that "normal use" was web browsing and a half-dozen terminals. DVD playback pushed those temperatures up significantly. I also had the system reboot a couple of times after having been running for 48 hours or so at 60c. Better cooling has eliminated that. I suspect, though I cannot prove, that the higher overall temperatures inside the case contributed to that problem. The D201 may be happy at those temperatures, but I'm not convinced the rest of the system components were. Either way, better cooling will doubtless contribute to better longevity of the system. And as impressed as I am with this little box, I don't see it going anywhere any time soon.

Yes. I think the issue is that the passive cooling for the CPU is not necessarily inadequate (as you stated), but that the board is not designed to work in a fanless enclosure. It's not so much that you need to add a fan to the CPU heatsink, it's that you need a fan somewhere in your case.

a9db0 · Post by **a9db0** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 10:29 am

you need a fan somewhere in your case

Got one. It's an 80mm exhaust fan located at the right rear of the case, blowing out the right side. I can hardly imagine what the temps inside would have been without it. The trouble is that it doesn't draw sufficient air directly across the cpu heatsink. And the stock D201 really needs air moving directly across the heatsink, as in the fan-equipped D201GLY2A.

tuneable · Post by **tuneable** » Sat Mar 22, 2008 2:02 am

A follow up message:

1. I received a new picoPSU and all power on/off issues are solved.

2. The dual PCI riser works! Currently I have a higher quality audio card and firewire card together.

derekva · Post by **derekva** » Sat Mar 22, 2008 1:07 pm

tuneable wrote:A follow up message:

1. I received a new picoPSU and all power on/off issues are solved.

2. The dual PCI riser works! Currently I have a higher quality audio card and firewire card together.

Did you use an active or passive dual PCI riser?

-D

Master One · Post by **Master One** » Sun Mar 23, 2008 10:27 am

tuneable wrote:The dual PCI riser works! Currently I have a higher quality audio card and firewire card together.

Please specify which dual riser card exactly you are using.

tuneable · Post by **tuneable** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 4:51 am

Please specify which dual riser card exactly you are using.

It is an active riser. "VIA EXT-PCIG rev B" is written on the board. I purchased it here, it is said to be configured for this motherboard specifically.

Nomisdk · Post by **Nomisdk** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 8:09 am

I have been reading alot about the board and my only concern about it is the x264 playback.

Woud it help adding a PCI grafic-card to it?

Im planning running Ubunto on it and use it as a Media Center PC for playing xvid, divx and x264 (720 pt hd)

jessekopelman · Post by **jessekopelman** » Mon Mar 24, 2008 8:54 am

Nomisdk wrote:I have been reading alot about the board and my only concern about it is the x264 playback.

Woud it help adding a PCI grafic-card to it?

Im planning running Ubunto on it and use it as a Media Center PC for playing xvid, divx and x264 (720 pt hd)

I don't think the Linux drivers for either Nvidia or AMD/ATI support H264/x264 acceleration. If your desire is to use a video card to offload video processing tasks from the CPU, you are pretty much stuck with Windows at this point. 720p x264 isn't that hardcore, though. You need something beefier than the Celeron 220 on the D201GLY2, but for the price of a D201GLY2 + video card you could build a fairly potent AMD ÂµATX system. If you really need mini-ITX size, Intel is coming out with boards based on the G45 chipset. Not only will they support Core 2 processors, but the integrated XMA4500 graphics may actually provide some video acceleration in Linux thanks to Intel's better driver support. Of course, mini-ITX G45 MB + C2D CPU is going to cost a lot more than a D201GLY2.

D201gly2: product and SPCR review discussion

D201GLY/2 follow-on

More Diamondville, Silverthorne and Atom news

D201GLY2 temperature

My experiences

Re: My experiences