How to determine if G400 will work in new Socket 939 motherboard

[chucky2]

Does anyone know how I'd go about determining if a G400 DH 32MB SGRAM AGP card would work in the following motherboard: ASRock 939Dual-SATA2?

I'd love to use this board as a cheap upgrade to my mom's PC for Christmas (she's using an older Super-7 system...which for her DV-AVI needs, simply doesn't work), while still being able to upgrade her in the long term future with a PCIe card when the G400 won't cut it for her anymore.

Thanks in advance for any replies!

Chuck

[Nowhere]

Give us model number of your G400.

[chucky2]

Nowhere- Thanks for the reply!

It may be a while (like Thanksgiving time period until I'm physically up at my parents where the PC with the G400 is at.

Is there any way to tell from within Windows what model number she has? She's running the latest G400 drivers if that helps...

Thanks either way! (depending on the answer, might just have to let this thread lie dormant until Thanksgiving...not ordering until 1st or 2nd week of Dec. anyways, so that's OK...)

Chuck

[Guru]

Look for the "4A" in the part number! for example : G4+M4A32DG

[chucky2]

Guru- That's the only value that will allow the card to work in that motherboard, just a 4A type G400?

Thanks either way!

Chuck

[Guru]

Guru- That's the only value that will allow the card to work in that motherboard, just a 4A type G400?

Thanks either way!

Chuck

As far as I know yes it is the only one that will work. The 4A in the product number means it's a 4X capable version (different voltage)! Runing a old 2x capable might even damage the motherboard.

I recomend you do a search here in the forums for more information!

[dZeus]

there have been countless threads on this subject....

a non-4A version will NOT damage the motherboard, as they ARE capable of 1.5v operation! The only possible problem is that it might not get detected as such by the motherboard because final 4x AGP specs changed after the non-4A revision was finished. Nonetheless it will either just work fine, or not boot because the motherboard will think that it's not capable of 1.5v operation. If it won't boot, a simple mod to the board will make it fully compatible (which is explained in a thread in the FAQ files forum).

I myself have been using non-4A G400 cards without problem in my Asus P3 and Intel P4 motherboards for years now...

[Nowhere]

chycky2, the only unique thing which DOES show in windows drivers is serial number of the card (AFAIK). It's in the "left" Matrox tab in advanced display properties. Now, that doesn't give you automagically the info you need...but perhaps with serial number in hand you could go to Matrox Tech Support forum. I would be surpised if they wouldn't know from s/n what's the part number... (if they will want to check that is... )

Alternativelly...perhaps your parents can open the computer after all? If it's a tower style case they won't have to do much more, the sticker is on the "back" of G400, so part/model number should be clearly visible.

[chucky2]

I honestly don't know if I want my mom or dad even touching the PC short of turning it on...those are some completely computer illiterat people there when it comes to hardware....

It's possible my brother will come home one of these weekends before Thanksgiving (he's 1.5 hours away vs. me being 5)...I somewhat trust him to not destroy the PC when removing the front cover and then then taking the side off.

Good to hear that the sticker is on the back of the G400...that means it should be easily seen once the side is off...

Since this isn't a screaming priority, I won't tie up the Matrox Support forums with this...now, if the sticker isn't there, then they'll be hearing from me...

Thanks for the help and direction (go see the FAQ) ya'll!!!

Chuck

[chucky2]

OK, got time to check this while I'm here for Thanksgiving...here are the codes on the heatsink side of the card:

LAM04594

REV .405F MT03230

Here at the codes on the opposite side of the card:

906-04 Rev. B 1999

G4+MDH4A32G


It sounds like from what was said earlier, since I have the 4A in the last code, it's a 4x 1.5v capable card, right?

Thanks either way!!!

Chuck

[Mcollector]

...
G4+MDH4A32G


It sounds like from what was said earlier, since I have the 4A in the last code, it's a 4x 1.5v capable card, right?

Yes.
G4+MDH4A32G is the one that will work in a 1.5V-only AGP slot.
G4+MDHA32G is the one that will *not* w/o a mod. (Notice the missing "4" in the 2nd P/N.)

The issue is NOT the speed (4x); it is the voltage signaling (1.5V v. 3.3V). Newer mobos w/ AGP slots don't support 3.3V AGP signaling. Some early AGP 4x cards with the dual universal voltage signaling notches (for both 3.3V and 1.5V) on the card don't work right at 1.5V signaling. Fortunately for you, you have the G400 version that does work.

Most newer AGP cards are 1.5V AGP signaling only, and all (or all I know of) pre-1999 AGP cards are 3.3V signaling only. Both those types should have just one of the voltage keying notches (in different positions) among the gold fingers along the edge connector. Universal voltage signaling cards had both notches; I don't think there are any universal voltage signaling AGP cards made anymore (my guess is they were made between 1999 and 2003).

[Wombat]

Yes.
G4+MDH4A32G is the one that will work in a 1.5V-only AGP slot.
G4+MDHA32G is the one that will *not* w/o a mod. (Notice the missing "4" in the 2nd P/N.)

I'm a little rusty, but I think that the "4" is present, and the "A" would be missing.

[Mcollector]

I'm a little rusty, but I think that the "4" is present, and the "A" would be missing.

No. The "A" stands for "AGP" to ID an AGP card in the P/N (like you couldn't tell from looking at the card). They use "P" for PCI cards instead of the "A" in that position. The "4" in front of the "A" is the extra thing for "reliable" 1.5V signaling G400 AGP cards. The ones w/o this extra "4" can be converted to be compatible w/ 1.5V AGP signaling by changing some SMT resistor to a different value, but I don't know the details of which resistor(s) or what value(s).

Matrox has a method to their P/N madness. They used to have a better explanation of the meaning on their website; their current explanation is more vague.

These P/N's mean:

for G4+MDH4A32G

G4+ ::= G400 GPU,
M ::= Millennium model
DH ::= Dual Head
[4] ::= 1.5V signaling (=> usuable on AGP 4x/8x-only mobos, but somewhat of a misnomer; more below).
A ::= AGP bus (a "P" would mean PCI bus)
32 ::= 32 MB video RAM
G ::= SGRAM

G4+MDHA32G is the one that will *not* w/o a mod (missing the 2nd "4" in the P/N).
If you have a single head Millennium G400, the "DH" will be missing. The Marvel G400 models use a different letter than the "M" (or maybe an additional letter, I forgot).

I just double checked on a couple of different Millennium G400 DH video cards I have -- one w/ the extra "4" and one w/o. Also confirmed from an old email a Matrox rep sent me once when I was asking about G550's v. P650's in re: which AGP signaling each permitted. I was warned at that time about the early G400 AGP models v. the later ones. Also checked a couple of single head Millennium G400 cards I have -- same on the "4", and the "DH" in the P/N is missing on the SH models.

There is a considerable amount of misinformation about AGP voltage signaling and AGP speed. A lot of people (including sales people, techs, computer stores, and various BBSes) think that AGP 4x means 1.5V signaling, or that the dual notches mean AGP 4x. They do not. Those notches only identify voltage signaling, not speed. AGP 4x can be 3.3V or 1.5V or 0.8V signaling, according to the AGP 2.0 and AGP 3.0 specs and how the design engineer follows one or the other for a particular card. If you want the definitive word, download the AGP 2.0 and AGP 3.0 specs somewhere off developer.intel.com (if they are still there).

The original AGP 1.0 spec specified AGP 1x/2x speeds at 3.3V signaling only. The AGP 2.0 spec specifies speeds up to AGP 4x (1x/2x/4x), 3.3V signaling required and 1.5V optional. The AGP 3.0 spec specifies speeds up to AGP 8x (1x/2x/4x/8x) with 1.5V/0.8V signaling required and 3.3V signaling optional (and generally not implemented). According to the AGP 3.0 spec, AGP 4x speed must work at 1.5V and 0.8V signaling (but they DO work slightly differently; some signals are inverted), and AGP 8x works at 0.8V only (if memory serves). You can also do AGP 1x or 2x speeds at 1.5V signaling levels, according to the AGP 2.0 and 3.0 specs. (To make matters worse, there are some AGP 2.0 spec compliant, AGP 4x cards that will not work in some AGP 3.0 spec mobos.)

Intel, starting with one of their P4 mobo chipsets, led the charge to kill off 3.3V AGP signaling by not supporting it at the mobo level.

If you want an example of an AGP 4x, 3.3V-only signaling card, the Number Nine SR9 w/ 16M or 32M video memory (the 8M versions of the SR9 were limited to AGP 2x). The SR9 is voltage keyed for only 3.3V signaling AGP slots, even though it is AGP 4x capable. (You have to watch out for some mobos w/ universal voltage keyed AGP slots that are 1.5V/0.8V signaling only, which is MOST later mobos for P4 or Athlon XP and above CPUs; a 3.3V AGP card will plug into them, but it won't work.)

An example of an AGP 2x (maximum) card that is BOTH 3.3V signaling and 1.5V signaling capable (and thus voltage signaling compatible with the mobo of this thread) is the Hercules 3D Prophet 4500 w/ 64M RAM (curiously, the 3D Prophet 4000 (a lower model) is AGP 4x capable). The 4500 card is voltage keyed for both 3.3V and 1.5V (universal) signaling, meaning it has 2 notches among the gold fingers of the edge connector (not counting the stabilization notch at the back of the card).

All AGP Millennium G400's are universal voltage keyed for both 3.3V and 1.5V AGP slots, but the early ones (w/o that extra "4" in the P/N, mentioned above) are not guaranteed compatible w/ 1.5V signaling.

[JohnY2]

I have a 16mb G400 OEM from Compaq running in an Asrock 939DualSataII with a 4400-X2 and 2GB of ram. It has a Compaq part number of G4+MILN/16/CPQ. It's got both 1.5V and 3.3V keys. I didn't know about the early G400, but this one works fine so far with Gentoo Linux and win2k3 server. When I shut is down I'll look for the Matrox part no, unless I can read it from dmesg or Xorg.0.log in Linux.


JohnY

[Mcollector]

G4+MILN/16/CPQ
looks like one of Matrox' OEM P/Ns, of which they had a bizillion.

The ID scheme I gave above is for retail (and "white box") cards. Some of it carries over, but w/ the OEM cards, you can't always use the subtleties, like that extra "4". Matrox has made slight changes to their ID scheme over the years, too.

Matrox was quite the whore when it came to cards for the Tier 1 OEM market -- pay them enough money and they'll do whatever you want. Tier 1 OEM versions (doesn't include the "white box", aka "bulk" OEM versions) frequently had mods made based on what the Tier 1 OEM (Compaq (CPQ), HP, IBM, AST, DELL, etc.) wanted. Usually, they were cost cutting measures, such as lower speed RAMDACs (back in the day when the RAMDACs were separate chips), lesser amounts of memory, different types of memory (SDRAM v. SGRAM, for example), absent connectors or upgrade sockets, etc., than what the retail cards had. Other h/w or video bios mods were possible, so your Compaq card might just have been spec'd by Compaq to work w/ 1.5V signaling. You'd have to search Compaq's site, or call them (if you can find anyone who will actually know what you are asking about).

Since it's apparently working in your system w/o problems, I wouldn't be too concerned about it.

The "white box", aka "bulk" OEM versions are intended for "system houses" (your local PC shop building PCs). They're the same as the retail versions, but w/o the pretty retail box, printed manual, and came w/ only 1 driver CD for some N number of cards and no extras. Bulk packs were bundles of 5, 10, 20, and [I think] 40 cards. You can recognize a white box card by a suffix of something like "/20/BN" or "/BN/20" (or similar), which meant
20::= 20-pack
B::= Bulk
N::= North American market

As I said, the white box cards were the same as the retail cards, though rumor had it the "white box" cards were not as overclockable as the retail cards.

Tier 1 OEM cards have a suffix of "/[CPQ,HP,IBM,AST,DELL,etc.]". There were apparently a lot of these specialty suffixes. I saw something like 20 to 50 varations listed on Matrox' site 1x, including some weird ones like "OE5", "OE6", et al. There were also suffix codes for non-North American market cards (I think "/I" was Ireland).

I confine myself to retail or white box cards made for the North American market. They're guaranteed compatible with everything from Matrox' site (video bios upgrades being my main concern). I'm not sure the North American part matters, but we do use 60 Hz AC power here, and Europe uses 50 Hz AC power; I'm not sure if there are bios mods to factor this in or not.

I avoid the Tier 1 OEM cards because:

(1) they tend to be stripped down or budget versions of the retail card. (This allowed the OEM to save $$ but still claim they had those great Matrox cards in their systems);
(2) Matrox didn't support them (if you called up and read off the P/N, w/ that OEM moniker, they'd tell you to go away);
(3) Matrox implied you shouldn't use the video bios flash upgrades on Matrox' site. I did see a separate video bios for a G100 Productiva HP card on HP's site once, and it wasn't as late as the Matrox bios. The HP card h/w was definitely different from the retail Matrox G100 Productiva card;
(4) Matrox also implied you should use the Matrox drivers from the Tier 1 OEM (saying there were modifications) for your Tier 1 OEM Matrox card, but I found only a slight glitch from using the drivers off Matrox' site once -- the drivers didn't recognize the card, windoze complained they weren't for the card when I forced the change manually, but worked just great anyway (that was on a W98SE system).

I once flashed the bios of an apparent OEM Millennium G400DH (no sticker to tell, I couldn't tell from looking at the card's video bios w/ debug, and the h/w looked exactly like a retail card w/ 32M SGRAM). The bios upgrade recognized the card and flashed it just fine. The drivers didn't recognize the card automatically. I had to manually select the card drivers, windoze complained, but when I rebooted, the drivers worked fine on that card. I don't recall the same experience w/ retail or white box Matrox cards. Maybe there is a different manufacturer PCI ID for the Tier 1 OEM cards that steers Matrox' auto recognize the wrong way, so you have to do it manually.