GIGABYTE GA-MA78GM-S2H, AMD PHENOM 9500, and AMD ATHLON X2 4850e

Phenom 9500

Our first CPU is the Phenom 9500.  A wholly redesigned quad-core unit crippled by a TLB bug discovered too late in the game. 

The AMD Phenom 9500.  Yes, it has the TLB bug...

Here are the four Phenom cores chugging away:

The Cool n Quiet power management works much better here than in previous Athlons.  The BIOS supported it immediately, and the latest AMD utilities installed showed it working as advertised.  On the left, the PC is set to "Always On", while on the right, it was set to "Max Battery".  The CPU voltage drops from 1.25V to 1.05V, and the core clock drops in half, from 2200MHz to 1100MHz. 

First we tested the Phenom 9500 with the Crucial Ballistix DDR2-800 memory.  Next we change the memory multiplier to x5.33 to increase memory speed to 1066MHz. 

Gigabyte has a PDF on their website listing tested memory modules at certain speeds.  We had none of those models listed for 1066MHz operation, but had sticks from other vendors that state theirs work at 1066 MHz, even at 1173 MHz.  Unfortunately, all failed.  Here is what memtest86 showed us when trying other memory at 1066MHz, even with full overvolting of the memory and northbridge:

After consulting with the memory vendors, they said that it is because of the timing profiles loaded into the DIMMs not being compatible with this new chipset and CPU.  Furthermore, Gigabyte's current BIOS had no option to manually adjust individual memory timing parameters.  I then communicated this to Gigabyte, hoping that the next version would allow more memory tweaks.

We did eventually receive a set of DIMMs from Qimonda, the chip maker of the Aenoen brand: 

Qimonda HYS64T256020EU-19F-C2 / Aeneon AXT860YD00-19E-K-4G DDR2-1066

From the very first test, these DIMMs performed superbly, and at stock voltages.  They should put some heatsinks on these poor guys.  During heavy memory testing, the chips peaked at 112 degrees F.