Shuttle HOT-661

[Maxxarcade]

Just got another free pc, with an old Shuttle HOT-661 V.3.1 board and a PII-400 cpu. It has 100Mhz FSB and 440BX chipset. Anyone know what the max CPU I can use with it is?

It is also loaded with I.Q. caps, all 1000uf 6.3v 8mm. Amazingly none of them are bulging (yet).

This board will supposedly handle 4x 256MB PC100 Dimms, so if I can get a fast enough CPU on it, I may be able to do something with it.

[shadow]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

I found this nice page that has the latest BIOS (I hope) and the manual for this motherboard.

The website is:
http://global.shuttle.com/Download/D...p?Item=HOT-661

I downloaded the manual for your motherboard, I made sure that I selected "661V31EN.ZIP". That is I made sure I selected the manual for revision 3.1 of this motherboard.

The manual does not say what processors are supported, however this board has two lots of jumpers. One to control the Front Side Bus, the other to control the Multiplier. The maximum supported Front Side Bus frequency is 150Mhz. This high frequency can be used to overclock the CPU. The maximum Multiplier is 5. Suppose that you had a Pentium III processor with a Front Side Bus frequency of 133Mhz and a multiplier of 5. This would give you an overall clock speed of 665Mhz. That should be the highest speed CPU that you can fit into this motherboard. Although if you overclock it and set the Front Side Bus to 150Mhz with a multiplier of 5. Then the overall clock speed will be 750Mhz. However I doubt that one could overclock the Front Side Bus from 133Mhz to 150Mhz. However I could be wrong here.

When I looked at the BIOS revision history on:
http://web.shuttle.com/share/fae/hq/.../readme661.htm

I noticed that on one of the older BIOS versions, there has been a fix which is titled:
"Update DMI information "CPU MAX SPEED" from 500 to 900"

Would this mean that the maximum CPU speed is 900Mhz? I really do not know.

[gastorgrab]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

I noticed that on one of the older BIOS versions, there has been a fix which is titled:
"Update DMI information "CPU MAX SPEED" from 500 to 900"

Would this mean that the maximum CPU speed is 900Mhz? I really do not know.

The 900 Mhz part is 100 FSB, 1.7v. (i just happen to have a bad one in front of me)
.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

One thing I've always been confused about with Slot 1 boards is the voltage regulation. There are several different voltages/versions of Slot 1 CPU's, yet most of the boards I've seen do not have adjustable voltage. For example the Dell Optiplex GXa which came with a 266Mhz PII, that doesn't even specify the voltage (I think it's a Klamath core), and I have several other systems that have CPU's of different voltages.

How does the slot 1 architecture deal with CPU voltage? I'm an AMD guy, so I don't know much about the slot 1 stuff. At one time I had a Powerleap PL-IP3-T with a 1400Mhz Tualatin that I used in the Optiplex GXa (at a slower speed due to 66Mhz FSB), but that had it's own VRM circuit on board.

[gg1978]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

The main question is what VRM spec is the onboard VRM.. If it's a late model BX, it's probably 8.4, while LX and possibly early BX are 8.2.. You can get the VRM specs from Intels website, just do a search for VRM x.x.. You can look up the VRM controller chip and see which spec it'll do..



IIRC, 8.2 only goes down to like 1.8V, while 8.4 goes down to 1.3V, with higher Icc current capability.


Klamath, Deschutes and Katmai, work on 8.2 and 8.4
Coppermine needs an 8.4 to be happy.
Tualitin needs 8.5, as Vgtl went to 1.25V and Icc went up again.

IME, BX's are good for coppermine's, at least the 100FSB ones.. Some AGP cards don't like to be run at 133 FSB, but the PCI slots and memory buses are up to the task.. Most "overclocker" BX boards can be run at 150+ FSB if you keep your choice in parts that can hold up to it..

As for how the slot 1's work with CPU voltage, they have a set of VID bits that are run to the connector, with the bits either shorted to ground internally on the CPU substrate, or floating high.. The VRM controller reads the VID bits, and sets Vcore appropriately. Back in the old days of Celeron overclocking, *the 300A days*, you could use nail polish or another nonconductive coating to mask of the VID pads on the slot 1 connector, and alter Vcore, even if the motherboard didn't allow it.. Or you could chop and connect traces to do the same thing.

I think the PPro also had VID bits, as PPro was VRM 8.1.. The Pentium "classic" and MMX didn't, but a lot of them used a linear Vreg anyway for Vcore.


I've "hotwired" a dead Dual socket A MPX boaard that for some reason had lost connection for the VID bits.. You could put CPU's in both sockets, and it would do nothing.. I wired some pulldown resistors to force the VRM's to output 1.75V, and it promptly started working again..

[gg1978]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

Oh, and on a side note, don't even worry about the multiplier on the CPU's.. Some chips were unlocked, and would actually respond to being set to a different multiplier, but most don't, and utterly ignore the multiplier setting on the motherboard.

[Logistics]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

Make double sure about the amount of RAM it can handle before you buy any. I have an Abit BH6 I am working on right now, which I believe is also a 440BX, and from what I can tell, the board was never able to handle more than 768MB of RAM.

[Spacedye69]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

I've got a bunch of Asus p2b p3b boards. That is the problem they fixed with the p3b. It gives additional switching for the agp ratio, so vid cards run more stable at 124, 133, and 150mhz settings.

As gg1978 said, processor support is based in the voltage the VRM contoller can go down to.

Just saw Logistics post. BX boards can handle 1gb of ram. They are just VERY particular of the types of memory they like.

[gg1978]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

Well, some BX boards have a limit of 768MB of RAM, and that's for the simple reason of having only 3 DIMM slots.. BX, and for that matter, i810 and 815 all need "Low density" DIMM's.. The max per slot is 256MB, and the DIMM has to be double sided, with chips on both sides. The correct 256M modules with have either 16 *non ECC*, or 18 *ECC* with chips that are addressed 16M deep by 8 bits wide. BX will work with ECC, and registered memory, but all of it has to be the same type.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

Thanks for all the great info. I'll be recapping the board soon when I get the Samxons in from Big Pope.

So the older socket 370 to slot 1 converter cards I have with the voltage jumpers must be catering to overclocking, since the CPU would normally control it anyway.

Still haven't had any luck upgrading the CPU in the Dell Klamath based board with anything other than the Powerleap adapter. Tried a generic socket 370 adapter card with a Celeron 366, and it would not POST.

There is only one jumper on the Dell board, for selecting 3 different CPU speeds, and moving it with the original 266 cpu in place will make it not POST as well.

[linuxguru]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

Maxxarcade - you'll probably need the right microcode updates to successfully run PPGA or FCPGA CPUs in a slotket on Slot-1 boards. Note that Slot-1 CPUs and S-370 CPUs have different microcode updates, and you will need the S-370 version to be able to run it in a Slotket. Most Slot-1 only boards will not have the S-370 microcode updates in their BIOS. This is a reasonably easy hack on most Award BIOSes, but nearly impossible on HP or Dell proprietary BIOSes.

There are also many kinds of Slotkets available - some only support PPGA Celerons, while others support both PPGA and FCPGA CPUs. Some have jumpers for Vcore (VIDs), dual-CPU operation, PPGA/FCPGA, Intel/Via CPU, FSB setting, etc. There's no easy way to predict what will work, short of testing.

[Spacedye69]

Re: Shuttle HOT-661

and that's for the simple reason of having only 3 DIMM slots..

...uhhh...oops!

OK, BX and 4 slots.