Intel D945GCLF2 Dual-Core Atom

**smashing** · 08-22-2009, 06:26 PM

Am following up on my earlier post about the S-Video to RCA adapter I had ordered from the States, which arrived today. It works, in full colour, however the picture quality is very poor. For that reason I wouldn't recommend it. The adapter listed by Kapone on Parts Express looks exactly the same as the one I got from the States. Not sure if one is a knock-off of the other, or I simply got a bad one, or it is actually possible to get better picture quality than Kapone and the other users on Parts Express experienced.

Here's a photo of the output I got with my old adapter that I had lying around.

And the adapter I purchased from svideo-rca.com

The second one looks like it is out of focus, but it's not. The adapter makes the picture blurry. This effect might not be so noticeable with moving video but is clearly noticeable with computer text.

What we have basically is two different types of adapters - one uses passive circuitry to convert an S-Video signal into a Composite video signal (2nd picture), and the other connects the RCA jack directly to the composite video pin on the S-Video jack.

It makes sense to sell a more complex adapter with conversion circuitry because some equipment with S-Video jacks simply does not provide a signal on the composite video pin as they should. This is where people get into trouble and is the reason an entire website selling a single adapter can exist.

Here are the connections that my 'good' adapter uses, as checked with a multi-meter.

I checked this against the standard pin outs on Wikipedia. At first glance it doesn't seem to correlate with any of the 5 variants listed. However. I actually think the text-based description (at time of writing) of the pins on the Wikipedia entry is incorrect. Look at this Wikimedia image of a 7-pin connector. The pins are numbered differently.

In any event. It turns out that if you apply the Wikipedia pin descriptions (reproduced below) to the Wikimedia image (also below), then these correlate perfectly. (I'm ignoring the ground pin variance as all grounds are common).

1 - S-Video Luminance Ground
2 - S-Video Chrominance Ground
3 - S-Video Luminance Signal
4 - S-Video Chrominance Signal
5 - Composite Video Ground
6 - (No Connection)
7 - Composite Video Signal

This is further confirmed by looking at the pin-outs on allpinouts.org (look at the male connector pinouts and note that numbering is somewhat different from above).

The least you need to know is that if you follow the connections from my superimposed image above, it will work. You can use either pin 1, 2 or 5 for the ground, and pin 7 for the composite video. You don't need to join pins 1 and 2 together, they (and pin 5) are joined together on the motherboard. If it doesn't work for you it means Intel have changed the hardware of the board at some point, although I doubt this.

On this subject I looked for any indications that there has been a hardware revision to the board. Normally a sticker on the PCB would give it away (Revision 2 or something like this) but the stickers looked fine. The only possible clue I could see that there may have been a revision to the board was text saying CPU-D945GCLF2(B) on the PCB itself (below). I think this may be a red herring but perhaps others could check and report back if they have the same, or different?

Also earlier I promised to check the composite video output on a known PAL only TV. Sure enough, the signal came out in black and white.

All this leads me to conclude...

The Intel Little Falls 2 motherboard does provide native Composite video on the Composite video pin (pin 7 above)
The signal is in NTSC format
There is a confusing array of S-Video to RCA adapters on the market, confusing variances in the pins used by different manufacturers, and your best bet is probably to solder your own adapter or lead until someone finds an adapter available online that uses the correct pins for this board. If you're in a hurry, you will get a colour signal, probably of lower quality, using the Parts Express or svideo-rca.com adapter.

For more on my experiences with the Little Falls 2 motherboard visit my roll your own set-top box project.

Good luck all. This has been trying but fun.

**Maheriano** · 08-23-2009, 05:04 PM

I'm having problems with this board. For some reason when I plug it in to a regular ATX power supply, it turns on without pushing the power button. As soon as I plug it into the wall, the computer boots up on its own and I can't figure out how to stop it. Any ideas?

**Deric** · 08-23-2009, 06:28 PM

Check your BIOS for recovery after power loss also the battery may be bad. I've seen the same thing happen with a bad 2032 battery.

Originally Posted by Maheriano

I'm having problems with this board. For some reason when I plug it in to a regular ATX power supply, it turns on without pushing the power button. As soon as I plug it into the wall, the computer boots up on its own and I can't figure out how to stop it. Any ideas?

**Maheriano** · 08-23-2009, 06:51 PM

Ya, I already turned that off, set it to STAY OFF.

**seninha** · 08-26-2009, 06:09 AM

I wonder if some of you guys recognize this problem.

Sometimes my CarPC wakes up from hibernation but for some reason screen stays black.
Only solution is to press the power button.

The button that I use has a 3 meter extended cable ans is connected to the M2-ATX using the J8 connector.
One time system restart whitout any problem, but sometimes it does not restart at all.
Only after pressing the button for several times it finally restarts.

Problem then is that it looks like the board has been given a CMOS clear because clock inside XP is always showing 00h00 and not actual time.
That means I need to set the right time manually inside XP.

I really wonder what the cause of this could be?

Also want to know If the issue whit static noise when starting up is somehow solved by Intel??.
Still have the problem that I hear a really bad static noise for a couple of seconds when starting the system.

**CabeSipes** · 08-26-2009, 07:19 AM

I'm using this same board and found no output on the s-video until I disabled the onboard video in the bios and downloaded the video drivers from intel. Then go to control panel and click on the video driver (cant remember what its called) and it will show single monitor or dual monitor. Pick dual and click on the second monitor as being a television. The s-video plug must be plugged in during boot up or it wont be recognized. Also if you unplug it while the computer is running you cant plug it back in and work, you have to reboot. My biggest problem is the input doesnt hold my s-video adaptor tight and when I hit bumps it works itself out and I lose my dual 7" monitors in the rear.

As far as the board my only issue has been one my usb inputs decided one day to no longer be 2.0. Evertime I plug anything into it it tells me that my device will run better in a 2.0 port. The other problem I have had is if I boot the computer without a monitor hooked up it loses the video drivers. By losing they are gone except in the add remove programs but you cant repair it so I have to boot in VGA mode and reinstall the drivers from Intel. I was told that Intel boards are notorious for doing that. I also have the black screen boot issue that a previous poster said and when it happens I have to restart.

Other than those issues it has worked great.

**YomTov** · 08-26-2009, 12:56 PM

Hey guy's,

My D945GCLF2 in shutting down sometimes because over heating issue
the MOBO is in mini-itx case manufactured by by Morex.
the temperature outside is 35+-

I have read allot about it, but nobody mention if his MOBO is in car or the temp outside.

Is this MOBO should be working good with the condition I have (35+ TEMP) or there is a known problem in this temps?

**nitefallz** · 09-10-2009, 11:23 PM

I read this entire thread earlier today but now I can't find the posts regarding stand by not working. When I have this board connected to my Opus 90W it will go into standby, but then when I try to resume, it simply reboots. Also after it enters standby mode, none of the USB devices are on, like my GPS.

What would cause the standby to fail? A power issue? I tried running it with only but the monitor and hard drive powered up, same problems.

**Punky** · 09-11-2009, 12:14 AM

have you try with an atx psu? try that first to see if its the psu's fault.
Though i recall the opus keeps the 5v on by default, so it should work for standby.
But double check on the manual to see if there's jumper that enables 5V.

**nitefallz** · 09-11-2009, 09:37 AM

Originally Posted by Punky

have you try with an atx psu? try that first to see if its the psu's fault.
Though i recall the opus keeps the 5v on by default, so it should work for standby.
But double check on the manual to see if there's jumper that enables 5V.

It works for a normal ATX psu. I switched back and tested it. Then I hooked it back up to the Opus and it seemed to work fine after that, with all the peripherals attached. I updated some drivers, but not the BIOS ( the windows bios installed said it updated, but it didnt ). Not sure if that changed anything, but it appeared to be working perfectly before I went to bed.

Now if I could only get the damn boot up time to be faster than 12-20 seconds. Do we know why it takes so long for it to hand off to the OS? It's insane.