**Official Asus A8N32-SLI DELUXE Thread**

[lemonkettaz]

just like to add my appreciation of this board.

its mint! much better than my previous pure innovation

 

[Kaiju]

Another gig up may be a little optimistic...maybe another mhz up maybe more prudent

Hehe, man it's feeling the burn now, can only get another 6MHz on the FSB STABLE ATM.

 

[okimanoob]

Hi does anyone know if the Scythe Ninja Plus fits the A8N32 ?
Used to use a Thermalright XP-120 but that was tight with the cooling pipes at I/O, so currently using stock fx57 cooler.
The Ninja seems to highly thought of in these forums for performance+noiseless.
How does it compare with Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro64 in terms of performance/compatability ?

 

[lemonkettaz]

Is there any specific bios update i should use or not.. can i just use the latest one..

ive just had this board 1/2days.

p.s. i have no floppy drive.. :s

pps what a 1000th post... iconic

 

[Boah]

Is there any specific bios update i should use or not.. can i just use the latest one..

ive just had this board 1/2days.

p.s. i have no floppy drive.. :s

I recently got mine too, and I flashed the latest bios (1103 as of now) and first installed the drivers from the CD, then upgraded to any newer drivers on the Asus website.

I couldn't get the Asus Update utility to work (comes up with a NT service error and DLL error), and after doing some digging it's apparently a known issue between Creative drivers and Asus drivers. What I did was rename the BIOS ROM file to "a8n32sli.rom" and burnt it onto an empty CD, rebooted and pressed Alt+F2. The board then boots into 'flash mode' and looks for the ROM on floppy (which fails) then CD, reads it, flashes and reboots again. I have no floppy installed either.

 

[Coolasmoo]

I recently got mine too, and I flashed the latest bios (1103 as of now) and first installed the drivers from the CD, then upgraded to any newer drivers on the Asus website.

I couldn't get the Asus Update utility to work (comes up with a NT service error and DLL error), and after doing some digging it's apparently a known issue between Creative drivers and Asus drivers. What I did was rename the BIOS ROM file to "a8n32sli.rom" and burnt it onto an empty CD, rebooted and pressed Alt+F2. The board then boots into 'flash mode' and looks for the ROM on floppy (which fails) then CD, reads it, flashes and reboots again. I have no floppy installed either.

Using a Creative X-FI here and ive not had a problem using Asus Update.

 

[Boah]

Using a Creative X-FI here and ive not had a problem using Asus Update.

That's interesting. We have the same motherboard, nearly the same graphcis card (mine's the XT), the same memory, the same soundcard.. I wonder why it doesn't even install on mine?

Edit: Actually, my CPU is the Opteron 170, and I installed the Athlon64 drivers for it, including the Cool 'n Quiet drivers. A possible problem/difference there.

 

[Coolasmoo]

I dont use Cool and Quiet but i did load up the CPU driver from AMD.

I have heard of others with the same problem as yourself, but this motherboard is really picky.

I have the ACPI boot issue and enabling Parallel port stops it where as others dont have the ACPI issue at all.

 

[Coolasmoo]

Just thought of something else thats problably not related but might help you.

To resolve IRQ sharing i installed the X1900XTX in the bottom slot (2) and the X-FI in the very top PCI slot (nearest the CPU)

 

[Boah]

To resolve IRQ sharing i installed the X1900XTX in the bottom slot (2) and the X-FI in the very top PCI slot (nearest the CPU)

I did the reverse - the XT is in the top PCI-e slot, and the X-Fi in the bottom PCI slot. IRQ sharing is a possible conflict, I suppose. I'm not too fussed to be honest, but it would be handy having the option to flash from within Windows (but the alt+f2 boot option is nearly as good, which is why I'm not too fussed).

I have the ACPI boot issue and enabling Parallel port stops it where as others dont have the ACPI issue at all.

I don't use the parallell port, and I've not had any ACPI boot issues. I did have an issue with the XT drivers and my flat panel loosing the signal when it tried to enter the Windows logon screen. I resolved it by moving the USB mouse to another USB slot (according to the ATI support documents disconnect any USB device might resolve it, which it did). From what I could find it's a problem with the "legacy usb" setting (which I've now turned off) and (some?) ATI cards.

 

[Coolasmoo]

I did have an issue with the XT drivers and my flat panel loosing the signal when it tried to enter the Windows logon screen. I resolved it by moving the USB mouse to another USB slot (according to the ATI support documents disconnect any USB device might resolve it, which it did). From what I could find it's a problem with the "legacy usb" setting (which I've now turned off) and (some?) ATI cards.

Hmmm, thats interesting

I get the occasional monitor signal loss with my Belinea TFT , i will try that later and see if i can reproduce it.

Thanks

 

[G.O.A.T]

Does anyone know if the memory clock (mhz) settings on the A8N32 work accurately or do they just relate to a divider?

I can clock my memory to 250mhz fine normally , however, when I underclock the memory and set the motherboard FSB to run at 250 as soon as I start bringing the memory up to full speed i can't even POST. The most I can get to is the 166mhz setting. 200 mhz or above always fails?

I am running the CPU and Hypertransport on a 4x divider so this doesn't seem to be an issue, anyone got any ideas?

 

[Boah]

Does anyone know if the memory clock (mhz) settings on the A8N32 work accurately or do they just relate to a divider?

They're given as speed, but work as a divider. So 166Mhz is 166/200, in other words 5/6. Which means that for a HTT of 250 and with a 5/6 divider the memory runs at around DDR416. To clock it at 1:1 leave the memory clock at 200.

 

[jemz]

ok quick update
just testing this board now....looks good

http://server2.uploadit.org/files/jemzlavigne-test5.JPG
only been up 1h......so more later

 

[G.O.A.T]

They're given as speed, but work as a divider. So 166Mhz is 166/200, in other words 5/6. Which means that for a HTT of 250 and with a 5/6 divider the memory runs at around DDR416. To clock it at 1:1 leave the memory clock at 200.

Thanks Boah, CPUz confims that the memory setting of 200mhz just equals running the memory in 1:1, I'm now running at 250 fsb and 250 memory thanks. Anyone know why they don't just have memory dividers on this board as most people are going to be overclocking it lol?!

 

[Boah]

Anyone know why they don't just have memory dividers on this board as most people are going to be overclocking it lol?!

I think it's common practice on many/most AMD motherboards, for some reason. I wish that the BIOS changed values that were affected by some change you did, so say you changed the HTT (FSB) to 250, the actual MHz listed in the memory clockings would be the actual speed you assigned the memory to run at (250 @ 1:1), but no, instead you have to realise the speed actually means a divider, then calculate the speed on your own

One niggling thing about this board is that I find the AMI BIOS more confusing than the Award BIOSes I've used in the past - and BIOSes are not exactly intuitive to begin with. You get used to it, though.

I have a question regarding the memory too - does anyone know what is better to run the memory at: DDR466 (233Mhz) with the rated 2-3-2-6-1T on the 166Mhz/5:6 divider, or DDR512 (256Mhz) with more relaxed timings on the 183Mhz divider? I tried the latter one with the rated timings and 2.8v but it still wouldn't post, but I haven't experimented with the timings yet. From what I've read the AMDs like tight timings more than raw speed, but I'm not sure where the threshold is.

 

[jemz]

ffs whos makes this NO SWEARING!!!

no volts over 1.6v.....sigh's.....thats max for FX60

grrrrrrrr i hate mobo makers

 

[Boah]

no volts over 1.6v.....sigh's.....thats max for FX60

You'll need to enable the "overvolt cpu vcore" in the Advanced -> JumperFree Configuration section in the BIOS. This overvolts the vcore by 0.2v, so keep in mind the voltage will be 0.2 higher than the CPU VID/vcore you set.

 

[jemz]

lol thats no good i need like 1.8v
anyway not impressed here final stable pc huh

a wussy 3445
http://server2.uploadit.org/files/jemzlavigne-test6.JPG
back to trying DFI expert next weekend grrr

 

[jemz]

ok maybe some low volts action

done have a lot of good things to say about this board atm
http://server2.uploadit.org/files/jemzlavigne-test7.JPG