Asus a8n-e..

[Shyatic]

Hi guys.. just found this thread

Anyways.. I have an A8N-E (i think I'm on the 1008 BIOS). I have had problems for a WHILE now trying to boot my PC. I have enough power -- 480 watts Antec running an A64 3200+, 2GB RAM, 2 Hard drives (one raptor one 200GB sata), an optical drive and an nVidia 6800 GT OC (BFGTech overclocked).

Anyways..... I am curious as to why this might be happening. When I turn the PC on from boot, it sometimes doesn't turn on. I mean, the monitor won't come up, the hard drives won't do their thing, etc. Then if I turn it off again and back on a few times, it will come up and work fine. I have *never* had a problem once the PC is up and running -- it stays up for days on end without a problem. I play games a lot and the PC is well cooled, so even when I'm sucking all the juice from the power supply, I am not croaking.

I am wondering if there is something wrong with my motherboard? I have had this problem for a LONG time and never really cared since I usually just keep it on 24/7 anyway.. but I would like to get it fixed. I don't think a reformat will help me since at this point, the booting problem doesn't even make it to Windows.

Thanks for any help!

Edit: I should mention, that this problem doesn't even make it to POST. Just a black screen and the video doesn't engage or anything.

 

[dubyoo]

You have the 12V 4pin plugged into the motherboard too? I suppose upgrading to BIOS 1010 would be a start.

I have recently bought an A8N-E 2.0 for an opteron 144 with 2x512Mb TwinMOS running off an Antec NeoHE 500W. Had fun getting it working. Enabled NvRAID in BIOS on first boot and couldnt set it up. After disabling it I could install the RAID drivers (using 6.70 drivers). The onboard audio has also been problematic. The soundstorm on my old A7N8X Deluxe used to have driver troubles resulting in BSoDs. On this A8N-E I installed the NvMixer and drivers first, but the digital output wouldnt work. Realtek drivers fixed that, but sound was distorted in games, so I uninstalled both and replaced with just the Realtek drivers. Ive flashed to BIOS 1010 now the drivers are up to date (as per Asus instructions) and it now recognises the Opteron. CPU temps reported average around 30 degrees but I dont have a side on my case yet as its off having a custom window cut.

Got to praise the NeoHE too. Three +12V rails. One powers motherboard, I have one dedicated to my Sapphire X800GTO2 (BIOS flashed to X850XT) and the third powers 2 Maxtor SATAs, NEC ND3520A, Antec P160 control panel, front panel LEDs & a floppy (for RAID/flashing). Quiet too. Like many others in this thread my voltages are reported to be low, but from my experience of Asus I doubt this is correct;
+12V @ 11.712
+5V @ 4.784
3.3V @ 3.2
Taken from Asus PC Probe 22308

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: StanFL
Does anybody with an A8N-E have a M-Audio Revolution 7.1 sound card? I'm using the 1010 final bios, and no matter what, I get no sound from the Revo after resuming from S3 standby. It works fine up until resuming from standby. I've done clean installs of XP Pro on two different hd's and the problem persists. I've also tried the Revo in all 3 PCI slots and I'm using M-Audios latest drivers. I've had the Revo for over two years and the sound after S3 worked fine on prior builds (both Intel chipset boards).

Asus tech support was a joke - don't ask. Still waiting on a response from M-Audio.

I can't get my Revo 7.1 to install at all. When I disable the onboard audio, put in the Revo, boot windows, and install the drivers... As soon as the drivers are done installing, the computer locks up and blue screens.... Only solution so far?... Not use the Revo soundcard. I tried all slots and same result. Not even going to bother anymore. Will look for a different audio solution down the road. I'll have to live with onboard for now.

 

[sandeep108]

Anyways..... I am curious as to why this might be happening. When I turn the PC on from boot, it sometimes doesn't turn on. I mean, the monitor won't come up, the hard drives won't do their thing, etc. Then if I turn it off again and back on a few times, it will come up and work fine.

Is the green LED on? If so, it could be the button on your case? If not, then PSU problem?

 

[werty316]

I just finished installing the A8N-E and first off I updated the the BIOS from the original 1008 to 1010. My board is revision v2.0. Everything powersup and I installed windows and that went fine. I went to install NF4 drivers v6.70 form nVidia's website. It installed fine but now during the windows boot screen notihng happens. The green bar scrolls but not HD activity. I tried NF4 drivers v6.77 and it boots into windows. Anyone know why? Is it possible to go back to bios v1008? I wanna run some tests if so. Here are my specs:

A64 3000+
ASUS A8N-E (BIOS 1010)
XFX 7800GTX (Drivers v81.95)
Patriot XBL 2x512MB
Coolermaster Real Power 550W
Maxtor Maxline III 300GB HD
Soundblaster LIVE!
PCI network card

Also I heard that nforce4 boards don't work well with certain Maxtor HDs, is this true? Anyone know of or heard of anyone with a Maxline III HD?

 

[pedramrezai]

go to device manager,Ide/sata controler,and uncheck NCQ.it solves your issue.

 

[werty316]

Originally posted by: pedramrezai
go to device manager,Ide/sata controler,and uncheck NCQ.it solves your issue.

Sweet it works now when I disable NCQ THX. That was a big help. I never like the NCQ technology anyhow.

 

[Flyingbig]

Hey guys, need abit of assistance. I recently purchased this motherboard with a new cpu cooler (gigabyte 3d rocket) and case but ever since i built the thing i can hear a subtle high pitched whine that is intermittent. It is barely noticable only when its quiet or when i have the machine running over night. My question is this, is it the chipset fan or something known because whatever it is i want to fix it as it is highly annoying. I am hoping it is something on the motherboard that is fixable or the cpu cooler (would be easier to fix). At the moment i am thinking its impossible to be anything to do with the case so at the moment i am looking at this otherwise great motherboard.

Thanks for anyhelp.

 

[ProviaFan]

I immediately replaced the chipset fan with a Zalman NB47J, so I can't really remember what it sounds like, but I seem to recall it as being somewhat annoying.

 

[Jorakal]

Is there any way to isolate exactly where the noise is coming from?

 

[werty316]

I am just wondering what people's OC'ing results are. So here are my results. I can't seem to get any higher 1:1. All voltages are stock.

A64 3000+ @ 2.2Ghz
Asus A8N-E BIOS 1010 HTT @ 3x
XFX 7800GTX @ STOCK
Patriot XBL 2x512MB @ 2.5-3-3-7 1:1
Coolermaster Real Power 550

Settings in the BIOS

Tcl---2.5
Tras-7
Trcd-3
Trp--3
Trc--11
Trtc-16
Trwt-6
Trw--3
Command 1T
S/W DRAM over 4G Remapping Enabled
S/W DRAM over 4G Remapping Enabled

When I try to increase the FSB to 250Mhz I get errors in SuperPI. I am disappointed with the stock OC'iing potential of this board. WIth my MSI K8N Neo2 Plat I could get the FSB to 2.4Ghz (270Mhz) with the same settings. Also one weird quirk is that the POST doesn't day nforce4 Ultra though it ain't a big deal.

 

[ProviaFan]

The best way to isolate noise is probably just to take the cover off of the case (or take the motherboard out entirely if it's not too much of a hassle), and place an ear near each potential source of noise.

 

[pedramrezai]

you have to use more relaxed memory timings lile 3,3,3,8 and increase your ram voltage to at least 2.9. my 3200 works flawlessly @ 2.7 with 2T and @2.6 with 1T.
10x270@ 1.475-HT 3x
10x260@ 1.425-HT 4x

but after all I got sick of this board and I replaced my mobo and cpu with a socket 754.
While looks like some downgrade, I am quite happy with the epox 8npaj and rev E6 sempron(64-bit enabled with SSE3). Unlike A8N-E that did not fix ram divider, this mobo does whatever you change.Right out of the box, my system is doing a 333x8=2666 from the original 200x8=1600 and it is at default voltage! I'm using 333 ram divider and my single 512mb ballistix is working @DDR533@3,3,3,8 1T @2.9v.Unlike A8N-E its chipset voltage is also adjustable and cpu voltage can go as high as 1.8! quite impressive for a
budget mobo-cpu combination which cost me only a 3200 venice!

 

[andlcs]

Originally posted by: werty316
I am just wondering what people's OC'ing results are. So here are my results. I can't seem to get any higher 1:1. All voltages are stock.

A64 3000+ @ 2.2Ghz
Asus A8N-E BIOS 1010 HTT @ 3x
XFX 7800GTX @ STOCK
Patriot XBL 2x512MB @ 2.5-3-3-7 1:1
Coolermaster Real Power 550

Settings in the BIOS

Tcl---2.5
Tras-7
Trcd-3
Trp--3
Trc--11
Trtc-16
Trwt-6
Trw--3
Command 1T
S/W DRAM over 4G Remapping Enabled
S/W DRAM over 4G Remapping Enabled

When I try to increase the FSB to 250Mhz I get errors in SuperPI. I am disappointed with the stock OC'iing potential of this board. WIth my MSI K8N Neo2 Plat I could get the FSB to 2.4Ghz (270Mhz) with the same settings. Also one weird quirk is that the POST doesn't day nforce4 Ultra though it ain't a big deal.

My board reaches 350MHz * 3 HT easily (Memory @ 266MHz).
SS

Maybe you need a little more VDIMM.

 

[werty316]

Sweet that you hit over 300. I think my RAM doesn't perform as well on this board as on my Neo2 Plat. I will try using a memory divider and see if I can get over 2.3Ghz. I guess my expectation are too high since the Neo2 can't OC quite well @ 1:1.

 

[fiveapes]

I have a question about setting up a RAID array on this MOBO.
This is the rig I am planning,
A8N-e
3700 San Diego
2 gb Corsair XMS
Seasonic S12-500
ASUS EAX850pro
My question is can I use 3 7200.9 80gb Seagate drives in a RAID 0 array and then use 1 7200.9 250gb drive as a straight back-up(not in an array? Any insight into this would be greatly appreciated. Thanx

 

[geekgeek]

Hey guys,

I'm new to these boards, and I have a problem which I hope you guys can help me with.

I recently upgraded to an Asus A8N-E + AMD 3200, so I did a clean install of WindowsXP with SP2. After Windows was installed, I installed the A8N-E drivers on the CD that came with it, and the Asus Update program. Since the mobo came with BIOS version 1008, I figured I'd run Asus Update to update it to 1010. Asus Update kinda hung on me, then later when I tried to install a newer version from the Asus Website, I kept getting a message saying that no Asus motherboard was detected!

Apparently the installer can't find a file called biosinfo.dll. I've googled a bit, but most people don't really seem to have a concrete answer for this. Is there anything I can do to get Asusupdate working, short of doing yet another fresh install? I hope not as it's such a painful and tedious process to reinstall all my drivers, programs, games...=(

 

[werty316]

Originally posted by: geekgeek
Hey guys,

I'm new to these boards, and I have a problem which I hope you guys can help me with.

I recently upgraded to an Asus A8N-E + AMD 3200, so I did a clean install of WindowsXP with SP2. After Windows was installed, I installed the A8N-E drivers on the CD that came with it, and the Asus Update program. Since the mobo came with BIOS version 1008, I figured I'd run Asus Update to update it to 1010. Asus Update kinda hung on me, then later when I tried to install a newer version from the Asus Website, I kept getting a message saying that no Asus motherboard was detected!

Apparently the installer can't find a file called biosinfo.dll. I've googled a bit, but most people don't really seem to have a concrete answer for this. Is there anything I can do to get Asusupdate working, short of doing yet another fresh install? I hope not as it's such a painful and tedious process to reinstall all my drivers, programs, games...=(

I would always to never use the windows update. Format a floppy disc as a system disc and put the BIOS file on it, reboot and press "ALT+F2" the bios files will load automatically. I never knew about this "ALT+F2" option which makes updating the BIOS really easy stuff.

 

[Jorakal]

geekgeek - I use the Alt-F2 option as well and it works fine.

fiveapes - It should work fine.

 

[AlvinTaussig]

Originally posted by: werty316
I would always to never use the windows update. Format a floppy disc as a system disc and put the BIOS file on it, reboot and press "ALT+F2" the bios files will load automatically. I never knew about this "ALT+F2" option which makes updating the BIOS really easy stuff.

What if u want to build a system w/out a FDD, would Alt-F2 work with a USB drive or maybe a external USB FDD?

 

[werty316]

I think it firsts checks the floppy drive then the CDROM. Not sure aobut USB though. It could be possible. Only way is to try and there is no harm if it doesn't detec anything.

 

[geekgeek]

Thanks guys, will try the Alt-F2 method, thanks!

 

[agathodaimon]

Does this motherboard have a FAST WRITES option anywhere in the BIOS?
I can't seem to find it, but would like to disable it... I think it might be part of the cause of some recent BSOD's with nv4_disp.dll.
Thanks.

 

[werty316]

There is not fast write option as PCI-E don't have it.

 

[agathodaimon]

ahh! Ok. Thanks for clearing that up.

One more silly question, but I'm going to be updating my BIOS.
When I make a system floppy disk, what all needs to be on it?
Is it simply a boot disk with the BIOS update files on it?
Do I need specific BIOS files, or just throw all of them on the disk that I download from ASUS?

I'm new to the whole BIOS updating thing. hehe