Happy w/ ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe???

[Capt Caveman]

Okay, today I finally got my last parts to build my new rig. I currently have the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe but after reading some many different forum threads, I wonder if I should look at another board. Are you happy with your mobo and think that new bios will fix things, ie. oc'ing?

Other boards in consideration are the DFI NF4-Ultra, Abit A8N Fata1ity. Or the Asus A8N-e NF4 Ultra or waiting for the possible A8N-SLI Premium which both have rev 2.0 of the board and may fix some of the current issues?

Ugh. I suck. I just can't decide....

 

[Sp33d]

well do u want SLI or not. Thats the first step.

 

[Framelord]

Hi!

Very happy!Running from day1!No problems of any kind!

Just waitting for Thermalright XP90 and some good graphic cards for good money.(2x6800GT)With XP90 I will try better OC.I think 2.85Ghz will be 100% or even higher.

Great board!Ah and sry for bad english!

Frame

 

[Sniper82]

So asus has released new 2.0 rev boards? Or are you guessing?

 

[Capt Caveman]

I don't plan to use SLI but I like the ASUS for its feature set and have had good luck with their boards. The 250mhz memory limit bothers me b/c I know I can go higher w/ my memory. But besides that, it appears the new bios have fixed the other problems. All the other boards seem to have their own issues too. Just wondering if I should start building or look at the pile for another week or two. I know stupid.

Sniper - if you check the Asus A8N-e Premium thread, there are pictures of the new NF Ultra board which just came out and has a rev. 2.0 board. In regards to the SLI - Premium, I'm just guessing that it'll have the rev 2.0 board like the Ultra.

 

[skgarach]

I'm also considering buying this board. Will a 400W power supply be sufficient to power this board and do other SLI boards use less power? I plan on using a A64 3000+ and 6600gt and will most likely upgrade those at a later time and wouldn't want to have to buy a new power supply at that time. thanks.

 

[Waylay00]

Well, wattage is not everything. Is it a generic 400w or a reputable 400w (Antec, Enermax, OCZ, etc.)? Also, what are the amps on the +12v rail?

 

[Sp33d]

Why don't you get the gigabyte K8NXP9? Its jam packed with features.

 

[arswihart]

I can't believe the fan loyalty for ASUS motherboards, its truly amazing. From what I've read, the A8V-E and A8N-SLI, both of ASUS flagship mobo's for Athlon 64 939-cpus are having terrible and unacceptable problems with hardware compatibility and poor BIOS coding. If you buy one, be prepared to encounter some of these issues yourself, thats all I can say. Meanwhile, Anandtech continues to recommend these boards simply based on the names ASUS and SLI, in my opinion. I you can think for yourself, take their corrupt recommendations for a grain of salt. I am currently using an epox 9nda3+ which they bashed in their review, and I have no problems at all with it, and neither does anyone else. Go figure

 

[akugami]

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=29&threadid=1526519&enterthread=y

Read above for my answer to arswihart. I'll agree the initial bios was terrible from an overclocking standpoint but if you weren't overclocking it was fine. One problem I didn't mention in the other post was that the initial series of problems with these boards partially had to do with the larger power requirements of this board and some of those using older PSU's were having a majority of the problems.

Glad you're happy with your board but unless you own one of the two Asus boards you're calling crap, I don't think you a legitimate complaint. Especially after most of the quirks and problems with the board have been ironed out in the case of the A8N-SLI.

 

[ohnnyj]

I have had my A8N since the beginning of December and have had no problems with it whatsoever. So unlike what arswihart seems to imply, not everyone is having issues with this board. It happened to be the first board to market and as such there are bound to be issues while at the same time the non availability of any competition made it so that this board was purchased by a lot of people. Therefore, with as many as have shipped, there are going to be be that many more incompatibilities. These are inevitable, with the vast amount of varied hardware out there it is impossible to test every type of configuration imaginable. I seem to be seeing quite a few problems coming to message boards about the other mobos as well, they just had to reach the retail channel. A reason why not too many problems with your Epox board show up may be because not many people own them. That is not to say they are not great boards, they may in fact be so and I am happy that your runs well. Bottom line is every board is going to have problems one way or another with some system out there, plus a lot can simply be user error. Some guy/gal sees this new thing called SLI and says gee I want that and they just throw it all together and hope it works, and when they forget issues such as a quality PSU, qualified memory, inserting the EZ card correctly, etc. and so come to message board for help. This is not to say that everyone who has had a problem is because of these reasons as there have been many legitamite problems with bad boards and such as well. But once again with such new technology, problems are going to surface. And to reitorate from the beginning, I have had no issues with my FX-55, 2GB (four DIMMS) of Corsair 3200XL, 2 BFG 6800GTs, 2 74GB Raptors, 1 34GB Raptor, 1 400GB Seagate, an Audigy4 Pro, Belkin Pre-N, a Plextor 716A and 716SA, and some thermal monitors. Of course this shows that my PCP&C PSU is doing well but also attests to the stability of the board itself. Yes, if you buy ASUS you buy their name but you are also buying a name that has proven themselves over the years and I am happy to continue to support.

 

[ATLDiver]

I had a couple of problems with mine, both my own mis-understanding with how SATA works in this system, but otherwise I'm extremely pleased. Now granted, I've always been an Asus fan generally I rate Asus #1 and Abit #2 with regards to quality and features. This new board is a quantum leap for me in new technology such as PCI-E, SATA Raid, the picky power and memory requirements and finally the sheer options this board brings to the table.

I can see why many are having problems with this motherboard, outside obvious dead hardware. It's a complicated MB and it's easy for people to assume something like I did with the boot order of devices and think it's a problem with the board. For those of you having problems I hope you get your issues resolved because this really is a sweet, sweet motherboard.

 

[MatrixVPR]

I have been a big Intel guy since I got into computers but I was never one to bash the other guy. In December I decided it was time to broaden my horizons and I made the move to AMD. I've always been one to root for the under dog anyhow. I'm lovin this shiz! I had the Asus A8V for a bit and it was a rock but I wanted something that was more for speed and gamming!

I got the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe, not for SLI but because like ASUS and I wanted the nForce 4 so I figured that I would go all out. At first I had a lot of problems, not as many as most but enough to wish i had gone with the DFI or Gigabyte. Nothing against them but I think that their boards are ugly and I was never a big overclocker. All the Intel rigs I built never really overclocked that well. Now that some time has past and I have had the opportunity to reformat a few times, learn the board and Do all the updates to the BIOS and such, I have to admit I'm really pleased. The board isn't perfect but with a few more BIOS updates it should be (in my opinion).

One of the best things that I have done is replace the active chipset cooler with a Zalman

I replaced the heatsink/fan on my 6600 GT with the Zalmen Dual heatpipe passive cooler

I have a Zalmen 7000b-Cu CPU cooler.

My computer is in my room so Quiet is a must. The compute is Quiet and cool especially considering the slight overclock. I ran Prime for 8 hours with no errors.

3D Mark05 = 3820
HL2 coast benchmark = 92 fps
I get between 80 and 160 fps while playing CSS
Sandra05 CPU Bench (Dhrystone) = 11008

 

[Dream Operator]

I'm with you matrix. Always had intel. Didn't really want to go with the current P4's, too hot, etc etc.

Got this setup and am just loving it. Sure it's been a bit of a struggle, but hey, this is the newest of the new on the market (for a short little time anyway!). It doesn't always come out perfect at first.

I really feel the bios is finally coming along. Reading good things about 1007-02. Though I am going to wait for the 1007 final.

Main issue left is the 240 1t. Which gets me at 2640 on the cpu. To me, this is great. Gives me a 15% increase in power for Nuendo. More would be better (always!). See what happens i guess.

Now if M Audio would just get the 64bit drivers going for RC2 I would be set!

 

[Insomniak]

Quite happy with mine!

 

[MatrixVPR]

I kind of wish i had the 3500+ now. If i was at 2.6 i would be very happy. My friend has the Prescott and i was peaking at his temps the other day and those suckers are freaking hot! He doesn?t overclock, his computer is in a cold basement and no one had been on the machine for hours. It was at 118F! He has like 7 or 8 case fans. I'm overclocked with 2 case fans on the net typing this and listing to music and I'm at 108F and my room is 76F where his basement is like 65F. I'm happy, and i still really like Intel?s processors don't get me wrong i still have my 3.2 Northwood. I just can't get myself to sell it. I'm thinking about building a server?

 

[jose]

I have had no problems w/ Asus for years, used 50+ boards, but I've had bad luck w/ the A8N...

I find all the continuing problems w/ the A8N unacceptable, shessh they were the first one's out & had a close partnership w/ Nvidia.

Why can a smaller tier company like DFI have fewer problems. I figured by this time all the problems were ironed out, but just read the bios threads, SLI is not even in the bios selection and ppl are getting worst oc'd then prev. bios versions. ie 1.04

If you want, get a A8N-E and I'll trade you a brand new A8N-SLI when my rma comes in, that's how much confidence I have in this mobo......

Personally I think the Ultra versions are having less problems. Someone reported that their is a new rev of the chaintech board. I've had zero problems w/ the DFI Ultra-D and I'd
hope that the A8N-E will have fewer problems than the SLI version..

Regards,
Jose

 

[MatrixVPR]

Originally posted by: jose
I hope that the A8N-E will have fewer problems than the SLI version..

Isn't the A8N-E the VIA board? I had the A8V as my first AMD system back in Dec. and i freakin loved it. Wasn't the fastest board but it overclocked well and it was rock solid. I wanted the PCIe so i Opted for the A8n and i have had my fair share of disappointments but they have all been remedied. Except for the 1t issue and i think they took the SLI option out of the BIOS and made it automatic? As it was the options were "normal" (nonSLI) and "Auto" (both SLI and non). Now it is just Auto all the time. I don't have SLI so i can't really offer an objective opinions but it will be interesting to see if the SLI options show up again in the next final release?

 

[jose]

No the A8N-E is the NF4 Ultra based mobo.

http://www.asus.com/products3.aspx?l1=3...l3=171&slname=NVIDIA%20nForce4%20Ultra

Regards,
Jose

 

[MatrixVPR]

Originally posted by: jose
No the A8N-E is the NF4 Ultra based mobo.

http://www.asus.com/products3.aspx?l1=3...l3=171&slname=NVIDIA%20nForce4%20Ultra

Regards,
Jose

AH! good to know!

 

[GuitarDaddy]

Originally posted by: MatrixVPR
I kind of wish i had the 3500+ now. If i was at 2.6 i would be very happy. My friend has the Prescott and i was peaking at his temps the other day and those suckers are freaking hot! He doesn?t overclock, his computer is in a cold basement and no one had been on the machine for hours. It was at 118F! He has like 7 or 8 case fans. I'm overclocked with 2 case fans on the net typing this and listing to music and I'm at 108F and my room is 76F where his basement is like 65F. I'm happy, and i still really like Intel?s processors don't get me wrong i still have my 3.2 Northwood. I just can't get myself to sell it. I'm thinking about building a server?

If you give up running 1:1 and use a DDR333 divider you can most likely get 2.6ghz.
Even though I've bought the high dollar OCZ plat. rev2 TCCD and desperately wanted to run 1:1, I wized up and am now running my 3200+ @292x9=2628mhz DDR333 w/ram @ 238mhz. I gave up a few mhz ram speed and gained 228mhz CPU speed. With A64's CPU speed is much more important than ram speed. My bench mark scores went up considerably when I started using my current settings.

Oh!, and I :heart: my A8N-SLI deluxe, without a doubt its the best machine I've ever used. Including the 9 machines I've owned personally and the countless Intel boxes I've used at work over the years

 

[MatrixVPR]

I think i might tinker around with the 333 divider a bit and see how i like the results. I was thinking about it but i have my computer in my room so it's all about the performance to temp ratio for me.

 

[bob661]

I just installed my Asus SLI today and, I have to admit, the install was totally painless. I was even surprised that no bios tweaking was needed although I did disable the parallel port, silicon image controller, and the marvel NIC but that was it. Hell, even my chipset cooler wasn't noisy or rattling so I left it in. Initial opinion is that I'm impressed.

 

[Savagestorm]

The A8N-SLI in my opinion is one of the top 2 SLI boards you can get. Alot of people are having problems (in my opinion) were not ready for the changes SLI will bring. Such as higher power requirements, new technology with green drivers, and a jam packed board that requires some time to play around with. I love my A8N board and is the best SLI board you can get for the price. If your going with the Ultra route I would recommend the Lanparty. But for a very well made SLI mobo this is the one to get. Supposedly the minor OC problem will be fixed with a new bios update.

Peace

 

[blinky2004]

Yes, I'm happy. Had a few issues with the Nvidia NIC due to the shonky firewall software. I just disabled it and used the Marvell as it has lower CPU usage anyway.

I need to change my RAM though as I've got 4x256Mb (Cube + generic, both Infineon chips) and it's forcing me to run at 2T, but this is a limitation of processor not the board.

Taking the overclocking slowly, up to 215MHz on my 3000+ Winnie.