*** Official ASUS A7N8X/Deluxe (nForce2) Thread ***

[osage]

Hikari, I have the same mobo, same Rev etc, and Mobile Bartons work fine on it. Runs 200Mhz fsb no problem.
The voltage won't go as low as I would like, but it works OK.

running a 2600M on mine at the moment.

 

[OLtimrNewbie]

A Barton 2800+ should be okay. I have the same board; but it's a Rev2.0 with the latest Bios, and it's going great with the 2800+

 

[Hikari]

The 2.0 board is totally different...

I think the rev 1.04 that I have often have problems running at 200mhz fsb (and mine crashes at that speed w/my 1700 anyway, even if I don't overclock it in raw mhz as much as I am at 166). What is the upper multiplier limit on the 1.04, does anyone know? Still looks like a 2500 or 2600 mobile is the best in my case perhaps.

 

[imported_Bunter]

My guess is your current BSOD problems are the CPU, not the board version. The 1700+ is a 266/133 clock, so getting 333/166 out of it isn't half bad. Most of what I see on the Asus site indicates what you have should be okay with a 3200+/200 or 3000+/166, so that means the 13x multiplier is available. I don't OC (not fanatical about it, just need stability more than wringing out extra performance), but bumping up the clock always seems less tricky than playing with the multiplier.

Since you are getting 333/166 out of it now, I'd probably go the 2500 or 2600 route. worse that can happen is you wind up with a 2500 or 2600, which isn't bad. The 2500+ was the chip of choice for OC-ing for a long time, and people were getting it up to 11 x 200 pretty consistently. I suspect, as Osage said, you'd have just as good of luck with the 2600, though.

 

[Hikari]

Thanks. I'll try one of those two CPUs out. The 1700+ I have is running at 166*11.5 now, so I guess worst case I could get a similar speed out of the 2500 or 2600 but be at a higher bus speed and have more cache.

 

[Assimilator1]

I've got v1.04 or 6 (can't remember which) ,using Crucial DDR333 RAM it tops out at 177MHz with CAS2.5-2-2-6.
Did have an XP1700 @2.04GHz (177FSB) ,now got an XP2400 @2.22GHz (177FSB).

Probably not worth upgrading from that to a Barton core for me ,what might I get ?another 200MHz or so? (& the bigger cache of course)

What's the limitations with XP M's & v1.0x mbrds?

 

[JSSheridan]

I've got a v1.04 board, and it can run at 200MHz FSB. however my Barton 2500+ won't make it to 2.1GHz. I don't know of any problems with the mobile XP's on the board, but you'll just need to be lucky to make it to 200MHz FSB. The 2400+ has a high multiplier, so it's probably your best option in your current situation. Have you tried using 2.5-3-3-7 on your ram timings. If you can get +5MHz FSB, the performance will be better than it is currently. I think you can also up your multiplier to increase the clock some more. I never heard that the Thoroughbred cores were locked. Peace.

 

[Assimilator1]

All thoroughbred cores after week39 03 are locked.

Mp XP2400 is an unlocked one though.Its at its max clock now btw without applying silly voltages.
I'd probably lose performance (at least in S@H) by droping timings & going up only 5mhz ,maybe 10mhz would be worth it,if I could do it.
I was mainly curious about XP Ms ,I thought I'd heard that v1.0x mbrds couldnt handle the mulipliers properly ,nm

thx

 

[Assimilator1]

Anyone here got a Mobile Barton on a v1.0x A7N8X ?

They seem to be a little cheaper now & I'm tempted

Btw whats the average overclock for those cpus?

 

[Assimilator1]

Should anyone be interested ,v1.0x mbrds do have limitiations with the multipliers available on XPM cpus.
Without mods you are limited to x12.5 multi.

Though joining 2 pins like the red circled one here allows multipliers from x13 - x20 ,thats the socket btw

Whether you do the mod via fine wire or conductive paint it is easy
Just make sure the orientation is right

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: Assimilator1
Should anyone be interested ,v1.0x mbrds do have limitiations with the multipliers available on XPM cpus.
Without mods you are limited to x12.5 multi.

Though joining 2 pins like the red circled one here allows multipliers from x13 - x20 ,thats the socket btw

I don't think a v1.0x board would cut it for a mobile. Mine runs at 2500mhz, which requires the 12.5 multiplier and 200mhz FSB. You would be seriously limiting your clockspeeds with a v1.0x unless you do the wire trick, and even then you're losing some memory bandwidth.

 

[Assimilator1]

It cuts it fine for a mobile

I've now got an XPM 2500 @2.55GHz! @1.66v ,atm its running 170FSB though the mbrd & RAM will do 177FSB & the cpu's got more to go!
I've joined the 2 pins via conductive paint on the cpu (instead of dropping a wire in the cpu socket).Running a x15 multiplier

I could possibly increase the FSB to the mid 180s but I'd have to back off the RAM timings to do that & I don't know if its worth it really.
As for losing some bandwidth , (177 vs 200) its not going to make a huge difference to performance in most apps/games ,maybe 5-10%?.
Bearing in mind that my RAM timings are 2.5-2-2 @ upto 177MHz FSB, & most 'ordinary' DDR400 RAM runs at 3-3-3 AFAIK then the performance difference is likely to be nearer 5%.

I would love to have DDR400 CAS2 & a 200MHz+ FSB capable mbrd, but it just isn't worth the large expense for a small gain............. unless your gonna give me those parts heheh

 

[dragonwick]

Building 3 systems and I just had (3) A7N8X-E Deluxe boards that did the same thing. Asus was generous enough to authorize an RMA. I did the RMA through the reseller and have three new boards.

Now what I run into is that I get everything up and running. 2k loaded, all the drivers, latest direct x, everything looks good. I run The Sims 2 (the whole point of my upgrade) and after a couple minutes, the system reboots.

I have 3 of these systems exactly the same doing the exact asme thing. Good solid power supplies (thermaltake 420w and raidmax 420w) Cool (45-50° CPU, ~30° board and 86° case internal).

Willing to take any suggestions.

 

[Assimilator1]

Does it run ok if you run Prime95?

Will it run 3dmark2001se or 2003 looped without problems?

 

[dragonwick]

Well, 3d mark is working like a champ. Have run it about 5 times back to back now. CPU temp is 44° and the motherboard temp is 33°. Gonna ret the Prime95 next. Thanks. Didn't have any good utils to put a load on. Just The Sims 2. . .

 

[dragonwick]

Prime95 ran overnight with no errors. Problem is only rearing its head in The Sims 2 it appears. Unfortunately that is the reason for the upgrade.

Got it to run in windowed mode and got a BSOD. Error follows:

STOP 0x00000050 (0xE35AE060, 0x00000001, 0xAF742484, 0x00000001)
PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA
Address AF742484 base at AF693000, datestamp 41942346 ? ati3duag,dll

I have tried ATI's drivers and Omega's drivers. Here's the most recent things I have tried:

http://forums.thesimsresource....howthread.php?t=256806

Kind of a summary of everything I have tried. Kind of frustrating but it looks like the system is stable otherwise (judging from the Prime95 and 3d Mark results).

Thanks and any suggestions would be appreciate. I'm going to run with this as a Sims 2 problem.

 

[Assimilator1]

Afraid I don't have time to read all of that thread , does sound like a game problem though....or maybe an ATI driver issue??

 

[dragonwick]

Thanks. I think you are correct in that assessment. I just put in a problem record with ATI. Hope to get some idea.

I borrowed Battlefield Vietnam from a friend and played it for a couple hours last night. It had no problems. Doesn't look like it was hardware.

Thanks for following up. - Rick

 

[Assimilator1]

no probs

 

[scarfase99]

can someone answer, what's the turnaround time for the ASUS warranty process? I got a ver 2 deluxe that won't post or beep at all, and believe it or not, appears to be killing off my CPU's left & right, i've already lost 2 Athlon XP's to it after testing them in the machine, just curious how long it would take to RMA

 

[dragonwick]

I can't answer for Asus' turn around time. I went back through my reseller for my RMA. However, the problem I had when my board wouldn't POST was a bad DIMM. Thought I would throw that into the mix. - Rick

 

[4rachnid]

I just got a A7N8X-E Deluxe for Christmas and it's PCB 1.01. Should I be concerned it's not 2.0, or at least newer than 1.01? Any known limitations to the 1.01?

 

[Assimilator1]

I don't think the revision numbers of the -E variant match up with the A7N8X mbrds ,I think that your v1.01 would be a latter mbrd than a v1.06 A7N8X

Can someone confirm/denie this?
(1 way to find out is to look at the bios release dates for the 2 mbrds at Asus's site)

 

[ShagsMcshrivels]

Hello, Ive read through this whole thread and have not seen anything like my problem.

My old setup

Asus A7N8X Deluxe V2.0
Hynix PC2100 512DDR 266Mhz
Athlon XP 2100+
Western Digital 160gig
Western Digital 80gig
Western Digital 80gig
MSI G4TI4200 64 AGP4x
Sound Blaster Live!
Antec Smart Bleu 350W (Came with LanBoy Case)

All this was running smoothly at 133FSB. Couple day ago after Christmas I decided I had too much money and went out and bought the following.


AMD Athlon XP3000+ Barton Core 333FSB
2 ? 512MB PC3200 DDR Kinston 400Mhz
AIW ATI 9800pro 128


After carefully installing the CPU and RAM first, before the video card I proceeded to boot the system. To my surprise nothing happened, only a black screen. Thinking the FSB was messing with my new processor I reset the BIOS and rebooted. Everything went through properly, but the clock speed of the processor was wrong (I expected this) and windows loaded nicely. All happy I rebooted the system to set the clock speed and the date ?etc. After doing all this and saving the setting the computer rebooted, and again a blank black screen, no beeps no nothing. Nothing is being sent to the monitor because the light stays amber. Thinking it was a power issue (only a little 350W PSU) I unplugged everything I did not need (Still using the TI4200 card) and tried again. Same thing happened. After resetting the BOIS again I entered it, changed nothing, and saved and exited. Same black screen appeared. I have no idea what is doing this and any help would be appreciated. I have not upgraded the BIOS, that was my next move but somehow it seems odd that no changes are made to it, only save and exit, and still does not work. Any comment / suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[dragonwick]

Go back to your old config. Still working?

Try just the CPU.

Try just the RAM one stick at a time.

The bad DIMM I had made the motherboard do that but it never came up. Not even once.

Good luck.