*** Official ASUS P5W DH Thread ***

[Skott]

K, thanks. I heard two different answers. One said 2v and other was 2.1v. So wasnt sure.

 

[touchstone1]

Sorry for the delay responding...

Back to my setup. The E6600 is stable at FSB 333MHz, and the Corsair Twin2X2048-6400C4 is running fine at DDR2-667 (4-4-4-12). I bumped VCore up to 1.40, and the memory is running at 1.95V, no problems with Orthos stressing the CPUs. (CoreTemp shows about 57C after an hour or two.)

I ramped up to 366MHz, but Orthos threw in the towel after 10s or so. I could bump up the VCore again, or the memory up to 2.1V, but the CPU is stable at 3.0GHz, so I'm going to leave it there.

I thought it worth mentioning because somebody asked about overclocking with RAID, and I'm using the ASUS EzBackup (RAID0) without any problems. I tried to use the ICH7R RAID, using the makedisc for XP setup, but they threw a STOP error every time I tried to set up XP. To be honest, I generally avoid any product starting with the letters "EZ", but it's working...

Thanks to phil for all the posts!!

 

[desk003]

phile: I know you posted this once in here, but I've looked all over this and can't seem to find it. Since you have the same proc,mobo, and ram that I'm gonna recieve soon, I'd like to try your exact OC settings, after I burn in and do the cooling mods. Could you post your settings again please? Thanks very much.

 

[imported_olaf]

Originally posted by: phile

Originally posted by: olaf
I set the vcore to 1.350 and left the mem voltage at 2.00

I was able to complete the Prime95 self test finally and havent had a BSOD yet. Also I left memtest on all night, no errors. So I think it is safe to say that if there is a hardware problem its not the memory. I still feel like something is wrong though, with one of the components. I just dont know which.

If you can't run the OCZ Platinums at their rated 2.1v, yet they are stable at 2.0, I'd be suspicious of the PSU.

-phil

Well that was just a suggestion from the OCZ guy. They memtested fine at 2.1 and 2.0 so the memory can be ruled out.

The problem is that in order to get any kind of stability I have to set memory to 2.0 and vcore to 1.35. Everything else stock, no FSB overclocking, no memory overclocking. And its still not really stable, I still get BSODs they are just rarer. It will run Prime95 and not error. But playing WoW last night I got 2 BSODs in like 5 hours. Whereas before I was getting them within 15 minutes or so trying to run Prime95. And the BSODs are very generic 'Page Fault in Non-Paged Area'/win32k.sys. I tried to debug the crash dumps and according to MS its either memory/cpu/mobo/psu.

I am 99% sure its not Windows. I am 99% sure its not the vid card. I dont think its the CPU. It seems like it has to be either the mobo or the PSU.

I am going to try and RMA the mobo and the PSU. Will Asus cross ship? Anyone know? PC Power and Cooling will I believe, I had a problem with a PSU of theirs once a long time ago and they next dayed me a new one.

olaf

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: desk003
phile: I know you posted this once in here, but I've looked all over this and can't seem to find it. Since you have the same proc,mobo, and ram that I'm gonna recieve soon, I'd like to try your exact OC settings, after I burn in and do the cooling mods. Could you post your settings again please? Thanks very much.

No sweat. Here's my current config:

FSB: 333
DRAM (option 1): DDR2-666 (downclocked from 800 to achieve 1:1 ratio)
DRAM (option 2): DDR2-833 (modest overclock, 4:5 divider)
VCORE: 1.35
VDIMM: 2.1

SPD: disabled
Timings: 4-4-5-15 (sticker will say 4-5-4-15 - P5WDH BIOS order is different)
Hyperpath 3: disabled

QFAN: disabled (did not stress with QFAN enabled... seemed stable, though)

Note: Benchmarking with each memory option revealed essentially no difference in performance, so I opted for DDR2-666 - 1:1.

-phil

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: olaf

Originally posted by: phile

Originally posted by: olaf
I set the vcore to 1.350 and left the mem voltage at 2.00

I was able to complete the Prime95 self test finally and havent had a BSOD yet. Also I left memtest on all night, no errors. So I think it is safe to say that if there is a hardware problem its not the memory. I still feel like something is wrong though, with one of the components. I just dont know which.

If you can't run the OCZ Platinums at their rated 2.1v, yet they are stable at 2.0, I'd be suspicious of the PSU.

-phil

Well that was just a suggestion from the OCZ guy. They memtested fine at 2.1 and 2.0 so the memory can be ruled out.

The problem is that in order to get any kind of stability I have to set memory to 2.0 and vcore to 1.35. Everything else stock, no FSB overclocking, no memory overclocking. And its still not really stable, I still get BSODs they are just rarer. It will run Prime95 and not error. But playing WoW last night I got 2 BSODs in like 5 hours. Whereas before I was getting them within 15 minutes or so trying to run Prime95. And the BSODs are very generic 'Page Fault in Non-Paged Area'/win32k.sys. I tried to debug the crash dumps and according to MS its either memory/cpu/mobo/psu.

I am 99% sure its not Windows. I am 99% sure its not the vid card. I dont think its the CPU. It seems like it has to be either the mobo or the PSU.

I am going to try and RMA the mobo and the PSU. Will Asus cross ship? Anyone know? PC Power and Cooling will I believe, I had a problem with a PSU of theirs once a long time ago and they next dayed me a new one.

olaf

My bet: PSU. And, if I recall correctly, you have another ATX 2.0 compliant PSU handy, but have not tried it, yet. I understand it's a hassle, but why would you RMA the mobo and PSU, when you can easily rule one of them by swapping in the other PSU?

-phil

 

[imported_olaf]

Its older and I dont think it has the SLI power connector.

 

[phile]

What exactly is a SLI power connector? In any case, the P5WDH doesn't support SLI. Does the PSU have a 20+4-pin connector, and another 4-pin connector?

-phil

 

[imported_olaf]

Not SLI, whatever that 6 pin connector is on newer/beefier gfx cards. I had a converter cable though so I did go ahead and swap out the PSUs. Running on the 470 watt one now, we'll see how it goes.

 

[imported_olaf]

Same issues with the different PSU. So I guess that points strongly to the problem being the motherboard.

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: olaf
Same issues with the different PSU. So I guess that points strongly to the problem being the motherboard.

At this point, I suppose I would RMA the mobo. I have since forgotten, so can you quickly list your bios settings, and everything that's connected to the mobo?

Also, do the BSoDs only occur when stressing the machine, like when playing games? Do you ever get a BSoD when the machine is idle?

-phil

 

[imported_olaf]

I have disabled most of the stuff in BIOS I am not using. 1394 controller, audio, LAN2, etc. all disabled. I have the Jmicron stuff disabled, I am only using the intel SATA/IDE controllers. I have legacy USB disabled and have 4 USB ports enabled. I also took off the wireless module. I have 2 SATA drives one on SATA 1 and the other on SATA 3. I have 2 IDE devices, a drive and a DVD burner on the same IDE channel, drive is set to master, DVD to slave.

I have a USB KB and Mouse connected, a NIC, DVI connection to LCD. The soundcard (XFi Music) is in currently but I tested with it removed and with an Audigy 2 and that didnt fix anything.

The BSODs only happen under load. During prime95 stress testing or when playing games...of which the only game I have played on this comp is WoW. I have Oblivion installed but I havent messed with it.

I have CoreTemp installed and it reads 53/53 under extreme load, dual Prime 95s running one per core. Idle is low 40s.

PC Probe II, the Asus app says 38C for CPU under load and 37C for the mobo. Its got a Zalman 7700cu hsf running at the lowest speed setting.

After swapping the PSUs I uncabled everything and took the mobo out and remounted the HS. Temps didnt change and still having the same problems, BSODs/reboots under load.

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: olaf
I have disabled most of the stuff in BIOS I am not using. 1394 controller, audio, LAN2, etc. all disabled. I have the Jmicron stuff disabled, I am only using the intel SATA/IDE controllers. I have legacy USB disabled and have 4 USB ports enabled. I also took off the wireless module. I have 2 SATA drives one on SATA 1 and the other on SATA 3. I have 2 IDE devices, a drive and a DVD burner on the same IDE channel, drive is set to master, DVD to slave.

I have a USB KB and Mouse connected, a NIC, DVI connection to LCD. The soundcard (XFi Music) is in currently but I tested with it removed and with an Audigy 2 and that didnt fix anything.

The BSODs only happen under load. During prime95 stress testing or when playing games...of which the only game I have played on this comp is WoW. I have Oblivion installed but I havent messed with it.

I have CoreTemp installed and it reads 53/53 under extreme load, dual Prime 95s running one per core. Idle is low 40s.

PC Probe II, the Asus app says 38C for CPU under load and 37C for the mobo.

Yeah, my setup is almost identical in every respect. I can't think of anything else to suggest. It appears that you have exhaustively ruled-out everything but the mobo. Tell me, have you gotten to the point where you can easily trigger a BSoD?

-phil

 

[imported_olaf]

Yeah pretty much. Basically set mem volt and vcore to auto (if I have them at 2.00 and 1.35 respectively then the machine is stable for longer but it will eventually crash) and then run prime95x2. It will either just reboot after about 15 mins or it will BSOD. When it BSODs it dumps the memory and when it comes back it generates a report that I sent to MS. Then it opens a link to a vague explanation of what they think caused it but they have no ideas. They are a little different each time and generally blame cpu/ram/mobo/psu or a device driver than cannot identify.

Now I did do the heatsink stuff described in this guide http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=106563 Do you think Asus or my retailer will give me ****** about that? I can easily reattach the wireless module but the tops of those heatsinks are gone.

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: olaf
Yeah pretty much. Basically set mem volt and vcore to auto (if I have them at 2.00 and 1.35 respectively then the machine is stable for longer but it will eventually crash) and then run prime95x2. It will either just reboot after about 15 mins or it will BSOD. When it BSODs it dumps the memory and when it comes back it generates a report that I sent to MS. Then it opens a link to a vague explanation of what they think caused it but they have no ideas. They are a little different each time and generally blame cpu/ram/mobo/psu or a device driver than cannot identify.

Now I did do the heatsink stuff described in this guide http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=106563 Do you think Asus or my retailer will give me ****** about that? I can easily reattach the wireless module but the tops of those heatsinks are gone.

Removing those heatsink caps and changing the thermal paste on the north and south bridges is not exactly what I would consider a modification. I would try to RMA the board.

-phil

 

[desk003]

phile: thanks for that info. I can't wait for it to arrive. Sad thing is, It's not my system, but my uncle's. Ah well, I get to set it up and play with it.

olaf: do report back to tell if they give a ****** about that. Personally I'm waiting to make sure the board is good before I'm doing those mods, just in case there is something wrong and they void the warrantee, but i wouldn't know why, as it's not like you're doing anything that could HARM the board. You're actually helping it.

Also, once I do the new thermal paste and such, I bought a couple 40mm fans to stick on the NB and SB, for the hell of it, because it's shown combined to drop the temp of each around 10ºC. Which is awesome, and totally worth the cost of the $6 fans.

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: desk003
phile: thanks for that info. I can't wait for it to arrive. Sad thing is, It's not my system, but my uncle's. Ah well, I get to set it up and play with it.

olaf: do report back to tell if they give a ****** about that. Personally I'm waiting to make sure the board is good before I'm doing those mods, just in case there is something wrong and they void the warrantee, but i wouldn't know why, as it's not like you're doing anything that could HARM the board. You're actually helping it.

Also, once I do the new thermal paste and such, I bought a couple 40mm fans to stick on the NB and SB, for the hell of it, because it's shown combined to drop the temp of each around 10ºC. Which is awesome, and totally worth the cost of the $6 fans.

Yeah, more cooling can't hurt. FYI, the mobo temp corresponds to a sensor very close to the southbridge. Unless you have your own temp measuring device, it's not really possible to know the temp of the northbridge. You'd think they could easily install a sensor by each, on high performance boards.

-phil

 

[ahkey]

Speedfan reports an idle temp of 57 degrees at idle, which can climb to 60 after a few hours of nothing but windows media player. The top of my case above the psu also feels very warm, verging on hot.

I removed the plastic film from the heatsinks but don't want to remove the caps incase these temps make an RMA necessary. I'm changing the fan but not sure if that'll reduce the mb temps by much, if at all. Any thoughts?

-------------------------
Gigabyte Aurora w/ 3x120mm fans (back 2 controlled by Q-fan at ~900rpm)
Tagan 480w psu
Intel E6600 (~3000rpm)
Stock CPU fan (changing for Scythe Mine w/ AS5 or equiv)
ASUS P5W DH Deluxe (1305)
2GB Corsair XMS2 PC2 6400C4
X-Fi Fatality (card only)
HIS x1900XT
75GB Raptor, 250GB WD (sata)

 

[phile]

Once you're comortable that the board is working without defect, definitely remove the caps from each heatsink. You can also lower the temps by install 40mm fans on each of the heatsinks and/or remove them and replace the thermal compound with some artic silver 5.

The procedures are illustrated here:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=106563

If you take your time and follow the instructions carefully, thee's very little risk of damaging the board. Following these procedures shaved a good 6C-8C of my mobo temp.

What case are you using? I ask because of the heatpipe on the northbridge. Some cases require you to install the mobo inverted, which inhibits the heatpipe from working properly.

-phil

 

[ahkey]

It's a Gigabyte Aurora with dual 120mm rear fans, but they only appear to run at sub-1000rpm regardless of Q-fan. I was wondering if the Tagan's (2x80mm?) fans aren't moving the hot air swiftly enough and causing a buildup heat near the heatpipes.

My Mine just arrived, so I'll see if that helps at all.

 

[mikepaul]

I think the poor job I did of installing the stock fan is why my temps START at 50c and climb rapidly from there. I noticed I'd smudged the pre-applied paste, but didn't think it'd have that much effect.

So my Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro is due later this week, and I picked up the Arctic Silver 5 from CompUSA on Sunday.

What's best to clean off the 'dried' paste from the CPU and whatever comes pre-applied to the Freezer?...

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: mikepaul
I think the poor job I did of installing the stock fan is why my temps START at 50c and climb rapidly from there. I noticed I'd smudged the pre-applied paste, but didn't think it'd have that much effect.

So my Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro is due later this week, and I picked up the Arctic Silver 5 from CompUSA on Sunday.

What's best to clean off the 'dried' paste from the CPU and whatever comes pre-applied to the Freezer?...

The purest isopropyl alcohol you can find.

-phil

 

[Pahonix]

Are the drive cables that come with this mobo satisfactory? I'm going to be putting in a 150gb raptor sata, 500gb wd sata, an IDE lite-on dvd-rom, an IDE nec dvd+-r all into a P180b. If I could do better as far as cable management, can anyone suggest appropriate cables and lengths that I could get? Rounded IDE cables sound like a good idea both from an aesthetic standpoint as well as a cooling standpoint. I have all the parts (I hope) except for the motherboard and HSF which should ship out today or tomorrow, but I'm hoping to avoid any build setbacks from not having the right accessories.

 

[phile]

Originally posted by: Pahonix
Are the drive cables that come with this mobo satisfactory? I'm going to be putting in a 150gb raptor sata, 500gb wd sata, an IDE lite-on dvd-rom, an IDE nec dvd+-r all into a P180b. If I could do better as far as cable management, can anyone suggest appropriate cables and lengths that I could get? Rounded IDE cables sound like a good idea both from an aesthetic standpoint as well as a cooling standpoint. I have all the parts (I hope) except for the motherboard and HSF which should ship out today or tomorrow, but I'm hoping to avoid any build setbacks from not having the right accessories.

The cables that come with the mobo are the standard fare, and are satisfactory. I use a rounded cable for my optical drives. My HDs are SATA.

-phil

 

[imported_olaf]

On the advice of more than a few people I removed a stick of RAM and tested. BSODs with one stick, but not with the other. So despite passing memtest, it looks like it is a RAM issue.