nForce650 (Asus P5N-E SLI) compatibility

[davidecapod]

Hi guys, I was looking for some informations about the Asus P5N-E SLI m/b that has a nForce650 chipset. Is this chipset fully supported in the kernel?
Does anyone have any success/failure stories about this m/b ?

Many thanks
Davide

[Michael]

Hi guys, I was looking for some informations about the Asus P5N-E SLI m/b that has a nForce650 chipset. Is this chipset fully supported in the kernel?
Does anyone have any success/failure stories about this m/b ?

Many thanks
Davide

We may be reviewing this motherboard at Phoronix in a few weeks.

[davidecapod]

Unfortunately I need to buy in a few days...
Anyone knows something about any issues of this m/b ?

Many thanks
Davide

[davidecapod]

Finally bought this, everything works perfectly.

[Michael]

Finally bought this, everything works perfectly.


What distribution did you use? Feel free to report your feedback as well on http://www.phoronix.com/lch/

[davidecapod]

What distribution did you use? Feel free to report your feedback as well on http://www.phoronix.com/lch/

I'm using Ubuntu Edgy 32-bit and Feisty 64-bit

[Michael]

The P5N-E SLI is a TERRIFIC board. You can expect the review in early May, and the testing process isn't yet fully completed but right now if nothing else comes up, it will receive the Phoronix seal of approval.

[joshuapurcell]

What distribution did you use? Feel free to report your feedback as well on http://www.phoronix.com/lch/

Does this link you gave supposed to go to some other page than the front page? When I use this link it sends me to the front page, but I thought it would take me to some area where we could enter information on the hardware we use and how well it works under Linux.

[Michael]

Does this link you gave supposed to go to some other page than the front page? When I use this link it sends me to the front page, but I thought it would take me to some area where we could enter information on the hardware we use and how well it works under Linux.

See: http://phoronix.net/forums/showpost.php?p=6635&postcount=30

[pingouin]

Hello,
What are the news about this motherboard and the review from Phoronix ?

I look for upgrading mobo/cg/cpu with an Etch Debian.
I have 2 ATA hard drive, 1 dvd burner/reader(IDE)
Wonder if this board will make it with no trouble at the installation, and after (IDE, hd, network....) thus it have 2 ide slots, and i dont have - yet - any sata devices.

Thanks for reading.

Best.

[Michael]

Hello,
What are the news about this motherboard and the review from Phoronix ?

I look for upgrading mobo/cg/cpu with an Etch Debian.
I have 2 ATA hard drive, 1 dvd burner/reader(IDE)
Wonder if this board will make it with no trouble at the installation, and after (IDE, hd, network....) thus it have 2 ide slots, and i dont have - yet - any sata devices.

Thanks for reading.

Best.

The P5N-E SLI is still functioning great under Linux. A review on it will (hopefully) be posted this Thursday.

[pingouin]

Hello,

Thanks you very much for your informations.
I'm waiting very much this test from Phoronix.

Do you know if this board and a Debian/Etch (kernel 2.6.18 at installation) make it ?

I look for a board with 2 IDE ports (i still have 2 hd ATA + 1 dvdburner IDE)

Anyway, thanks for you answer and the review of this board.

Best.

[Michael]

Hello,

Thanks you very much for your informations.
I'm waiting very much this test from Phoronix.

Do you know if this board and a Debian/Etch (kernel 2.6.18 at installation) make it ?

I look for a board with 2 IDE ports (i still have 2 hd ATA + 1 dvdburner IDE)

Anyway, thanks for you answer and the review of this board.

Best.

I haven't tried Debian Etch, but it works with Feisty Fawn, Fedora 7, Solaris, and KateOS with the 2.6.18 kernel.

[pingouin]

Hello,
Amazing fast answer.
Thanks you very much.

I'm not a linux 'guru' just an simple user, so i wonder how can i check the kernel sources to know what is supported inside according to the P5N-E SLI's chipset (i think an nvidia nforce 650i, C55, mcp51 north/south bridge)
All i know about from now i found here :
http://kmuto.jp/debian/hcl/wiki/index.cgi?pci%3ap5n-e%20sli



Maybe all the 'nvidia' choose in kernel configuration include 'all' chipset from nvidia ?

Anyway, again, thanks for you fast answer.

Best.

[falko]

Hello,

Thanks you very much for your informations.
I'm waiting very much this test from Phoronix.

Do you know if this board and a Debian/Etch (kernel 2.6.18 at installation) make it ?

I look for a board with 2 IDE ports (i still have 2 hd ATA + 1 dvdburner IDE)

Anyway, thanks for you answer and the review of this board.

Best.

This board will work for you. Currently I am running 2 PATA HDDs, 1 DVD burner (PATA), 1 CD burner (PATA), and 2 SATA HDDs. All of them are playing well together.

I have really enjoyed this board. Any issues I have had are minor things that I were easily fixed (either with software upgrades or minimal tweaking of my setup). My only other issue was a physical issue that was solved with a gentle squeeze from a pair of pliers.

Also I initially installed Debian Etch on my system and then upgraded to Debian unstable. Worked like a charm.

[pingouin]

Hello Falko, hello to all,

I want to say thanks you very much for sharing your informations about this motherboard and Debian Etch/Sid. It's really nice to heard it from a user of this board.

You mention « minor things that I were easily fixed » what are they ?
What about the « [...]physical issue that was solved with a gentle squeeze from a pair of pliers.» ?

Anyway, thanks you again.

I run to click on the review from Phoronix !!! (many thanks !!)

Best.

[StringCheesian]

See: http://phoronix.net/forums/showpost.php?p=6635&postcount=30

I still don't understand why http://www.phoronix.com/lch/ redirects to http://www.phoronix.com/. It's confusing.

[Michael]

I still don't understand why http://www.phoronix.com/lch/ redirects to http://www.phoronix.com/. It's confusing.

Because the content from lch/ was merged into the forums temporarily. We will be rolling out a new type of interactive compatibility list in the near future.

[cl455ik]

For those who are looking for a working kernel config (2.6.20), I got one (http://www.geocities.com/awtand/linux/2.6.20-gentoo-r8_config.txt).

The config assumes that you're using full SATA system (DVD/CD & hard drive) and nVidia GPU. Adjust according to your system.

BTW, the kernel version is 2.6.20 + patches from Gentoo Linux team (release 8.)

[falko]

Hello Falko, hello to all,

You mention « minor things that I were easily fixed » what are they ?
What about the « [...]physical issue that was solved with a gentle squeeze from a pair of pliers.» ?



Sorry for the late reply, but the holiday weekend took me away. To answer your questions.

My 2 software issues were:
1) The real-time clock chip (RTC) was unable to be set with Debian etch, until I modified the script /etc/init.d/hwclock.sh to add the options --directisa (HWCLOCKPARS=--directisa).
2) My ethernet over Firewire (IEEE1394) initially wasn't detected properly. After updating to testing this problem went away. I was not able to determine why or what was wrong. (On a side note, I took another drive I had laying around last week and installed the amd64 etch image on it. It didn't seem to have any issues with the ethernet over firewire. :confused:)

My hardware issue that was solved with pliers, was really quite funny. When I installed my PATA (40-pin IDE cable) in slot IDE1, one of the pins in the socket must have caught the edge of the connector and was pushed out the back of the socket. The IDE sockets are installed at 90 degrees to the motherboard, so the pin merely extended out the back. I was getting all sorts of DMA errors until I realized that the pin had been pushed out of the socket. I pulled the cable out and using some needle-nose pliers just pushed the pin back into the socket until it aligned with the other pins. I plugged the cable back in and things work great now.

Hopefully that helps. If you have any other questions feel free to ask.

[pingouin]

Hello all, Hello Falko
Many thanks for your explanations.

As you propose, i want to ask you some more few questions :

As seen in the other post about p5ne-sli ( http://www.phoronix.net/forums/showthread.php?t=3005 ) from Thund, what memory do you run on this board ? Did you have some troubles with it ?
What about the 'heat' problems that some people talk ? Did that occur for you ?

Again, Many thanks for your previous answer.

Best.

[Michael]

We had used OCZ's Flex XLC for that motherboard and hadn't run into any issues.

We also didn't run into any cooling issues, BUT our systems are in the open-air and aren't inside of any case or anything like that.

[falko]

I put some WINTEC AMPO DDR2 800 memory in it. The memory has worked fine for me. I tried to overclock it and it wasn't stable, but I didn't buy the memory to overclock it. I was going for a price point.

I have not had any heat issues with my board. It has a fairly large heat sink over a section of the motherboard where I would expect the North and South bridges to be. Pulling the case cover off, the heat sink is only warm to the touch. I have an Antec SLK-3000 case with a 120 mm exhaust fan. The power supply fan doesn't really run very much (it is thermally controlled), so I am cooling it with one 120 mm fan.

[pingouin]

Hello all,

I was looking for an core2duo board.
Reading phoronix review of asus p5n-E-sli, make me think i had found it to suit my need - several ide drive/burner.
I bought it today.Samsung ddr2 800 1go x 2.

I just moved my hard drives/burner, switched on.... and the Debian Etch kernel 2.6.18 make it perfectly. The sound is ok, ide = no problem.
(no sata hard drive....yet)

I build a new kernel 2.6.22.1 in smp mode to make the 2 cpu reconized, that's ok now. The sensors for temperature spit me a warning, but i got it.All the memory is also reconized perfectly.

The reseller can't have in time the graphic card i have ordered, so for now he borrows me an msi 8500 GT, that work fine once the nvidia drivers installed. Played 2 hours of Unreal Tournament 2004, no problems.

I still have to check for my usb stuff - scanner/printers - and the onboard firewire - got a dv camcorder.

But i still have few questions about the bios setting :

In the Advanced section of the bios there is the :
SPREAD SPECTRUM CONTROL
CPU spread spectrum control : Disable/auto
PCIE spread spectrum [Down spread] : Disabled/Down Spread
SATA spread spectrum : Disabled/auto
LDT spread spectrum : Disabled/auto
SLI Broadcast Aperture : Auto/disabled
LDT frequency : 1/2/3/4/5/6/7/8 x

So what is this spread spectrum control and how i'm suppose to set those options ?
What is LDT ?
Which LDT frequency i'm suppose to set ?
I dont use the board in sli, so i guess i can leave the SLI Broadcast Aperture on disabled ?

The manual is only showing options not explain it :/

About the kernel configuration, i used to put the AGP in the kernel, to suit my AGP card, i guess now that there is no more AGP on the board, it not necessary to put AGP option on in the kernel ? I put the pcie option in the kernel is it enought ?

If you also have some tips to configure a kernel for core2duo i'll take them with pleasure.

Thanks phoronix for your reviews, the one with this mobo help me to make the good choise for my linux.

Best.
and sorry for my bad english....

[multics]

> So what is this spread spectrum control and how i'm
> suppose to set those options ?
I was asking this myself.
Found this:
http://www.nforcershq.com/forum/spread-spectrum-vt40540.html

Keep this feature disabled.

> What is LDT ?
Don't know.
> The manual is only showing options not explain it :/
Yes. The manual is not really helpful for most
of the options you can set in the BIOS. I noticed this, too.



> About the kernel configuration, i used to put the
> AGP in the kernel, to suit my AGP card, i guess now
> that there is no more AGP on the board, it not
> necessary to put AGP option on in the kernel ? I put
> the pcie option in the kernel is it enought ?
AGP ist definitely not needed.

Btw: Apart from the south bridge that runs _very_ hot
this board just works nicely. I bought a small
heatsink for the SB after I hat a blister(!) on my
finger after touching it. Interestingly there
seem to be versions of this board that have a
heatsink (and that is without(!) OC).

http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/13-131-142-11.jpg

Even a print on the PCB says heatsink!

Greetings from Germany
Multics.

[pingouin]

Hello,

Many thanks for you answer, comments, and links. Very usefull, i was clueless front of this options.

I've disable all the 'spectrum' stuffs in my bios.

Thanks.

Best.

[pingouin]

Hello,

I have another questions, about the bios configuration on the p5n-e sli.

In the 'Advanced' menu, FSB & Memory Config, i've leaved on 'auto' the options :
FSB - Memory Clock Mode
FSB - Memory Ratio

So the 'grey' informations that bios give me are ok - fsb 1333.33, got a core2duo E6750 @ 2.66GHz - also for the memory 800mhz.

But in the CPU Congiguration i got :

CPU Speed : 664 mhz
with a
CPU multiplier : [8] (was the default, did not touch it)

What is this 664 mhz ?!! Is it ok ? Also for the default multiplier setting, what about ?

When booting on Debian/Etch with a home build kernel 2.6.22.1, the dmesg tell me :

CPU0: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz stepping 0b
CPU1: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz stepping 0b

and a cat /proc/cpuinfo give also the 2 cpu at correct speed.

Still in this CPU configuration menu i got the options :

Limit CPUID MaxVal [Disabled]
What is it ? Enable or leave Disabled ?

Execute Disabled Bit : [Disabled]
The same, what is it ? Enable or leave Disabled.

The bios is 0505 - i tried to update it from usb device with the last 0608 on it, throught the Menu Asus EZ flash 2 in the bios, Usb stick is seen, but when it time to load the bios 0608.BIN it fails, telling that there is no boot signature.


Any explanations, help, advices, welcome.

Many thanks.

Best.

[multics]

Hello,

I have another questions, about the bios configuration on the p5n-e sli.

In the 'Advanced' menu, FSB & Memory Config, i've leaved on 'auto' the options :
FSB - Memory Clock Mode
FSB - Memory Ratio

So the 'grey' informations that bios give me are ok - fsb 1333.33, got a core2duo E6750 @ 2.66GHz - also for the memory 800mhz.

But in the CPU Congiguration i got :

CPU Speed : 664 mhz
with a
CPU multiplier : [8] (was the default, did not touch it)

What is this 664 mhz ?!! Is it ok ? Also for the default multiplier setting, what about ?

When booting on Debian/Etch with a home build kernel 2.6.22.1, the dmesg tell me :

CPU0: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz stepping 0b
CPU1: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz stepping 0b

and a cat /proc/cpuinfo give also the 2 cpu at correct speed.

Still in this CPU configuration menu i got the options :

Limit CPUID MaxVal [Disabled]
What is it ? Enable or leave Disabled ?

Execute Disabled Bit : [Disabled]
The same, what is it ? Enable or leave Disabled.

The bios is 0505 - i tried to update it from usb device with the last 0608 on it, throught the Menu Asus EZ flash 2 in the bios, Usb stick is seen, but when it time to load the bios 0608.BIN it fails, telling that there is no boot signature.


Any explanations, help, advices, welcome.

Many thanks.

Best.

If you have 800Mhz RAM you should clock it with
800Mhz. I have Corsair XMS2 TWIN2X2 DDR2-SDRAM. The
BIOS allows different settings for CPU and FSB/memory clocks.
In my case the board set the memory clock
to 800Mhz automatically (using SPD). I increased
the voltage for the RAM from 1.9x to 2.0xV for
tighter timings.

I use the "linked" setting. You may play around
with the setting. Since this board will always
boot because it restores fail save settings.

Linux dmesg and /proc/cpuinfo tell you that your
processor is running at the correct speed. So, just
change your memory setting. I am at work,
so I can not see how it looks like right now, but
it's easy. Also, I have a C2D 6420 running @ 2.133Ghz.
My multiplier is also 8. So it is suprising to me
that you have the same. Intel uses 266.66Mhz steps
by the way, and 266.66 * 8 = 2133Mhz.

Your CPU speed is not 664Mhz. It is 2.66Ghz.

You may have to increase the memory voltage
setting a little when going from 664 to 800Mhz.
Make sure your memory is capable of 800Mhz. Otherwise
it will not work even with higher voltage.

Limit CPUID MaxVal [Disabled]
Set to disabled if you want to overclock.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CPUID
"By using the CPUID opcode, software can determine
processor type and the presence of features (like
MMX/SSE).
"

Execute Disabled Bit : [Disabled]
Intel calls this XD.

"However, Intel's XD bit and AMD's NX bit perform the
same function and are different only in name.
"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NX_Bit

Greetings
Multics

[multics]

The bios is 0505 - i tried to update it from usb device with the last 0608 on it, throught the Menu Asus EZ flash 2 in the bios, Usb stick is seen, but when it time to load the bios 0608.BIN it fails, telling that there is no boot signature.



Btw, I would not recommend to update your BIOS. Esp. since the board is new. If there is no compelling
reason do not flash the BIOS.

*Personally* I follow the "golden admin rule": Never
touch a running system. ;-)

Greetings
Multics.

[pingouin]

Hello everybody,
Hello multics, many thanks for your advices and answer.

I've read, on http://vip.asus.com/forum/topic.aspx?board_id=1&model=P5N-E%20SLI&SLanguage=en-us
that some people had troubles after updating bios....so i gonna repect the "golden admin rule".

For the others stuffs :
When entering the bios,it give me some feedback information :
i got the QDR FSB at 1333 (perfect this IS the fsb of my cpu)
i got the QDR MHZ memory at 800 mhz, so that also ok, this is some pc800.

I dont want to overclock so, i'm happy with that.

But in the advanced menu/Cpu configuration the bios send me information about the cpu speed at 664, with a multiplier of 8. So i guess it's the way this Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU E6750 @ 2.66GHz stepping 0b works. ( (664*8)/2=2656) )

Also, i've read that LDT is Lighting Data Transfert , is about the speed transfert beetween bus. It on 5 by detected bios, i've tried to make it at maximum, 8. The card refused to boot. I had to remove the battery onboard, and make a clearrtc to make it booting again. I've set it up back to the default LDT 5. That's fine.

I expect to buy a SATA hard drive. And i dont see any options in the bios to tell the 1st boot device should be the SATA1 - instead of Master hd1 ide1 port.Maybe is because, there is no SATA plugged.
Do i have to unplug all my IDE drive while installing the system on SATA, then replug them ?

Anyway, thanks for your time.
Have a nice day.
Best.

[multics]

>When entering the bios,it give me some feedback information :
> i got the QDR FSB at 1333 (perfect this IS the fsb of my cpu)
> i got the QDR MHZ memory at 800 mhz, so that also ok, this is some pc800.

Sounds good to me.



> But in the advanced menu/Cpu configuration the bios > send me information about the cpu speed at 664, with
> a multiplier of 8. So i guess it's the way this
Guess so, too. Altough your *real* CPU freq is 2.66Ghz.


> Also, i've read that LDT is Lighting Data Transfert
> , is about the speed transfert beetween bus. It on 5
> by detected bios, i've tried to make it at maximum,
> 8. The card refused to boot. I had to remove the
> battery onboard, and make a clearrtc to make it
> booting again. I've set it up back to the default
> LDT 5. That's fine.
Yeah. Don't push things too hard if it is not necessary.


> I expect to buy a SATA hard drive.
Sure! You _want_ SATA and nothing else!

> And i dont see any options in the bios to tell the
> 1st boot device should be the SATA1 - instead of
> Master hd1 ide1 port.Maybe is because, there is no
> SATA plugged.
> Do i have to unplug all my IDE drive while
> installing the system on SATA, then replug them ?
Sorry, I have only SATA devices attached.

I could image that if you have a PATA drive
attached to one ofthe IDE connectors and it is
bootable it will boot from there.
?? Just guessing.

Btw, I would recommend switching off the boot
image. If you do that you'l see that you
can press F8 to select the boot drive.

And another thing regarding memory: Did
you check your memory using memtest86?
http://www.memtest86.com/
I _definitely_ recommend doing that.

Greetings
Multics.

[pingouin]

Hello everybody,

I wanted to add some informations.

I've just received more RAM, 2 others PC800 1go.
The bios see very well all the memory (4096 if i remerber well)
But after the boot, an free -m give me only :

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3546 732 2813 0 27 575
-/+ buffers/cache: 129 3416
Swap: 478 0 478

I got well configured my kernel to support 1G to 4go memory.

But i know it's in the manual mobo, that some memory will not be appears.(on windows systems !!)

Also, just installed geforce 8800 Ultra (Asus EN8800Ultra) with nvidia drivers :

NVRM version: NVIDIA UNIX x86 Kernel Module 100.14.11 Wed Jun 13 18:21:22 PDT 2007


Model: GeForce 8800 Ultra
IRQ: 11
Video BIOS: 60.80.18.00.12
Card Type: PCI-E
DMA Size: 40 bits
DMA Mask: 0xffffffffff
Bus Location: 01.00.0

For now, no troubles, UT2K4 works well, Blender is ok. Have to re-install Quake4 to check.


Best.


Edit : I've build a new 2.6.22.1 kernel, this time i check in the option for the memory that i have more than 4G (thus the bios told me 4096) :
CONFIG_HIGHMEM64G=y

and then....all memory is reconized also by kernel :

total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 4054 505 3548 0 22 375
-/+ buffers/cache: 107 3946
Swap: 478 0 478

Perfect !

Best.

[davidm]

Hi guys, I was looking for some informations about the Asus P5N-E SLI m/b that has a nForce650 chipset. Is this chipset fully supported in the kernel?
Does anyone have any success/failure stories about this m/b ?

Many thanks
Davide

I have had extremely bad luck with this m/b. The first one I got died for no reason... it worked great for 2 weeks then crapped out. The second one ran well for 5 weeks, then a capacitor blew up. The third one ran for one day without trouble, now refuses to boot at all. Nothing... the fans spin up, no POST, no beeps, no video, no nothing. If I hold the power switch in for 5 seconds, the fans shut off, but no sign of life from the m/b other than that.

Perhaps I have something going on that I don't understand...?

CPU: E4400 Core2 Duo, 2GHz
Memory: Kingston 1GB- 667 MHz x 2 (on the QVL for this board)
Power supply: Thermaltake 430W

I've had the same CPU and memory all through this ordeal. I bought a second power supply of the same type, thinking this may improve the situation, but to no avail. I've tried to run the system outside the case, in case there was some grounding issues, no change. I've tried moving the RAM sticks around to different channels, different combinations of slots, and number of sticks. WHen it was running, CPU temperature never exceeded 41C at full load, about 34C at light loading.

Any thoughts??? I am very frustrated with this product.

[pingouin]

Hello

Yeap, as you said «bad luck»....i absolutly dont know what can produce the troubles you have/had (will have ? :/ )

All i can say, is stuffs you surely already know : i dont know if you bougth it througt internet, of in the shop in your town. There is garanty , so bring it back to your reseller, and...if you can afford it, take the p5n32-e sli for instance (if you dont need the two IDE ports).

Sorry i have no idea from you troubles comes from. Maybe the heat of south bridge ?

This board lack a heat sink on the south bridge (the pcb allow to put one, 2 holes and the word HEAT SINK write on) mine is hot, but my case is always open, and i afraid the GF8800 ultra dont allow me to plug a heatsink ( the graphic card is just above one of the hole for heat sink)

So, dont wait to much for another troubles that maybe break other composents of your computer (cpu, memory...) bring it back would be my - not very usefull - advice.

Tell us about the next...
Best.

[davidm]

Hello

Yeap, as you said «bad luck»....i absolutly dont know what can produce the troubles you have/had (will have ? :/ )

All i can say, is stuffs you surely already know : i dont know if you bougth it througt internet, of in the shop in your town. There is garanty , so bring it back to your reseller, and...if you can afford it, take the p5n32-e sli for instance (if you dont need the two IDE ports).

Sorry i have no idea from you troubles comes from. Maybe the heat of south bridge ?

This board lack a heat sink on the south bridge (the pcb allow to put one, 2 holes and the word HEAT SINK write on) mine is hot, but my case is always open, and i afraid the GF8800 ultra dont allow me to plug a heatsink ( the graphic card is just above one of the hole for heat sink)

So, dont wait to much for another troubles that maybe break other composents of your computer (cpu, memory...) bring it back would be my - not very usefull - advice.

Tell us about the next...
Best.

I put a stick-on heatsink on the southbridge.
Yes, it is still under warranty, but I will have to RMA this one back to ASUS... again.:(

[pingouin]

I put a stick-on heatsink on the southbridge.
Yes, it is still under warranty, but I will have to RMA this one back to ASUS... again.:(


Hello,

Yeah i know...it's not pleasant to send back some hardware....

This is why i never buy stuff by internet/shipment/ , i go to the nearest shop in my town, talk with reseller about my linux usage, and sometimes compatibility issues, he understand, and borrow me some stuffs that i can try (got it with mp3 players, and sata hd i just bought) with time this resseller knows me, and trust me (few weeks ago, he borrow me an Asus gf8500 gt while i waiting for my 8800, cause i dont have any pci-e graphic card, and the order was late)
I know internet is great for the price, not for the services, and if you have troubles, you have to pay to send stuff back...so the price is not always a good arguments.

So, send your card back - once again - to asus, maybe ask to change for another one (can you call someone ? ) or ask for some commercials arrangements maybe ? get a better board for the price of this one, after your send back several time this board

Good luck, and tell me what's happen next.

ps : Which is the heatsink you put on your south-bridge ? Do you have an picture/url to see it ? Which brand/Ref ? Or maybe a picture of it on your mobo ? Many thanks.

[davidm]

Hello,

Yeah i know...it's not pleasant to send back some hardware....

This is why i never buy stuff by internet/shipment/ , i go to the nearest shop in my town, talk with reseller about my linux usage, and sometimes compatibility issues, he understand, and borrow me some stuffs that i can try (got it with mp3 players, and sata hd i just bought) with time this resseller knows me, and trust me (few weeks ago, he borrow me an Asus gf8500 gt while i waiting for my 8800, cause i dont have any pci-e graphic card, and the order was late)
I know internet is great for the price, not for the services, and if you have troubles, you have to pay to send stuff back...so the price is not always a good arguments.

So, send your card back - once again - to asus, maybe ask to change for another one (can you call someone ? ) or ask for some commercials arrangements maybe ? get a better board for the price of this one, after your send back several time this board

Good luck, and tell me what's happen next.

ps : Which is the heatsink you put on your south-bridge ? Do you have an picture/url to see it ? Which brand/Ref ? Or maybe a picture of it on your mobo ? Many thanks.

In this case, I did buy this m/b locally. Unfortunately, since it failed more than 30 days after I bought it, their policy is for me to deal with the manufacturer directly .

I think I am going to order an Intel motherboard in place of the P5N-E, and if that works out, I will go ahead and RMA the P5N-E anyway.

As for the the stickon heatsink, I bought at CompUSA as part of a 'chipset cooler' package.

[glenmack]

Hello!

I'm new to all this forum stuff and I used to listen to my friends boasting about how their rigs benched and so forth not understanding quite what the hell they were talking about, I couldn't afford to buy the parts at the time and to be honest I didn't know how. I'm still pretty retarded and so my questions will be simple. Please humour me!
After several months of research I decided to jump into the fray and build a budget (sub 300 quid) rig, so away I went:

ASRock 775 DUAL-VSTA SKT VIA PT880 Pro (mobo)
XFX 6800XTreme 256MB DD3 (AGP grapics card)
Pentium 4 641 3.2 GHz (800 MHz with 2MB cache)
Kingston 1GB PC3200 DDR
and finally Artic Cooling AC-FRZ-7P (massive CPU fan)

and after the odd few extras, dvd drive and the like, it came to 309 quid, which I thought respectable. Until I put it together. The noise was like a 100 horses dragging 1000 rabid cats through a field of dogs that were on fire.

Also as it turned out I had miscalculated my budget, which should have been around 75 quid as I had forgotten I needed food (like that is ever a major consideration in a gamers life anyway) and had to send most of it back... (not a shame after the horrible noise it had been making) I realised later after reading a bit more that my fan was on a constant 3200 prm, making most of the noise and I still don't know for certain if the graphics card was adding a lot to the noise level.

So now I'm left with the processor (LGA 775), the CPU fan, a 500W PSU a case, a CD/DVD drive (no r/w capability, didn't read enough, my fault) some screws and a floppy drive I found in the cellar of an old house (which I've had no problems with funnily enough).

What does all this whing have to do with the P5N-E SLI?

Well after a lot of teasing from my friends about how badly this went, I am slowly putting together a rig that I can work on over the next year or two, and I have decided on this one. Hopefully you will agree a sound choice, but as a novice I would like to know a few things...

1. Does the ASUS Q-fan work on only two of the three fan connectors? As I have read in some reviews?
2. Does anyone think it would be bad for me to go completely passively cooled considering I won't overclock much and my favourite games are Black and White, The Rollercoaster Tycoon/Tycoon series and WOW (when I have the subscription money)
3. I am seriously considering not getting any graphics cards for a while, waiting until the Direct X10 graphics cards with GDDR3 come down to a reasonable price and maybe go SLI, (one graphics card at a time though!) Will the onboard graphics tide me over with the above games?
4. Is it worth chucking the artic frezzer pro, or should I let Q-fan work its magic, I heard that once it gets down to 2700 rpm the noise isn't so bad (but I have no way of knowing as my last mobo had no fan control... ARGH! I was incredibly annoyed at that, but again my own fault for being a hardware retard)
5. Any other advice on SLI graphics cards, quiet cooling solutions or anything else I might have glaringly overlooked would be appreciated!

Best wishes. Glen Mack

[davidm]

What does all this whing have to do with the P5N-E SLI?


3. I am seriously considering not getting any graphics cards for a while, waiting until the Direct X10 graphics cards with GDDR3 come down to a reasonable price and maybe go SLI, (one graphics card at a time though!) Will the onboard graphics tide me over with the above games?


The P5N-E SLI doesn't have any built-in graphics.

[bissomitch]

>When entering the bios,it give me some feedback information :
> i got the QDR FSB at 1333 (perfect this IS the fsb of my cpu)
> i got the QDR MHZ memory at 800 mhz, so that also ok, this is some pc800.

Sounds good to me.



> But in the advanced menu/Cpu configuration the bios > send me information about the cpu speed at 664, with
> a multiplier of 8. So i guess it's the way this
Guess so, too. Altough your *real* CPU freq is 2.66Ghz.

Whew. Thank you guys. I was seeing this same behavior on this processor and was worried. This is my first foray into the dual-core world and wasn't as sure of what was going on.

> Also, i've read that LDT is Lighting Data Transfert
> , is about the speed transfert beetween bus. It on 5
> by detected bios, i've tried to make it at maximum,
> 8. The card refused to boot. I had to remove the
> battery onboard, and make a clearrtc to make it
> booting again. I've set it up back to the default
> LDT 5. That's fine.
Yeah. Don't push things too hard if it is not necessary.


> I expect to buy a SATA hard drive.
Sure! You _want_ SATA and nothing else!

> And i dont see any options in the bios to tell the
> 1st boot device should be the SATA1 - instead of
> Master hd1 ide1 port.Maybe is because, there is no
> SATA plugged.
> Do i have to unplug all my IDE drive while
> installing the system on SATA, then replug them ?
Sorry, I have only SATA devices attached.

Yes, you need to disconnect the PATA drive to install the OS on the SATA drive. Once you have done that, you can reconnect the PATA and start copying info.

If you have just one SATA drive, you should not need to use RAID, the m/b handles the drive and WinXP Pro (what I'm using) saw the drive just fine.

Once you have both drives connected, there will be an option under the Boot parameters to prioritize the harddrives. You can pick which one is looked at first during boot.

I could image that if you have a PATA drive
attached to one ofthe IDE connectors and it is
bootable it will boot from there.
?? Just guessing.

Btw, I would recommend switching off the boot
image. If you do that you'l see that you
can press F8 to select the boot drive.

And another thing regarding memory: Did
you check your memory using memtest86?
http://www.memtest86.com/
I _definitely_ recommend doing that.

Greetings
Multics.