A8V Inquiry

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Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus (More info?)

I am considering moving to an Athlon 64 3500+. Has anyone had any
problems with the following configuration:

Asus A8V
AMD 64 3500 (939)
Corsair 1GB PC3200C2 (2 x 512MB DDR)
Creative Labs Audigy 2
ATI X800 Pro
Seagate 120GB SATA HDD (in RAID 0)

Thanks for you feedback.

-Randy
 
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Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.asus (More info?)

"Randy Snyder" <aggie07@austin.rr.com> wrote in message
news:rEXfd.5404$EI6.3104@fe2.texas.rr.com...
> I am considering moving to an Athlon 64 3500+. Has anyone had any
> problems with the following configuration:
>
> Asus A8V
> AMD 64 3500 (939)
> Corsair 1GB PC3200C2 (2 x 512MB DDR)
> Creative Labs Audigy 2
> ATI X800 Pro
> Seagate 120GB SATA HDD (in RAID 0)
>
> Thanks for you feedback.
>
> -Randy

I am building a similar config... A8V with 3500+ Newcastle .... 1GB Geil Ram
PC3500... Don't think there are any issues with your config, the one thing I
would recommend that you do, is be VERY careful with which CPU you get.
There are two cores for the 939 3500+ CPU, the Newcastle (130nm) and
Winchester (90nm). There are currently compatibility issues with the
Winchester core for most boards. In the case of the Asus A8V you need to
update the bios on the board to rev. 1007 or higher, my board was shipped
with rev. 1006 which I assume yours will be too which is not compatible with
the Winchester (90nm) core. There is a chance the machine will not post
without rev. 1007 bios update installed, and flashing the bios without a
posting board is a case of hot bios update which means you need another
board, or borrowing a Newcastle CPU updating the bios and THEN putting in
the Winchester chip. Some people have said that the boards may post out of
the box with rev. 1006 if you install just 1 stick of Ram in the B1 slot.
BUT personally I couldn't be bothered with the agro, and have ordered the
Newcastle 130nm chip (hopefully arriving tomorrow) to be on the safe side,
apart from this, I don't think there are any issues with this config.

Monarch said this first:
"Our motherboard technicians report that the Asus A8V motherboard will POST
out of the box with the .09 micron chips. They still require a BIOS update,
but you do not need a .13 chip installed first. All of the other boards that
we have tested thus far require a BIOS update before they will POST."

http://www.monarchcomputer.com/forum/showthread.php?s=506281b1bafa3c2fb3ff15fdcb00a29b&threadid=2360

Then changed their mind!
"Looks like I need to make a correction to my statement. SOME Asus A8V
motherboard will POST directly from Asus, some need to have the BIOS updated
before they will POST. The unfortunate circumstance for most customers,
Darkspoon is that there is not way to update the motherboard BIOS to get the
new processor to POST without having an older processor to perform the BIOS
update first."


FYI - More forums for you to browse through..

http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=357429
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=28&threadid=1411736&enterthread=y
http://forums.pcper.com/showthread.php?t=355679

Regards

Craig