Asus AV8 rev1.2 vs rev2.0

[eva2000]

straight from http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=40482


1.2 will never have a release bios enabling locks. They say that over several days the use of the beta bioses that enable locks will eventually cause quality control problems.

2.0 - all new shipments to distributers and resellers from asus from today onward will be 2.0 boards. There will be different distributer SKU #'s but same basic model #. The new box has a whitish background instead of green. the new boards will not come with Wi-Fi cards. The same bios will be used for both 1.2 and 2.0, but only 2.9 will see the pcb revision and enable the locks options.

here is the link showing the new sku #'s

http://usa.asus.com/wheretobuy/SKUs/Motherboard_SKUs.pdf

it's the one not marked deluxe/Wi-Fi.

Boards should be available Monday. Be very careful as to which version the reseller is still stocking. I'm sure there are still many 1.2's in the reseller channel still, but they are discontinued.

[McDrokz]

THX I was planning on getting me that board. Now I know what to look for

[Mad Murdock]

Ok, I'm a SKU noob, Where do I find the SKU number for my MOBO. I suspect I have the 1.2 board has I've had it over a month. Actually, My original board ran for about a week and then after OCing it to about 5%, it ran for a bit, then locked up, I got it RMA'd and replaced last week, so I'm hoping I got the new V2 board in it's place. But I don't know how to verify.

Thanks

Dale

[Blaster]

heheh

this board with no OVP mod is no good :(

[Urlyin]

Mardock... I would assume it's the tag on the parallel port... nothing on the box corresponds with any number on the link in regards to a SKU #...
Don't you get the Rev number from between the PCI slots or at the end of the board next to the last PCI slot?

Part Number : 90-M9L0A1-G0UAY

[Section8]

I had to RMA my first A8V because it just died after 2 days. It starting randomly rebooting and I tried to reinstall the OS because I wanted to use the VIA chip instead of the Promise for my RAID and that's when the real big problems started. It wouldn't let me install Windows it just kept giving me error messages when it was copying files from the setup disk. I tried replacing every piece of hardware but the CPU and motherboard. Finnaly on the last attempt the video went out on the Motherboard. Never could get it to come back on? Video card was fine I put it in my other rig. Anyways I RMA'd it last week and just got the new one installed yesterday. I am running the 1005.021 Beat BIOS and it has the AGP/PCI locks and they appear to function correctly. I was also hoping that I would get the new REV 2 board but it didn't happen. Well see how this one goes.

[grdh20]

I had one 2.0 that was DOA. I'm getting another one Monday. I hope I have better luck this time. The rev. # is in between the slots where it says A8V on the board. The sku # is only for dtstributers. Serial #'s that begine with 48xx are probably 2.0's now. They are located on the box.

[grdh20]

2nd one was not a DOA, but was a dud too. maybe wait for the dfi 939 boards at this point. Back to the 1.02 for now.

[AndyT]

The V 1.0-1.2 was never officially released here from what I have heard. The retailers were importing them directly from Europe without the blessing of ASUS USA. I have been wary of the boards available here and would be very careful what you get.

[JNav89GT]

http://home.insightbb.com/~fnpjc/site/asusreview1.htm

my review on 2.0 board, this is unedited, should be posted on www.madshrimps.be in coming week or two. Just hosted on my ftp through my isp now so please don't link it.
Will give you idea about board. I like it.

[Section8]

http://home.insightbb.com/~fnpjc/site/asusreview1.htm

my review on 2.0 board, this is unedited, should be posted on www.madshrimps.be in coming week or two. Just hosted on my ftp through my isp now so please don't link it.
Will give you idea about board. I like it.

Testing:

Due to limited time, and basically a plethora of benches available around the internet running the Asus A8V at stock speeds I will jump straight to the "sweet spots" of this board. I chose OCZ PC4000 Gold Rev 2.0 memory to attempt to show how high the board can overclock running the memory at 1:1 with the HTT bus. After hitting a wall with memory at 1:1 I then set memory at the 5:3 divider and continued to run the HTT bus to the highest stable speed I so I could find the limit of my particular board. All testing was able to be completed using the 4X HT multiplier in bios. Lowering this to 3x did not improve HTT overclock over the stable limit I found. Cpu multipliers were altered to remove cpu frequency as a possible confounder in stability. That said, I could hit 250HTT bus at 1:1 on the memory. I will say that this memory has been tested in other boards up to 260mhz at Cas 2.5, 3:3:8 timings stable, so I am going to assume the limited bios voltage of 2.8v is somewhat holding me back from going higher, or possibly it's a bios issue. Memory cooling was provided by a homemade 60mm fan mounted on a bracket I made. Of note, I could bench higher but stability was not good and Prime 95 would error almost instantly. At 250HTT and memory at 250mhz the system was rock solid during my testing. By moving the memory to a 5:3 or PC2700 divider, I was able to scale the HTT to a very very respectable 283HTT bus. I chose to back off HTT to 278 and bring cpu multiplier back to 9x to bring mhz back to 2.5ghz to closer correspond with testing done at 250HTT.



Great stuff!!!! I can't wait until Monday for mine to get here..... This 1.02 is on my last nerve. Great board if you don't want to OC but that is not in my nature so the Rev2 should be here Monday and after reading you review I am sooooo excited!!!!!! Good job man

[AoEGoD]

Hi i have the AsusA8V rev. 1.02 mainboard and want to update my bios with the new A8V-1005.002 bios. :irk:
Now i have two questions:
1. Can i fix the AGP/PCI problem by overclocking with this bios.
2. When i start to flash, i have to rename the bios file in "filename.ami" ?
All official asus bios files are called filename.ami. Is this correct?
Sorry for my bad english iam from europe :beer:

[joeMan]

Hello AoEGoD -

I can only answer part of your question. All of the ASUS BIOS files I have downloaded and flashed lately have been named "filename.ami" - where "filename" is the name of the new BIOS version. For example, the latest version 1006 BIOS file was/is called A8V1006.AMI when downloaded from the website (on the USA link anyway).

You are doing well to research everything carefully before proceeding - BIOS flashes are cool - but ya know how they can go sometimes - AAAAAAHHHH!!! :yikes: heh heh...

Good luck AoEGoD... :beer:

[hotstocks]

I also have an Asus A8v rev1.02. I can get the locks working currently stable at 238 fsb with locks in the beta 1005.21 bios. Any other newer bios 1007 or 1008, I lose the option to lock my agp/pci. I called Asus and they said if I RMA it they will give me only the EXACT same rev 1.02 board "fixed". I tried to explain to them that ALL the rev 1.02 boards are "broken" as far as the agp/pci lock in the bios. Since I got nowhere with them on the phone for an hour, I decided not to RMA it and go without a computer only to get the same board revision which might not even lock with 1005.21 bios. The only ray of hope is I heard Tony might be able to modify the newer 1007 / 1008 bioses to give the rev 1.02 people back the agp/pci locks. If you can do it Tony, God bless you and thanks

[Archangel]

Please, modded BIOS for the 1.02's to give updated BIOS's to us Rev. 1.02 owners access to our PCI/AGP locks without having to use the 1005.021 would be awesome! I currently use the 1005.021 beta but I'd just like ot see if I can get a better, more stable overclock with a modded updated BIOS.

[BB_One]

:welcome: to BE Archangel,

Maybe this page might help...seem to suggest a newer bios for your mobo. What it does i personaly do not know however.

http://www.tcmagazine.info/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=7726

Edit:2 different mobos discussed in this thread the A8V and the AV8, my link takes u to A8V bios.

[Rukee]

I have a ver 1.02 and use the 1007 BIOS and have no option for it but the lock is working. Also, when I was testing BIOS`s that showed an option to lock the PCI, I would always have to leave it set to 'auto', anything else and the computer was unstable or unbootable.

[joeMan]

Hi Rukee, how do you know the lock is working? I am also on Rev 1.02 and using BIOS v.1007. Thanks, joeMan

[Rukee]

I`m running at 249fsb and benching at 265 so it must be working.

[joeMan]

Guess so. Geeez. Pretty good man. More like really good.
Thanks.

[Rukee]

there is a screen shot @ 258fsb in this thread.
http://www.bleedinedge.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3714&page=1&pp=15
you can also get the set_FSB in that thread too.

[joeMan]

Cool. Rukee, I noticed that to the left of Set FSB in the little window up top the AGP/PCI numbers say 359/740...? What is this?

[Rukee]

I dunno what those #s are for, the 740# never changes and the 359 scales up and down with the fsb. @ 200fsb it`s 212 and @ 300 it`s 464 @ 400fsb it`s 716 and at the maxx the utility will do, 410fsb it matchs the 740#.

[joeMan]

Allright. Thanks for the feedback.

[Archangel]

I'd like to know that too. When I used on official BIOS on my Rev. 1.02, when I OC'd the FSB, the PCI/AGP clock went with it. How can you lock something that doesn't come locked even though it works? With the beta, I currently have 246MHz FSB and I'm struggling to get it up to 250. I was stuck at 240 for the longest while but I've figured out something odd about this board or CPU. When I would go past 240 with the multiplier of 10, my system would be unstable and crap out at 242MHz FSB. So, I figured my CPU can handle more MegaHertz so I uped the multiplier to 10.5 and it was rock stable! I figured I'd up the FSB to see how far it would go and now it's sitting at 246MHz FSB which it won't do with everything the same at a multiplier of 10. Anyway, I'd love ot find a user modified BIOS to use. Anyone want to offer one up? I want a more stable BIOS to push my system harder.

[Rukee]

archangle- what memory are you using?? I have to run CAS3.0 to get over 245fsb.
The PCI-AGP lock still shows to scale up and down with the FSB according to the set_fsb program, but I really think it`s just a glitch with the program, maybe it was writen before they got the lock to work on the MB. It MUST be working as I`m running a SATA RAID set-up and bench at 265fsb 1:1

[Archangel]

Well, I'm running timings of 3-4-4-8-1T and the memory is Corsair PC4000 Pro. Without hte beta BIOS, my locks don't work because they can't be set. Running a standard BIOS is just like not setting the PCI/AGP frequency at all. ClockGen reports a FSB increase when I overclock on a later than 1005.021. Also, the video card gives out after 220 on the FSB if I OC with a supported BIOS. I'm going to try and push it a bit further to see if I can get it to do 250 at 10.5. The messed thing is though, why won't it do 246 on the FSB with the multiplier at 10 but it will with a multiplier of 10.5 and it's rock stable?

System Specs:

Athlon FX53 (Socket 939)
Thermaltake Venus 12 CPU Cooling
Asus A8V Deluxe WiFi (Rev. 1.02)
1GB Corsair XMS PC4000 Pro Dual Channel Kit
74GB WD Raptor, 160GB Seagate SATA, 2 X 120 GB Seagate SATA (Not in Raid)
HIS Radeon 9600XT 256MB
Audigy 2 ZS Platinum
Enermax Noisetaker 470 Watt
U2-UFO Aluminum/Blue Case

[Rukee]

I think the memory divider kicks in when using a half multiplyer, check the memory speed with cpu-z.

[Archangel]

No memory divider. I made sure to set it correctly in the BIOS so it keeps the memory in sync with the CPU. I checked on CPU-Z and it states the memory is at 246 as well as the HTT Bus.

[Rukee]

hmm...I thought for sure I read something somewhere that mentioned the memory speeds where not right when using a half divider, can`t seem to find it now.
Can you run some bandwidth benchs at both speeds to see if there is any huge diffrence??

[Archangel]

Well, I'm not sure how to post pics in here and all or what to use. I've used the new SisSoft Sandra but it's not like it used to be with the nice bar graphs and all anymore. :'( That's the odd thing though, when I set the CPU to 10X240=2400, it's fine. Anything above that with a multiplier of 10 won't boot. If I set the multiplier to 10.5, I can continue to go further up to where I am (which is were I stopped at last attempts. Right now, it's running at 10.5X246= 2583. It's just odd. I'm going to reboot and push it further with the multiplier of 10.5 to see how far it will go and to see if it will stay stable at 250 if I can get it there. That's my goal!

[Archangel]

Okay, tried this again. I set the multiplier to 10 and didn't change anything else. Had to power down completely to reset the CMOS. Set everything back and a multiplier of 10.5 and everything was a go. I increased the FSB by 1 until 248 when I got a memory error playing Doom 3. That was from me running the RAM at 2.7 VDIMM when Corsair calls for 2.75 which isn't an option on this board. So, I rebooted, kicked the RAM's VDIMM to 2.8 and voila, I'm running at 10.5X250=2625MHz. I figured I'd try to run it at 10 to keep the temps a little lower but it wouldn't boot at all. Go figure! I think Asus needs to do some stability work with this board. Then again, maybe they have and it's in a newer BIOS that I just won't use because I can't lock my PCI/AGP frequencies with them. If anyone knows of a user modded BIOS that emables locks on newer BIOS revisions for people with Rev. 1.02 boards, please, post a link to them.

[Rukee]

That is sooo strange cause I have the rev 1.02 with the 1007 BIOS from ASUS and it works. I`ve never run a multiplyer less then the 11 default, maybe try that??

[Archangel]

Grrr, the image didn't show up the first time I tried this and I lost my post. To sum up what I had before, I don't think my CPU will handle it's default multiplier of 12 or even 11 even though it's an FX. A 250MHz FSB I didn't even think I was going to get at 10X250 so to have it at 10.5X250, I'm quite pleased with that. It's survived some Doom 3 already at 10.5X250=2625MHz and some editing in Photoshop CS with the Windows Swap File disabled. Anyway, got the inage in a good spot now to show you all my timings, voltages, temps and so on. Please excuse the mess of my desktop. :o

http://www.lungehavencottages.ca/Desktop.jpg

[glorfy]

Check out post 17 here (http://www.bleedinedge.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4614&page=2) it will tell you what you need to know about half multipliers - i.e. they don't work as expected!