The Official ASUS P5N-E SLI & Ultra 650i Thread

silversurfer · 13 Jan 2007 at 18:35

I bought it before it came to ocuk but I got no receipt, they have no support telephone number and wont reply to my emails

Lets hope I dont need any actual support because asus dont have a uk base afiak and postage to usa for something this heavy sucks tbh

Proc · 13 Jan 2007 at 18:39

From reading the thread it does sound like a good board. I would be looking to clock to about 3ghz something like that (not greedy

) and this board seems to do that well. The only thing thats really bothering me is the heat issue, i have bought a Tuniq Tower and a Lian-Li PC7+ case. I'm don't really want to go adding an extra fan over the northbridge, as i'm not sure of what sort of space i'll have with the Tuniq and the noise from another fan. Don't mind getting a heatsink for the southbridge, mmm decisions decisions.

WJA96 · 13 Jan 2007 at 19:05

silversurfer said:
Also speedfan is reporting the cpu temp as 15c below what coretemp says, can speedfan be relied on is there anything better maybe?

Nothing accurately reports temperatures like Coretemp. Speedfan is pants because it relies on the sensor chip on the board. If the sensor chips are pants (and they all are) then Speedfan will report pants data. There isn't anything better.

silversurfer said:
Heres my speedfan graph for stock vcore with +.1mv under orthos, doesnt seem as bad as the asus with 805 was

With the extra [+100mV] the board seems fairly immune to droop. I've dropped mine back to 1.4V+0.1V and it's running 5-8C cooler and no stability issues.

WJA96 · 13 Jan 2007 at 19:10

Proc said:
From reading the thread it does sound like a good board. I would be looking to clock to about 3ghz something like that (not greedy ) and this board seems to do that well. The only thing thats really bothering me is the heat issue, i have bought a Tuniq Tower and a Lian-Li PC7+ case. I'm don't really want to go adding an extra fan over the northbridge, as i'm not sure of what sort of space i'll have with the Tuniq and the noise from another fan. Don't mind getting a heatsink for the southbridge, mmm decisions decisions.

I don't think this is the board for you unfortunately. Get a DS3 (on special at the moment) and it'll quite happily give you 3GHz with either an E6300 or an E6400.

I should point out that E6600 owners don't have to turn the FSB up so hard because of the higher multiplier, so the Northbridge doesn't get so hot. I'm not running any fans at all. My system is completely passive water cooled and I've made my peace with the 70C surface temperature of the Northbridge heatsink.

Proc · 13 Jan 2007 at 19:21

I've got until next week when the DS3 goes off this week only to make my mind up. The reason i was looking at boards other than the DS3 was i'd read a few posts from people who had received boards that wouldn't post and had to be rma'd. But from the many that bought it i suppose your going to get a few duff ones now and again, also was just keeping my options open as i like the look of the Asus, but thanks for the advice anyway.

WJA96 · 13 Jan 2007 at 19:39

Proc said:
I've got until next week when the DS3 goes off this week only to make my mind up. The reason i was looking at boards other than the DS3 was i'd read a few posts from people who had received boards that wouldn't post and had to be rma'd. But from the many that bought it i suppose your going to get a few duff ones now and again, also was just keeping my options open as i like the look of the Asus, but thanks for the advice anyway.

I think the popularity of the DS3/GeIL RAM combination has resulted in lots of noobie builders and noobie clockers who are generating a high level of RMAs. Also, it's worth bearing in mind that the DS3 routinely outsells all the other mobo's put together so even if there was the same rate of failures across all boards, you would just see a lot more DS3 issues as a result of their higher numbers.

I'm in absolutely no doubt that the ASUS is a better board than the Gigabyte - in every way, but I just got the impression from your post (Tuniq Tower + Lian Li PC7 + worried about noise) would mean that you are going to be unhappy with whatever motherboard you bought (the Tuniq is quite loud and doesn't cool the surrounding area well) so it would be better if you were complaining about the DS3 rather than the P5N-E SLi. Seriously.

Proc · 13 Jan 2007 at 19:54

Don't get me wrong i'm not after a truly silent pc, just trying to keep the noise down as best i can. I got the Tuniq as a good few people on these board recommended them and said they were quiet and it was also in offer

. I know the DS3 has heat issues as well when clocking, so suppose which ever board i buy ideally it could do with extra cooling. When my rig is built i will look if there is sufficient space for a fan over the northbridge.

Like everyone else i'm just trying to buy the best board for my money, but tbh honest as long as either board does its job then no complaints from me. But from looking at both boards and assessing what i'm looking at running, i suppose the DS3 may better for my needs.

Steves_pc · 13 Jan 2007 at 20:10

Nice results guys.

Question though if you fancy another test to run

Whats the hdd performance like?

I ask because I dont feel the ds4/intel/jmicron chipset combo is that good with disk i/o performance in fact I'm sure my dfi ultra-d was faster

WJA96 · 13 Jan 2007 at 21:35

Steves_pc said:
Nice results guys.

Question though if you fancy another test to run
Whats the hdd performance like?

I ask because I dont feel the ds4/intel/jmicron chipset combo is that good with disk i/o performance in fact I'm sure my dfi ultra-d was faster

I have no idea if this is any good or not...

Is there any particular test info you want? It's a pair of Hitachi 80Gb SATA HDD in RAID 0. I like these because I picked up about 20 of them for £20 each ages ago and they 'feel' fast.

OC_A64 · 13 Jan 2007 at 22:38

WJA96 is the guineapig for a while, looks like my board's dead

Fitted waterblock to the CPU and after that, nothing

Can't get it to boot anymore

CPU/ram are fine in another board which only leaves dead board. Will leave it clearing CMOS overnight but otherwise it looks like it's RMA time

All the voltages in various places are as they should be, so not sure whats happened!

Shame really, was just starting to get to grips with the board too!

WJA96 · 13 Jan 2007 at 22:46

OC_A64 said:
WJA96 is the guineapig for a while, looks like my board's dead
Fitted waterblock to the CPU and after that, nothing Can't get it to boot anymore CPU/ram are fine in another board which only leaves dead board. Will leave it clearing CMOS overnight but otherwise it looks like it's RMA time
All the voltages in various places are as they should be, so not sure whats happened!

Shame really, was just starting to get to grips with the board too!

I'll say a prayer to the foldy-gods for it. Very, very sorry to hear that.

Kaiju · 13 Jan 2007 at 22:49

WJA96 said:
I'll say a prayer to the foldy-gods for it. Very, very sorry to hear that.

Ditto. My condolences mate.

On that note, I'm gonna buy mine at OCUK. :cool:

Dark_Angel · 13 Jan 2007 at 23:26

sorry if this question has already been asked.

Does anyone know if this board will run an 8800 GTS in SLI? I am considering this board right now rather than the DS3, and if I get it it will be with an 8800 GTS, and I will probablly add a second one in the future...

OC_A64 · 13 Jan 2007 at 23:32

Dark_Angel said:
sorry if this question has already been asked.

Does anyone know if this board will run an 8800 GTS in SLI? I am considering this board right now rather than the DS3, and if I get it it will be with an 8800 GTS, and I will probablly add a second one in the future...

Yup, VR-Zone's review uses GTS's in SLI, they work fine.

torrentthief · 13 Jan 2007 at 23:42

board is a bit expensive, over £10 more than on competitors. i wanna find out what the max fsb people can get with these, my team ram will overclock bloody loads, my cpu will do 3.7ghz on air and hopefully 3.8 on water.

hope some new bios' are out soon and people get 510+ fsb on these.

Dark_Angel · 13 Jan 2007 at 23:52

OC_A64 said:
Yup, VR-Zone's review uses GTS's in SLI, they work fine.

Thanks for that! I googled the boards name and VR-Zone and up popped a review

Very cool! 4 EIDE devices on this board as well correct? thats great for me I must say, who has a plethora of IDE devices.

Kaiju · 14 Jan 2007 at 00:19

Dark_Angel said:
Thanks for that! I googled the boards name and VR-Zone and up popped a review

Very cool! 4 EIDE devices on this board as well correct? thats great for me I must say, who has a plethora of IDE devices.

Me too mate. My initial search for a Conroe board with 2 IDE channels was welcomed by WJA96's 650i recommendation.

The rest, as they say is history.

Kaiju · 14 Jan 2007 at 00:32

Guys, quick question about the Asus BIOS profiler. Is it possible, theoretically to swap profiles with other people, if of course the RAM and CPU are the same?

edit: WJA96, another thought I had... is the stock N/B cooler fine when oc'ing if you give it some airflow? I can't see how any third party passive cooler would be better unless it were copper.

Steves_pc · 14 Jan 2007 at 01:41

Thats fine mate thanks, unless youve got a pair of raptors you can do it with.

WJA96 said:
I have no idea if this is any good or not...
Is there any particular test info you want? It's a pair of Hitachi 80Gb SATA HDD in RAID 0. I like these because I picked up about 20 of them for £20 each ages ago and they 'feel' fast.

Thats not bad for Hitachi's, did similar on my dfi before i went to raptors, incidentally if you've got that many why only a pair raided!

OC_A64:
Thats a buggr, dont know if it'll work but worth a try is, hold the insert key while hitting the power up switch, seems to have an effect on my ds4 when it has the boot reset boot reset thingy, well i've never had the cmos battery out yet or had to use the clr cmos so somethings going on.

terryuk22 · 14 Jan 2007 at 01:51

I just bought one as well gonna try out soon

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