Robilar

Finally got the board installed last night. Bit of a trick to get it working. (I had the Asus A8N-SLI Premium prior, its now in my second rig). Before loading WinXP fresh (as I always do when I change MB), I loaded the newest non-beta bios via CD thorugh the bios update boot up feature (version 7.03). Upon updating, I began a fresh xp install. About 10% into the ntfs format, I got a blue screen o death stating that the ACPI bios driver is not compliant and windows is halting installation to prevent damage to my hardware. Tried twice more restarting format. Went into the bios and didn't see anything funky. Finally on my 4th try went into the bios and loaded setup defaults (And then turned off all the stuff I won't be using like on board audio etc). Worked perfect. What a noob mistake. I've loaded hundreds of computers and updated bios many times but the bios instructions always state "after updating load setup defaults in bios". Well, this is the first time I've ever HAD to do it. So anyone else loading, be warned its a must do with this board.

Also addressing the issue of limited PCI slots if you have SLI cards on the board (which is pretty much the main reason for buying the board). I have 2 6600GT's with Zalman VF-700 CU's. when mounting them beware! you will only have 1 free PCI slot (which I put my audigy 2 zs in). Considering what this board has built in, its no biggie and the cramped quarters doesn't seem to have any effect on the temps (both cards are running stock 41C idle, mid 40's load). Of course I do have a 120mm side fan mounted almost on top of them in the door of my case blowing cool air directly in. If you are using this board and have to add a pci card, I highly recommend a fan in the side door near or above the vid cards for extra airflow (although stock coolers would have a much larger clearance area). I'll attach some pics tonight to show what it looks like. I'm also going to re run all my benches this evening to see how much of a difference it makes.

umd man

Thats a nice board, what can you put the vdimm up to?

Robilar

I'll let you know. I'm doing some OC experiments tonight.

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umd man

Great please keep us updated, I was looking at the DFI expert but after all the issues, and since I love asus I think this is what I want, but I ordered some BH-5 ram so I dont know if I should send it back or what. Asus has never had really high vdimm voltages.

Robilar

Ran some benches (aquamark 3 3dmark 01 03 05). All benches came back 5-7% faster than an identical config with the Asus A8N-SLI Premium. Ran them twice to verify. This board is definitely faster than its predecessor at stock speeds. OC specs to follow. considering the asus a8n-sli premium was considered the second fastest board on the market vs dfi (and #1 in some benches), seeing that the A8n32 is faster makes a case for this board being the top stock board (and with none of DFI's finickyness). I still expect overclocking to be slightly behind the dfi but considering I am not a monster overclocker, will it really matter?

Freaky

Any updates, Robi ?

Evo

Blue screen on installing may mean your ram is stuffed it happened to me when building a friends rig