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*Official* Asus P5N7A-VM uATX HTPC Motherboard Thread - Page 7

post #181 of 1122
11/12/08 at 3:15pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by nst6563 View Post

anyone know how to force higher refresh rates in the video drivers? The max I get is 60Hz in Vista. However, on my old setup with an ATI card and XP, I could set it at 120Hz. Just curious as to if I could set it at that refresh would my tearing issues go away.

Right now I'm completley re-installing everything and will test things one step at a time.

Internal 120hz panel refresh is different then 120hz input rate. No LCD can accept higher than 60hz at this moment.
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post #182 of 1122
11/12/08 at 3:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by tomjot View Post

I'm starting to think these Asus boards are flawed or their quality control doesn't exist. I don't blame the chipset since it's already in macbooks where space and cooling is very limited and there hasn't been this many complaints. Perhaps the Gigabyte board will be better, anyone know the ETA on it?

If it's not the board then the next likely candidate is ram, can everyone with startup/shutdown problems post their ram makes/model/size... lets see if there is a trend.

Good thinking....for me I'm utilizing 2x2GB G.Skill 500MHz (DDR2-1000) ram, defaulting at 333MHz @ 1.9V.
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post #183 of 1122
11/12/08 at 4:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by stranx44 View Post

As for Crucial....being an avid overclocker over the years, it's funny that they produce such crappy memory compared to Corsair / OCZ, even when the others are utilizing the same Micron memory....hmmmm.

I think Transcend uses Micron as well. I've always had great luck with their sticks, but I never overclock.
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post #184 of 1122
11/12/08 at 5:17pm
I'm getting close to pulling the trigger on this board for my first HTPC build (built lots of other PCs, but not HTPCs). Because I use a zone 2 setup and remote audio/video to an exercise room through my receiver, my preferred mode of connection is Component/Digital Audio/Regular Video from my boxes to my receiver. The component/digital audio get the HD signal to my TV and surround and the reciver downmixes the digital audio and puts it out with the video signal to zone 2 for the remote zone.

From what I've read, you can have two video ports active at once (I'm thinking I can get component out of the DVI and regular video out of the VGA). But no one here has talked about the digital audio out. Does anyone use the digital audio out? Is it 7.1?
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post #185 of 1122
11/12/08 at 8:42pm
The problem with Asus is that the Bios' don't know how to read SPD on your ram sticks... try this - set up all auto and default and boot to windows... run CPUID (cpuz.exe) and look at the ram sticks SPD info... then look at how your RAM is set up in the memory tab... gee, where did those numbers come from ????

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post #186 of 1122
11/12/08 at 9:40pm
Is the problem only on this board or on multiple Asus boards? My previous P35 board from Asus had no memory problems when I used Everest Ultimate to check.

If it's only on this board, I'd assume they would offer a quick fix.
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post #187 of 1122
11/12/08 at 9:52pm
no, goes WAAAYY back...

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post #188 of 1122
11/12/08 at 10:14pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by tomjot View Post

I'm starting to think these Asus boards are flawed or their quality control doesn't exist. I don't blame the chipset since it's already in macbooks where space and cooling is very limited and there hasn't been this many complaints. Perhaps the Gigabyte board will be better, anyone know the ETA on it?

If it's not the board then the next likely candidate is ram, can everyone with startup/shutdown problems post their ram makes/model/size... lets see if there is a trend.

G.Skill PI Black F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B (4-4-4-12, 1.9V) - I'm getting a Memtest+ error and CPUID reports totally incorrect timings. I'm unable to manually adjust timings since the BIOS reports an overclocking error no matter what I try (I'm not overclocking anything). However, I don't think I've encountered any RAM-related errors when encoding, watching Blu-Ray, running Prime95 for half a day, etc. So I'm not sure if the Memtest error or CPUID timings are a "real" problem or just an non-meaningful "glitch." Vista RAM Score = 5.5 (not sure if this is what I should expect with my RAM; this is my first Vista PC).

To clarify, I'm calling my restart problem an "incomplete" restart or shutdown:
If I'm in Windows, Windows will shut down cleanly. Screen goes black, fans keep running forever. Power button doesn't work. I need to either press the reset button or unplug/replug/power on.

If I'm in the BIOS settings, when I save and exit, screen goes black, fans keep running, same as above.

As a recap, I've traced my particular problem to whenever I tweak the BIOS directly or use CPUID within Windows (64bit Home Prem). Otherwise, it restarts or shutdowns just fine.

BTW, is there a way to create subtopics or some other way to better organize the various questions/issues? I can't seem to choose anything but Linear view from my UserCP (so I'm having trouble following along).
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post #189 of 1122
11/12/08 at 10:41pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by pbw View Post

G.Skill PI Black F2-6400CL4D-4GBPI-B (4-4-4-12, 1.9V) - I'm getting a Memtest+ error and CPUID reports totally incorrect timings. I'm unable to manually adjust timings since the BIOS reports an overclocking error no matter what I try (I'm not overclocking anything). However, I don't think I've encountered any RAM-related errors when encoding, watching Blu-Ray, running Prime95 for half a day, etc. So I'm not sure if the Memtest error or CPUID timings are a "real" problem or just an non-meaningful "glitch." Vista RAM Score = 5.5 (not sure if this is what I should expect with my RAM; this is my first Vista PC).

To clarify, I'm calling my restart problem an "incomplete" restart or shutdown:
If I'm in Windows, Windows will shut down cleanly. Screen goes black, fans keep running forever. Power button doesn't work. I need to either press the reset button or unplug/replug/power on.

If I'm in the BIOS settings, when I save and exit, screen goes black, fans keep running, same as above.

As a recap, I've traced my particular problem to whenever I tweak the BIOS directly or use CPUID within Windows (64bit Home Prem). Otherwise, it restarts or shutdowns just fine.

BTW, is there a way to create subtopics or some other way to better organize the various questions/issues? I can't seem to choose anything but Linear view from my UserCP (so I'm having trouble following along).

It is either a hardware of (hopefully) BIOS issue with this motherboard, as I'm having the same symptoms w.r.t. strange RAM behavior and the power-down to funky state. Reset doesn't always work with the later, as I need to truly power down first. In addition, upon waking up from self-induced S3 sleep, my ethernet port stops working. I have to use vista to reset it. Meanwhile, blu-ray and dvd playback in VMC is flawless! However, I did have to turn of the vista sounds in VMC, or else I'd get choppy playback of DVDs. Must be a vista problem, as I have the same problem with my Intel DG45ID.
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post #190 of 1122
11/12/08 at 10:42pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by m104 View Post

I just looked at the bios hardware monitor temps - the PC auto-shut'et when the chipset was at reported 39 degrees celsius - the CPU temp at this point was at 41 degrees celsius. ...

My conclusion is that some P5N7A-VM boards have serious problems with the chipset temps - ans the BIOS reporting of these temps. No way is that chipset 39 degrees celsius when my PC shuts down - its way higher. I believe I can fry eggs on it...

For what it's worth: Neither Speedfan nor the ASUS PC Probe are reporting a "GPU" temp for me. Speedtest reports a Mainboard temp and Aux Temp (both around 28C idle, 40C under full load Prime95). If I use PC Wizard 2008, it reports a GPU temp around 60C idle, 70C under load (I don't have a separate graphics card installed). I tend to believe that the high GPU temp is accurate since the ASUS heatsink always feels wicked hot (can't hold my finger on it). I haven't suffered any sudden reboots due to heat (and I've really stressed this system out) but it does bug me. I'll probably install a different heatsink after I get my RAM issues squared away.

Setup: Antec NSK2480, Q9400, Scythe Mini Ninja, 4GB G.Skill PI Black DDR2 800 (4-4-4-12), LG Blu-Ray/HD-DVD GGC-H20L
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post #191 of 1122
11/12/08 at 11:29pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by jimwhite View Post

The problem with Asus is that the Bios' don't know how to read SPD on your ram sticks... try this - set up all auto and default and boot to windows... run CPUID (cpuz.exe) and look at the ram sticks SPD info... then look at how your RAM is set up in the memory tab... gee, where did those numbers come from ????



Even if you set up the mem timings manually (like i have), those funky numbers are still reported....unless your experience is different?
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post #192 of 1122
11/13/08 at 12:00am
Quote:
Originally Posted by stranx44 View Post

Even if you set up the mem timings manually (like i have), those funky numbers are still reported....unless your experience is different?

the quetion is, do the funky numbers affect performance?
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post #193 of 1122
11/13/08 at 1:17am
Quote:
Originally Posted by tsb View Post

the quetion is, do the funky numbers affect performance?

there's two explanations i can try to deduce:

1) The numbers are true and the BIOS is fudged.
2) The numbers are false, as it maybe an Advance Path driver issue relayed to the OS/Application.

Whatever the case, my IO transfers are about 33% down from my previous G45 setup.

BTW> I was able to finally overclock a little by utilizing the auto overclock setting in BIOS. Seems the FSB has very limited range up to about 375MHz before it chokes. Terrible board for overclockers in general.
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post #194 of 1122
11/13/08 at 3:31am
Quote:
Originally Posted by m104 View Post

Hi
I just put together my new HTPC system today - and it does NOT work very well. During installation of winXP the PC crashes - im thinking its the Chipset overheating (its extremely hot).

I have exactly the same problem with a P5N7A received yesterday. BIOS 0404. These are my findings from experimentation with that board.
MB would shutdown after 5-10mins. Could not get through more than 1-3 passes of memtest before shutdown would occur. During the 'expanding files' point in Vista install machine would always shutdown. Suspected NB after finding it impossible to touch more than momentarily.
I have a Scythe Ninja II on there with some of it's airflow passing over the NB heatsink, but still this is not enough.
From cold, placing hand on NB heatsink and sitting in BIOS hardware monitor, the temp reading quickly rises to 39C. However, the NB continues to get hotter and hotter. Eventually I have to take my hand off cos it's unbearable. But reading is still 39C. Though I understand this is MB temp and not NB temp. Left it in BIOS for 15mins or so and it didn't shutdown. Perhaps the NB actually needs to be busy to generate enough heat and push it past some safety limit.
Putting a 120mm fan blowing directly over the NB heatsink, gets the machine stable enough to run endless memtests and even install Vista.
From reading here, others have a NB which is not hot to touch and does not need extra cooling, so it seems I have one of the many duff boards. Gonna return this one.
Thanks to all for the reports.

BTW That heatpipe is a joke. It's parallel with the MB. It moves heat around in the same plane and not away from the NB. It should be perpendicular to the NB to move heat away from it and further into the heatsink. ******** baffles brains.
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post #195 of 1122
11/13/08 at 4:47am
Hi,

I have setup my first HTPC and the MB appears to be working fine (no memory issues). But I cannot get any sound via HDMI, even with the bios set to HDMI Output. And when I connect via SPDIF I do get audio but my receiver only recognizes the input as two channel (left/right) stereo. When I change the setting in the Realtek control panel to 8 speaker it still only use the L/R channels. I have exhausted my understanding of this and I come to you for help. How do I get this thing to output 7.1?

BTW, my receiver is a Denon AVR-2807 and the PC is running XP Pro SP3, video is vid HDMI and audio is currently via SPDIF. (but I would love to run it via HDMI)

Thank you.

David
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post #196 of 1122
11/13/08 at 4:58am
Quote:
Originally Posted by gildenman View Post

I have exactly the same problem with a P5N7A received yesterday. BIOS 0404. These are my findings from experimentation with that board.
MB would shutdown after 5-10mins. Could not get through more than 1-3 passes of memtest before shutdown would occur. During the 'expanding files' point in Vista install machine would always shutdown. Suspected NB after finding it impossible to touch more than momentarily.
I have a Scythe Ninja II on there with some of it's airflow passing over the NB heatsink, but still this is not enough.
From cold, placing hand on NB heatsink and sitting in BIOS hardware monitor, the temp reading quickly rises to 39C. However, the NB continues to get hotter and hotter. Eventually I have to take my hand off cos it's unbearable. But reading is still 39C. Though I understand this is MB temp and not NB temp. Left it in BIOS for 15mins or so and it didn't shutdown. Perhaps the NB actually needs to be busy to generate enough heat and push it past some safety limit.
Putting a 120mm fan blowing directly over the NB heatsink, gets the machine stable enough to run endless memtests and even install Vista.
From reading here, others have a NB which is not hot to touch and does not need extra cooling, so it seems I have one of the many duff boards. Gonna return this one.
Thanks to all for the reports.

BTW That heatpipe is a joke. It's parallel with the MB. It moves heat around in the same plane and not away from the NB. It should be perpendicular to the NB to move heat away from it and further into the heatsink. ******** baffles brains.

Nice to hear ur experiences (and saddening aswell) - this confirms my believes that my board (and ur aswell) is faulty... Returning the board is the obvious action. I sure hope I wont recieve another faulty board :/ (im buying from the same webshop again - only one that has the board in stock).
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post #197 of 1122
11/13/08 at 5:31am
I'm on my 3rd install of Vista x64 on this board and I've FINALLY got no tearing...not sure what the issue is...as I've installed all the same stuff.

One thing I did note was that if you're installing the Nvidia codecs AND PowerDVD8...install PowerDVD8 first because otherwise it unregisters the Nvidia codecs in favor of it's own. Or simply use the Directshow Filter Manager and re-register them.

Also, no hangup/power/reboot issues here like some have mentioned. Bios 404. Q6600 oc'd to 3Ghz, 4GB of Patriot and 2GB of Adata all running at DDR889.
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post #198 of 1122
11/13/08 at 5:55am
Quote:
Originally Posted by xradman View Post

Little more information.

- The PC will not boot if HDMI is connected by itself or with DVI
- The PC will boot with DVI connection, but once booted, there is no way to select Clone mode on the NVidia control panel
- If I switch out the DVI connection for HDMI with PC booted, the screen goes blank

Is this a BIOS issue or driver issue? I tend to think that it's probably BIOS related since the PC will not even boot with HDMI connection. Any ideas?

I solved this issue by connecting a second monitor with a VGA port. The MB will not boot with HDMI connection only. It will boot with both VGA and HDMI connected (monitor connected to the VGA port does not even need to be on). It seems that BIOS screen comes up on the VGA monitor with HDMI monitor only coming up once the Windows is loaded (?BIOS issue).

I then had no sound through HDMI even though I had installed the NVidia HDMI audio driver. The problem was that I had also installed Realtek audio driver. I had to disable Realtek in device manager to get audio to come on.
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post #199 of 1122
11/13/08 at 6:29am
Mine boots with HDMI only, and shows POST. However my projector does not respond to EDID, so that may make a difference. When VGA is also connected POST shows up on VGA, and when login it shows on HDMI since I have that designated as primary. Have VGA and HDMI set as independent (not cloned) displays. Differing resolution working properly. XP Pro.

Ya, glad some are catching on to the heat problem. And tried to tell you guys about the memory.
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post #200 of 1122
11/13/08 at 8:30am
Quote:
Originally Posted by xradman View Post

The problem was that I had also installed Realtek audio driver. I had to disable Realtek in device manager to get audio to come on.

This solved my issue of no audio via HDMI. I disabled the Realtek audio driver and now have 7.1 running via HDMI. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
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post #201 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:10am
Quote:
Originally Posted by xradman View Post

I solved this issue by connecting a second monitor with a VGA port. The MB will not boot with HDMI connection only. It will boot with both VGA and HDMI connected (monitor connected to the VGA port does not even need to be on). It seems that BIOS screen comes up on the VGA monitor with HDMI monitor only coming up once the Windows is loaded (?BIOS issue).

I then had no sound through HDMI even though I had installed the NVidia HDMI audio driver. The problem was that I had also installed Realtek audio driver. I had to disable Realtek in device manager to get audio to come on.

I don't have anything connected to my board but HDMI which goes to an Onkyo 604 which is connected to the TV via HDMI.

Maybe your display device doesn't respond to EDID well or at all?
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post #202 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:17am
Quote:
Originally Posted by nst6563 View Post

I don't have anything connected to my board but HDMI which goes to an Onkyo 604 which is connected to the TV via HDMI.

Maybe your display device doesn't respond to EDID well or at all?

Well, this is the only device that had problems with my projector. I have another HTPC with HDMI (GeForce 7600GS), Toshiba HD-XA1, XA2, A35, Sony PS3, Panasonic BDP-BD55K, and Motorola FIOS DVR all work perfectly well with my projector through HDMI and Denon 3808CI receiver. So I don't think it's my projector that's at fault.
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post #203 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:33am
that being the case, I wouldn't think so either.
maybe bios settings effecting it??? Reset CMOS and try? Dunno. From some of the issues I'm seeing in this thread I'm thanking my lucky stars mine is working as well as it is.
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post #204 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:42am
My reboot hang issues seemed to go away when I disabled acpi 2.0 support in bios (the default, but I had changed it on initial bios setup).
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post #205 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:54am
Quote:
Originally Posted by nightfly85 View Post

My reboot hang issues seemed to go away when I disabled acpi 2.0 support in bios (the default, but I had changed it on initial bios setup).

Interesting, I will try this later on tonight. I ran OCCT overnight for about 12 hours without any issues overclocking the FSB about 10%.
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post #206 of 1122
11/13/08 at 9:54am
Quote:
Originally Posted by md_climber View Post

This solved my issue of no audio via HDMI. I disabled the Realtek audio driver and now have 7.1 running via HDMI. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

If you're using Vista, try going into the Realtek controls and have it output SPDIF via HDMI. I remember there was some dependency to install the realtek driver before the nvidia hdmi driver, but forgot where i saw it.
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post #207 of 1122
11/13/08 at 10:26am
Quote:
Originally Posted by stranx44 View Post

If you're using Vista, try going into the Realtek controls and have it output SPDIF via HDMI. I remember there was some dependency to install the realtek driver before the nvidia hdmi driver, but forgot where i saw it.

That did not make any difference in XP. I installed the Realtek driver, then the NVidia HDMI driver, but I got no sound (until I disabled the Realtek driver).
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post #208 of 1122
11/13/08 at 10:51am
So overall it looks like this is the best HTPC board right now. Should I pull the trigger on this, its listed at eworldsale.com for $112, is that a pretty good price, have you guys seen it for less?

What do you think the min. processor I should get with this to run 1080p .mkv files smoothly?

Thanks
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post #209 of 1122
11/13/08 at 10:57am
Quote:
Originally Posted by m104 View Post

Nice to hear ur experiences (and saddening aswell) - this confirms my believes that my board (and ur aswell) is faulty... Returning the board is the obvious action. I sure hope I wont recieve another faulty board :/ (im buying from the same webshop again - only one that has the board in stock).

I'm in the same boat. Very few places have this in stock.
I can only hope that we were just unlucky this time.
Others don't *seem* to need special cooling on their NB to get this board to work. The fact that Asus installed a heatpipe which does nothing would seem to suggest that the NB does not actually get that hot normally. Otherwise they would've installed the heatpipe properly i.e. perpendicular to the MB.
We are essentially beta testing this board for Asus and the chipset for Nvidia. There is a memory prefetch problem, which was mentioned in the Tom's Hardware and Anandtech reviews. If that is fixed, as is supposed to be happening soon, then that would be a new chipset revision and probably other issues would be ironed out at the same time too.
Fingers crossed, we get a MB next time that is stable, with no special airflow over the NB.
Cheers.
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post #210 of 1122
11/13/08 at 11:04am
Quote:
Originally Posted by tparikh4 View Post

So overall it looks like this is the best HTPC board right now. Should I pull the trigger on this, its listed at eworldsale.com for $112, is that a pretty good price, have you guys seen it for less?

What do you think the min. processor I should get with this to run 1080p .mkv files smoothly?

I went for an E5200 as it's pretty low power and cheap.
Playing a 1080p h264 encode here with:

Zoom player 6 MAX Pro
CoreAVC 1.8 providing the h264 decoding
ffdshow resizing from 1920x800 to 1360x768 (for my 720p TV)

CPU usage is 45-65%. Smooth. Not been able to make it glitch at all, under Vista x64, 4GB DDR2800, with the .mkv file playing over 100MBit/s off my NAS box.
Cheers.
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