Is the P5WD2-E Premium a true dude..

[Eastcoasthandle]

I have only purchase Asus MBs for the past 5-6 years and never had a problem. I recently purchased an P5WD2-E Premium and for the first time in history had a geniune MB problem inwhich it would not detect 1 single PCI device. No matter what slot I put the device in it was rendered undetectable aka yellow exclamation "PCI Device" instead of Lan card, multimedia device, etc. I did not see any 975X NB chipset descriptors in the INF files. Nor did I find any ich7Ride.inf files but I did find ich7ide.inf SB drivers. Upon installation they infact did read ich7ide under device manager.

Asus tech support (upon my second call) did redeem the situation detected that the I was having a chipset problem that was not driver related and needed to exchange the MB as it is unrepairable.

Although I couldn't get my chipset driver question answer it is plausible to believe that my problem was a result of incorrect drivers for this MB. However, I cannot find a NB chipset driver with a 975X nor a SB driver with a ich7ide descriptor that are specific for this board. Does any have chipset drivers they can upload that actually do say that? Not sure why their website has these drivers for this board. But I do recall posters saying they have ich7Ride SB chipset drivers, not sure about the 975X drivers.

Can anyone shed some light on this? This has been the worst experience to date lasting nearly 1 week from the time I open the box to paying $14 to return it for an exchange.

[ingentingmendeg]

use your driver disc that came with the mobo?

[Eastcoasthandle]

Did that and it didn't work, spend 3 days on it. What is so fustrating is that everything else worked. Even the crappy onboard sound. No problems what so ever. I was still learning how to OC DDR2 mem as cpuz reported 3:2 timing even on default clock settings, wired!! But any hoot that was my only problem at the time. When I call Asus tech support they knew right off the bat what the problem was after explaining to them I:
-tried all 3 slots with 3 different pci devices
-Formatted 2 times
-updated the bios
-used cd drivers in 1 format
-used online drivers in 2nd format
-reset the cmos
-checked for grounding as it takes 1 less screw when mounting to the case then the P5GD1. I made sure I removed that peg from the case on the 1st install.
-used the toilet for a hard long think of the situation
-gathered my composure and finally called Asus tech support after 3 days of Hell.

They told me what the problem is right away. Which tells me they are aware of the problem. Some sort of chipset conflict with the pci slots.

[Nasgul]

Drivers for the 975X can be found in two flavors, .EXE and ZIP: here (http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2261&OSFullName=Windows*+XP+Professional&lang=eng&strOSs=44&submit=Go%21), v.7.2.2.1006.

Is this were you got your drivers from?
I never use drivers from the installation disc, always Intel, for F6 and Matrix Storage Manager, because I run RAID-0. Which those can be found; here (http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2101&OSFullName=Windows*+XP+Professional&lang=eng&strOSs=44&submit=Go%21), v.5.5.0.1035.

Another issue I heard with the P5WD2-E Premium is that if you're going to install WinXP, it should be the one with SP2. These happened to a couple of fellas.

[Eastcoasthandle]

Drivers for the 975X can be found in two flavors, .EXE and ZIP: here (http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2261&OSFullName=Windows*+XP+Professional&lang=eng&strOSs=44&submit=Go%21), v.7.2.2.1006.
Yup, I tried those also and notice no 975 descriptors for the .inf files. Only 915 and 945 specific. Which I assume is generic driver for 955 and 975 as well.

Is this were you got your drivers from?
I never use drivers from the installation disc, always Intel, for F6 and Matrix Storage Manager, because I run RAID-0. Which those can be found; here (http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/filter_results.aspx?strTypes=all&ProductID=2101&OSFullName=Windows*+XP+Professional&lang=eng&strOSs=44&submit=Go%21), v.5.5.0.1035.
I downloaded those as well but I don't have a raid setup yet, I didn't get that far

Another issue I heard with the P5WD2-E Premium is that if you're going to install WinXP, it should be the one with SP2. These happened to a couple of fellas.

I did try those, from reading this post you didn't have any problems. Did you install any pci devices? In particular the X-FI sound card?

[Eastcoasthandle]

oh, I also noticed that the P5WD2-E Prem doesn't have prefetching in the bios... am I missing something?

[LarsK]

Well, I'm having all sorts of weird problems with my P5WD2-E, like some programs not wanting to start because they can't recognize the motherboard etc.. I'll try to install the X-Fi soundcard later today, what you say don't sound good though....