Asus M4a79 deluxe up close and personal

I thought I'd document some shots and work on this.....

I usually post a board before I tear it apart as my warranty is preety much void the first time I turn it on.......however this time I pulled it all apart due to a poor mounting job on the mosfets. It was literally not even touching on one side......as you will see from the pics.

I will follow up with thoughts, results etc etc next week, I have a big weekend planned and I need something I'm a little more comfortable with for those plans.

Onto the picture show...

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus1.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus2.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus3.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus4.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus5.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus6.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus7.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus8.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus9.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus10.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus11.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/asus12.jpg

Vcore read point
yellow circled is the chip pic 1.....yellow circled pin is read point pic 2. Have fun :)

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer1/asusvcore1.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer1/asusvcore2.jpg

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/IMG_0530[1].jpg

looking good already with my 940BE 3800 on stock heatsink/paste 1.45v 2400HT, 2600NB preety sure my gigabyte would have given me a blank blue screen at this speed/volts.
http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/IMG_0532[1].jpg

Prime stable and a screenshot of bios to show what it takes to get it there, take note that this board has a rather large amount of vdroop....This particular chip refuses to boot at 1.6vcore in other boards on air, in this board it refuses to boot at about 1.63 = measured 1.6v.

I ran prime for 3 hours instead of 2 as I had it fail once shortly after the hour mark.

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer3/primepass1.JPG

Bios

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer3/primepass2.jpg

Some NB and ram clocking, the efficiency with the board is preety good, finally cracked sub 67,500 efficiency rather easily. Shows how much PI is motherboard tuning dependant..

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/NB.JPG

Now for the fun stuff Xtreme air benching

Beat my previous validation with air, max before was 4.2
http://valid.canardpc.com/cache/banner/525966.png

Just some benches i'm tossing up no rhyme or reason, 32mPI is preety impressive considering everything I had open after I ran the 1m.
Dissapointed with my PC mark run, will probably re run it appears I needed a defrag preety bad.

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/airbench1.JPG

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/airbench2.JPG

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/airbench3.JPG

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/airbench4.JPG

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer4/airbench5.JPG

Reserved 3

Some DI results with X3 720 BE

1102 bios ran very smooth although at this point I was low on Dry Ice so I wasn't pushing it to hard.

No optimizing, one bench after another, managed to crack my current x3 720BE WR pifast time....just quick benches, was tired after an 8 hour Dry Ice run.

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer1/bingo1.JPG

http://members.cox.net/bostonreefer1/bingo2.JPG

Reserved 5

You have no idea how hard it is to find that board in UK and Ireland.

I want and need it!

Please Chew, please make it squeel with overclocking :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by N19h7m4r3

You have no idea how hard it is to find that board in UK and Ireland.

I want and need it!

Please Chew, please make it squeel with overclocking :D

---

hell yeah, god it took so long for the SB750's to turn up, that it was too late for me, got myself a Phenom II :rofl:

i got to admit that board looks sexy, its been a while since i seen a sexy AMD board, but again as you noticed chew*, bad contact on the mosfets.

tut tut, i wish these mobo makers would get there act together with this, i wonder how many are RMA'd for this very reason?

what are you going to do with the heatsink and bridges? remount it with some ceramic?

all the same i look forward to your review of it, i myself am very busy over the weekend, so no crosshair fun for me just yet :(

Ooo... That be the board I'm getting for my 940BE so I'll keep an eye on this thread for sure!:cool:

:up:

nice board, thanks for the pics chew*.
i thought about getting one, but ur pics made me realize that my mosfet waterblock doesn´t fit on it...
why does asus have to change the mosfet cooler?? and don´t even ensure good contact... damnit

I used ceramique on north and southbridge.

Spread out the mosfet pad a little, straightened the heatpipe assembly and reinstalled. I will try it like that.

If I'm not happy with it I will use a hardware mount versus the pushpins and springs.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by chew*

I used ceramique on north and southbridge.

Spread out the mosfet pad a little, straightened the heatpipe assembly and reinstalled. I will try it like that.

If I'm not happy with it I will use a hardware mount versus the pushpins and springs.

---

when i do this, i allways get rid of that mosfet strip, and just put ceramic on there, then use some bolts to lock it down.

as you said, you can try the push pins first, for me i allways just snip them off, cause i wrecked a mobo trying to get them through one time,

yeah bolts and nuts since then :up:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by N19h7m4r3

You have no idea how hard it is to find that board in UK and Ireland.

I want and need it!

Please Chew, please make it squeel with overclocking :D

---

funny enough i was looking for fun, and guess what i found in the UK? :up:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=34974

i have delt with aria a few times, and they are sound :up:, prompt postage and delivery :up:


mmmmmmm, shall i pull the trigger? sleep on it, the missus will kill me :shocked:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by soundood

funny enough i was looking for fun, and guess what i found in the UK? :up:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=34974

i have delt with aria a few times, and they are sound :up:, prompt postage and delivery :up:


mmmmmmm, shall i pull the trigger? sleep on it, the missus will kill me :shocked:

---

There are some slight hardware changes, I personally think it has been tuned for 45nm specifically as I have seen asus do this before.....you can sell off your current. I was a big fanboy of abit but when oscar left it fell apart, I'd bet money that this will get that cpu cranking more. I did a lot of homework before I made the purchase.

Hey Chew!

Boy am I glad you're working on this mobo...:D

I have the same and I'm having problems with software (AOD, OCCP,...) not detecting my voltages (vCore, 12V, 3.3V) correctly...

I tried the 701, 801 and 901, but there's no difference....

Do you have any idea what it could be...?

And oh yea, my CPU is overheating like crazy...

I will look into it, I just decided to set it up, posted fine running memtest now.

Just working off the 940 and stock heatsink for now...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mcbalaban

Hey Chew!

Boy am I glad you're working on this mobo...:D

I have the same and I'm having problems with software (AOD, OCCP,...) not detecting my voltages (vCore, 12V, 3.3V) correctly...

I tried the 701, 801 and 901, but there's no difference....

Do you have any idea what it could be...?

And oh yea, my CPU is overheating like crazy...

---

Try BIOS 0903, the 0801 had a problem with overvolting Core VID, also AMD is working on an update for AOD, until then try and use TurboV for the basic settings.

OHhhhh this is gonna be interesting... It gonna be my next Mobo too. Like the M3 79-T,, Repasted before i even used it. Its most likely the Number One flaw with any AMD Mobo ,,

Manufactures need to give us better bang fr the Buck. Its not hard to make shure the Heatsinks actually lay flat and work now is it:D

Beside that ,, I like the 8+2 or actually 4+4+2 power department and New Layout. Clean . Funny that Before i used Asusu it was MSI or ABIT. Its nice to see ASUS Still on Top after all these years. Adding a M4-79T will make Four Asus Mobos in the last year for me. Waiting for a 945/950 and ill be happy.

Chew ,, Crank that puppy :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by gOtVoltage

Manufactures need to give us better bang fr the Buck. Its not hard to make shure the Heatsinks actually lay flat and work now is it:D

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Its a flaw with many motherboards, especially asus, my maxximus formula southbridge had one corner touching the SB chip and that was it, it was so bad it was noticable to the eye how crooked it was.

I like the memory options, not bad at all, should be able to unlock some extra performance out of these sticks now. Still not as good as my manta options but they will do. ( that board would give most users brain freeze, the amount of settings was insane )

The phase for the ram definitely needs to be paid attention to, it runs very hot, under the shot of the asus NB heatsink.

Hehe, you don't want to see the thermal cr@p under the heatpipe assembly of a $350,- Asus Rampage Extreme, it was just awfull!

I will keep an eye on this thread chew, thanks for posting it up.

First flaw i found with mine is that NB frquency set in bios is not always detected after you've set it in bios.

Setting it to 2.6GHz for example and rebooting will put it just at 1.8GHz according to CPU-Z.

Workaround is to go back into bios, set it to 2.4, reboot and then set it to 2.6GHz.

Did you notice this too?

Oh, selecting 1066 divider allows to even set cas level 3 and 4, naturally both didn't boot. :D

i ran into this issue with am3 my workaround is to use stock multi ex. if i tried 18x227 going for 3.5nb in windows cpuz shows 2200nb. i was racking my head with that one. it not a big problem though, i set 15x oc htt till u get the ram were you want it then use k10stat in win thats if you have unlocked chip. lock chips should work just needs more massaging:)

No choice for 925 locked @ 14:)

Have to be all set from bios then k10stat if neccessary.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by bingo13

Try BIOS 0903, the 0801 had a problem with overvolting Core VID, also AMD is working on an update for AOD, until then try and use TurboV for the basic settings.

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You don't know how much better that makes me feel....:yawn:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by soundood

funny enough i was looking for fun, and guess what i found in the UK? :up:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=34974

i have delt with aria a few times, and they are sound :up:, prompt postage and delivery :up:


mmmmmmm, shall i pull the trigger? sleep on it, the missus will kill me :shocked:

---

I have already tried registering on their site.

I live in Ireland , we dont use a postcode.

Even if you select Ireland from the drop downbox it still insists on a postcode.

I emailed them, they told me to select Ireland from the drop down box.

I'm extremely pissed at this moment. I detailed in my email that it still wants a postcode even with Ireland selected and I got that rubbish answer.

I sent another email this morning, although I went alittle over board....

I have never delt with them but already I dont like it.


I'm stuck with a dead system until I get a new mobo and I dont want to get a nornal AM2+ that I need to flash the bios. I've no spare cpu to do that...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by N19h7m4r3

I have already tried registering on their site.

I live in Ireland , we dont use a postcode.

Even if you select Ireland from the drop downbox it still insists on a postcode.

I emailed them, they told me to select Ireland from the drop down box.

I'm extremely pissed at this moment. I detailed in my email that it still wants a postcode even with Ireland selected and I got that rubbish answer.

I sent another email this morning, although I went alittle over board....

I have never delt with them but already I dont like it.


I'm stuck with a dead system until I get a new mobo and I dont want to get a nornal AM2+ that I need to flash the bios. I've no spare cpu to do that...

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SCAN are also showing them, they ship to ireland, in the postcode box when ordering online put 'RIE' shipping should cost you £20 though :up:

any problem give them a call, again i have dealt with scan a few times, they are sound :up:, with a great returns system, never had any hassle from them :up:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?W...source=froogle