Retail Abit IN9 32X-MAX - Pictures, observations and testing...

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Originally Posted by linflas

Would you like to see my tracking numbers? 3 is getting off easy, someone int his thread has posted about having gone through 4 of them, check the EVGA forums and you will see i am not even close to alone in the number of RMA's.

Lifetime warranty, yeah, whatever, 3 years from now my Abit dies, oh well, got more than my money's worth in three years, and $360? I paid $314 with shipping included. Paid almost as much for the EVGA with tax when bought locally.

EVGA is not doing anything about the bios other than troubleshooting, all the bios's for the reference boards come from NVIDIA.

And I also said my experiences with the EVGA board, I don't work for ABIT, this is my first ABIT board ever.

So try reading a little, instead of making accusations about something you obviously know nothing about. I was a big fan of the EVGA, I worked hard in there forums to get people up and running on this board. Just check there forums and look for my post's over there.

OK, back on subject. Yes, I am very happy with my ABIT so far, but it has not hit the 3 week mark for me yet, until then, it is just another 680i chipset for me, however it does not squeel from the capacitors, so that in itself is a bonus.

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So linflas, abit is a good choice, better than next EVGA mobo ( that is my second :( ) ?

In my experiences in a short period of time with this board, yes

And that is good answer for me ;)

I would think that for many people, especially enthusiasts, 3 years is plenty for a MOBO warranty. It will be very obsolete by then anyway.

Does anyone here have both Abit IN9 and Striker Extreme/Asus )P5N32-E ?

I've wanted to try a 680i for months now, and now that all 1st gens are released, Im still undecided between trying Abit or Asus.

Would like to see some IN9 vs Striker heads up comparisons, anyone?

Guess I will lay down some of my data here.

IN9 32x-Max
uguru 3037
Bios 1
nb/sb with AS5

C2D e6600 week 29b
Crucial Ballistix 2x1gb (presumed Micron DGMH)
Gecube x1900xtx
Corsair HX620W
Seagate 160gb SATA
CPU cooling: lapped TT Big Typhoon with a Delta 120x76mm fan


Maximal Ballistix Overclock
e6600 9*266 unlinked Ballistix 3:7 621mhz
5-5-5-18-23-2T
core 1.2375, RAM 2.2v, NB 1.5v, SB 1.5v, CPU vtt 1.2v, HT 1.2v
screencap orthos.



Thus far, I've taken my core to:

e6600 9*380 synch'd Ballistix 380mhz
5-5-5-18-23-2T
core 1.2975, RAM 2.1v, NB 1.45v, SB 1.5v, CPU vtt 1.2v, HT 1.2v
screencap-orthos stable.


and continuing on.



The minor snag I've hit upon is a lot of instability with uguru 3037, so I now set everything in the bios.

I juz got mine...
came with an evaluation bios...

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Originally Posted by Malik

So linflas, abit is a good choice, better than next EVGA mobo ( that is my second :( ) ?

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My thoughts on what 680i board to buy.... I've had 4 EVGA's, 2 Abits and 1 Striker. My EVGA is so solid right now. Ever since P24 Bios. You have to remember that the reference boards (EVGA, ECS, Biostar, BFG) have had many many bios releases. They almost have all issues ironed out (if they truly can be ironed out) My abit has almost all the same issues as the early reference boards. It may take them months and months of bios releases to get where EVGA is now. I've truly hammered this last EVGA board. I've hit it with everything i can think of. It has been in and out of my rig 6 or 7 times. It has been abused by removing and remounting water block mount hardware over and over and its still solid. I'll have another Striker from RMA in a few days. I haven't messed with a striker since early on when they first came out. I'll remove my EVGA once again to give it a try. My choice today would be EVGA.

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Originally Posted by nugzo

My abit has almost all the same issues as the early reference boards.

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Really? I have had no real problems so far. Things I have found are the bios has massive FSB holes, the bios is not WHQL certified so there are some errors in Event Viewer in windows Vista regarding IRQ assignments across the PCI bus. Some save features in the bios do not function correctly. I also have a sata controller pause for a restart with the boot up of Windows Vista (does not occur with XP, so am assuming this is a driver related issue more than a bios one).

Everything else in functioning smoothly. Abit has already addressed almost all of my issues with a beta3 bios, only problem is that it was unstable, hoping to see the beta4 this week.

This is the changelog for the unstable bios3

Here's the notes we got on the beta BIOS 3:

Beta BIOS M622A_11.B03: The beta bios still unstable wait for next beta version for testing.
1. Fixed S3 Resume 3 times will get POST Code "A0" issue
2. Modify string in BIOS. (Mhz to MHz)
3. Fixed NB Voltage limit calculating
4. "CPU Core Unlock" item default set to“Enabled”, and hidden this item
5. Del DRAM Timings value on Auto
6. Fixed EIST function failure issue
7. Update ROMSIP & OC clock range. (FSB hole issue in OC with certain of memory)
8. Fixed EM64T string incorrectly issue
9. Fixed Thermal Control function failure issue
10. To support Conroe Extreme (X6800) CPU's Multiplier range from 11 to 60

USB emulation issue:
the BIOS was changed from USB Keyboard or Mouse support via OS to BIOS then Windows XP would refuse to load.
Suggestion: Please be attention if you encountered this issue, Please avoid to change the setting as BIOS for the time being.


So that pretty much covers most of my issues with the board, just need it to be stabalized in version4.

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Originally Posted by Malik

You don't help me ;) So what you propose ?

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Man I was not here to help you, I did not even see your question, I just saw Linflas statment and I felt it was a biased one and that is why I reacted or maybe over reacted
But llisten if you have 360 bucks in your pocket right now waste them I do not care :slap:
But remember that there are alot of poor people around the world in damn need for this extra $100 you are gonna waste :stick:

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Originally Posted by linflas

Would you like to see my tracking numbers? .

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No man thanks I believe you, and I apologize if I was harsh some but your bold statement really bothered me!
You had 3 RMA Mobos but you did not tell us in detail why they were RMA?
Were they DOA?
If they were DOA then this is something has to do with manufacturing and not with How good this Mobo could be or with how much this Mobo can give
If you do not mind just adress exactly why you sent these mobos in RMA
And I promise I am gonna read this time :toast:

I have to say one thing....

I have "found my Ram's frequency" once again with this mobo.....:) :toast:

With the ASUS Striker my rams could do MAXED out 3D benchable, 415MHz at Cas 3-2-2-5-1T-8-21-2-6-2-7.8us where on other mobos (975-965) could do 432MHz.......
Now I'm at 431MHz 3D benchable at the same timmings....
I ALSO can bench about 50MHz - 60MHz more on AIR than the Striker.....
This tells me something.....
My rams are the Corsair 8000UL Fatbodies......
I'll test the 1000C4 Cellshocks one of these days too....;)

I have to say that I didn't have NOT EVEN ONE freezing when in Windows and benching.....With the Striker one, at 10 reboots, I had 6 good runnings and 4 freezings......:)

P.S. With the B02 bios, when I pick 1T within bios, it puts it at 2T and I have to change it back at 1T within Windows with the Memset.....

Fair enough dontoc,

The EVGA's as I have said were the best motherboard's I have ever had...for three weeks, and then they have failed on me.

First one failed after three weeks, just shut down one day and would never post again "--" post code, tried all the recovery methods, still nothing=RMA

Second Board-work great then three weeks into it, dimm slot 4 burned up a 1GB stick of ram, and the slot was dead, nothing I put in that slot would post at all.=RMA

Third Board-Sitting under my desk, not sure if it will be my media center pc upgrade board or not yet. Have not decided on what to do with it yet.

I got my board all setup and running, but when I add any extra vcore to my cpu my PWM buzzes... like loudly sometimes.. depends on which voltage I set it to... 1.4v is very noticable, 1.45v is quite loud.. 1.5v not as much.. but with default it's dead silent.. gah! not good.. anyone else have anything like this happen?

no, I ran 1.7, no noise from the pwm's, only problem I had from them was I could boil a nice pasta dinner on them...

hrm.. well, looks like I might need to return this board after all.. that really stinks.. unless I can find the offending area and put some lock-tight on it

like they're talking about here: http://techreport.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=46694

Interesting links, I had a "squeel" with my EVGA 680i under orthos load, not really under 3d app load. This Abit does not have it, I have 2 8800GTX's and have never had the issue they descibe. My 8800's were puchased 5 days after launch.

I did mod the cards for watercooling, not sure if I added sinks to the right place to avoid this sound.

Good luck tracking down your source, hope you find it, and find a solution to the noise.

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Originally Posted by revenant

oh yeah, and let me know about the thermal tape. are the sinks on well? I was afraid they'd fall off because the chip tops are so tiny and smooth, the tape wasn't seeming to hold well.. maybe it's time for new tape.. hrm.

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I would really like to know that too. Im just specing up for watercooling this board, and am about to order a bunch of heatsinks as well as a pair of MCW60's and a DDC Ultra with Petra's top. All in all, this board is running nicely for me tbh now im getting to grips with it. Seems to be clocking decently... at 3.8ghz so far and still going strong, but really need to watercool the NB and GPU's.

Sorry to hear about your prob with the PWM's Rev, hope u can get it fixed ok, have to say Ive not had that issue myself.

Revenant, I have not come across this buzzing either but it reminds me of an old problem some boards had with resonating inductors. Thing is with the digital VRM the inductor is not that long chip with PULSE written on it. Perhaps if possible when it buzzes could you take something non conducting like a chopstick and press down on that chip see if it helps or not. Interesting problem you've got there.

WOOPS see that they say its the 8800GTX card at the techreport.

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Originally Posted by Johnny Bravo

WOOPS see that they say its the 8800GTX card at the techreport.

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I do beleive he was just refering to the sound as basis so we understood what he was hearing. If I read his first post right, he states it is coming from the motherboard.

Quick question. Are any of you guys that own and use this board running any version of Vista 64bit? I have an issue where I can't even install it, I get a BSOD when I have all 4 sticks of my Corsair Dominator installed. If I pull out 2, it will install and work great. I can install and run Vista Ultimate 32bit all day long with all 4 sticks installed, 100% stable and solid. I tried every imaginable setting in the bios, voltages, freq's, timings, etc.. Nothing helped. I did actaully get it to install when I set the memory speed to 533 5-5-5-18 2T @2.3 volts. But alas, It would only boot into Vista every 2-3 tries, always stopping on the same bsod.

If anyone has had any luck with installing 64bit Ultimate with the IN9, could you post and let me know. It makes no sense that the 32bit version installs and works perfectly, but the 64bit version won't even install. The bsod error message says to check my hardware and update the bios to help correct the error, so it's not driver related, it seems to be memory-controller related.

Shawn

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Originally Posted by revenant

I got my board all setup and running, but when I add any extra vcore to my cpu my PWM buzzes... like loudly sometimes.. depends on which voltage I set it to... 1.4v is very noticable, 1.45v is quite loud.. 1.5v not as much.. but with default it's dead silent.. gah! not good.. anyone else have anything like this happen?

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I don't know if mine is the same but I'm hearing a buzz sound now too. It buzzes in exactly the same time the HD light blinks. I have diskeeper 2007 on mine and it runs in the back ground all the time. My fans kind of cover it up but now that I hear it, it's bugging me LOL!

PS: 100% sure it's NOT the HDs. Turned off auto defrag and I can live with it now. I always use manual anyway.:shrug:

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Originally Posted by linflas

10. To support Conroe Extreme (X6800) CPU's Multiplier range from 11 to 60

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Aren't the quads supposed to be unlocked as well?

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Originally Posted by Speederlander

Aren't the quads supposed to be unlocked as well?

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yes they will be too, don't worry :)