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In my Fatal1ty manual it says,Quote:
Originally Posted by thebluesgnr
"DDR Ref Voltage: "Ancient Chinese secret."
HA HA No, but really it says this;
DDR Ref Voltage: This item selects the voltage for DDR memory reference."
CPU Ref Voltage: This item selects the voltage for CPU memory reference."
Can anyone explain these?
:confused:
you got me on that one i have no clue either. I wish it said *ancient chinese secret* at least id understand it better.Quote:
Originally Posted by thebluesgnr
:lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by chew*
ancient chinese secret... how to enable it? :banana:
Same here, I might have ot ditch that Neo2 you sold me to fund a Fatal1ty if it turns out to be as good as advertised.Quote:
Originally Posted by jinu117
Maybe the board is preprogrammed with the voltage for the individual piece of hardware?Quote:
Originally Posted by Gitsum
Cool pics.
I've seen the board in person, its sexy as hell (my windowed Lian-Li wants it I hear).
I'll pick one up. :cool:
how about firing some emails to ABIT tech support (in hope they are still awake :D) & ask for a clarification about the voltages & multis.?
Can you say "user error"?Quote:
Originally Posted by Unrealcpu
Seriously, there aren't enough reports of trouble to even come close to making this statement.
I've got one of these abit A8N's on order, but I'm not expecting too much. Abit hasn't been the same since thier best engineer's left for DFI. This new board has all the usual gimmicks, but where's the beef? The voltages are far too wimpy. And the idea of having to flash to a BIOS that voids your warranty just to get higher voltages is BS :stick:
That said, I've always been a Abit fan and its been sad to see their decline n the last 18 months. I'm hoping the A8N signals a turn around. I'm tired of all the plastic gimmicks for the kiddies (OTES, etc) and would like to see the Abit boards get back to basics....high stability at high overclocks. And some real voltage choices that don't void your warranty!
I'll have some A8N results this weekend.
Nah, dude. I know Conrad is no noobie, I'm not one myself, we've both lost a board pretty early. Mine croaked during a reboot from a pretty mild memtest session. (250x11, 2-2-2 w/VX, 3.3VDimm, cooled fet...error-free session I might add!) Nothing the cpu/mem haven't done before with ease in other boards. I do agree that there aren't enough reports to say that this is going to be a trend, and there are plenty of noobie-type "I'm lost, wtf" posts on this forum and DFI's, but some of these boards have just dropped out. Conrad and I both got in on first shipping of these boards, I'm hoping some of the first release had some QA issues and all will be well from here, but time will tell.Quote:
Originally Posted by mdzcpa
OK guys, can we stay on topic with the Fatal1ty please? Alot of us are considering this board and would like to keep this thread clean except for Fat discussion. I hope I don't come off sounding like a :banana::banana::banana::banana::banana: or the "forum police". I just don't care to hear an argument about the DFI problems on this thread.
So the voltage is weak, but the board is stable & pretty? Sounds decent, but IDK if I would spend $200 on that. A $200 PCIx board should be a high end piece that we could build on in the future. If it won't clock well, then there is a big problem. I know the P4 Fatality was reviewed & basically considered the best P4 OCing board by a pretty wide margin. I was hoping for similar quality from the AMD version and it would surely be a letdown if this board didn't OC well.
Sounds alot like what MSI does. Ill give a brief rundown. MSI has their setup like so:Quote:
Originally Posted by Gitsum
CPU VID
CPU Voltage
The VID is the base voltage while the CPu voltage goes in percentiles. It worked like so:
CPU VID = Default (until changed / max of 1.55) = 1.4v
CPU voltage (max of 10%) = 10%
1.4 x 10% = 1.55v
I assume this is what Abit is using. Ie they are refering to the base voltage to be used + a percentage value (which is a different setting in the same tab)
I saw something on Abit forums, but can't seem to find it again. If you register with them for something or another (I can't really remember if it was something to do with a fatal1ty club), you can get a special BIOS e-mailed to you with a code to open it in Windows and put on a floppy, then you flash it and you get crazy voltage and OCing options. I'll keep looking.
No, it is not a percentage like MSI does. It is a milivolt setting that can be added or subtracted. In the screen shot you can see I added on the VCPUref and subtracted on the VDDRref.
http://webpages.charter.net/klaasman/uGuru.jpg
http://webpages.charter.net/klaasman/eq.jpg
That must be the "Magic BIOS" I've seen people refering to. I have seen nothing mentioned at the Abit forums nor was there any reference to joining or registering included in the mobo documentation either.Quote:
Originally Posted by SPQQKY
well if all it is is register for abit forums and register your board, then go ahead and do it!
i'm registered at abit forums ever since my nf7-s. which was why i've recently constantly been trying to justify an abit purchase, becuase i like them so much.
edit: i went and perused abits forums a little bit and found this bit of info.
This special bios isn´t bulls***, since I invented it for Abit for their "Innovation Awards 2004" in summer 2004. I called this feature as N.S.N (No Soldering Needed) technology.
Those outrageous overclocking options would be unleashed by special bios, that you can get from Abit when you send them your board SN.
Thou, I dont know if its possible to "hardcode" the bios for specific SN only, since AFAIK the board doesn´t "know" its own SN.
Your board SN will be listed in "Warranty void" list by Abit, so using this bios will void your board warranty.
Most people ask why this bios voids your board warranty, even there isn´t any physical modifications done.
The answer is simple: When board components are pushed beyond their manufacturer rated specifications ex. AA8XE Fatal1ty 925 rev. E MCH (NB) core voltage is raised over absolute maximum 1.65V (rated by Intel), the lifetime of that certain component will be decreased (in theory). When the lifetime of component decreases, MTTF (Mean time to failure) will also decrease and when the component finally fails Abit will be the one who is responsible. Thats the reason why the warranty is voided.
My idea was to offer easier way to get better overclocking features that motherboard manufacturers currently dare to offer. Because most enthusians aren´t enough skilled or willing to make physical modifications to their product, I wanted to offer safer way to get those features.
- Roger
so what i would do is email ABIT support i guess, with your SN#, they will know what board you have by that and send you the special bios.
this is about the aa8xe board though, not the an8, so i don't think this bios will void your warranty like the intel. but either way, abit's E-RMA service just seems to take boards back regardless of what you have done to them.
edit again: go here http://www.abit-usa.com/support/techsupport.php
and give them all the info they ask for, it asks for serial number and board model, then ask for the special bios.
OK. Sent e-mail to tech-support asking about special bios and also told them about the multi issue and asked what the hell the VDDR and VCPU ref voltage adjustments do.
Wow... that's cool. Just flash back to the original bios if you end up frying it.
I would really like to know how it perform with sub-zero cooling.
We also need to have hipro or hell-fire take a look at the voltage possibilities ;)
:confused: :stick:Quote:
Originally Posted by quicksilverXP
"
Your board SN will be listed in "Warranty void" list by Abit, so using this bios will void your board warranty. "
This page says that it is only for USA-CANADA.Will they answer my request for that bios?How can i have access to the same tech support page for Europe?Quote:
Originally Posted by Skip
Any link for that? Plzzzzzzzzz
I wasn't referring to anyone specific, so don't be offended:)Quote:
Originally Posted by mikead_99
Relax. Discussing the boards shortcomings as well as its strengths, and how it compares to the competition, is important in the evaluation of the mobo. No one needs a thread that glosses over weaknesses and only gives postive hype.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pr0d1gy
I hope Abit doesn't pull the same warranty voiding crap with this board just to get decent voltages :mad: The A8N won't last 30 minutes on my stand with Vdimm of 2.85v. Perhaps a leaked BIOS might be the trick.
So what your saying is i was right gitsum about +10 to +60 being +.01v to .06v which gives a max of 1.91 vcore and 2.86vdimm?Quote:
Originally Posted by Gitsum
1.91 vcore is cool heck my gigabyte is supposed to fry if coldboot at 1.85
wish the memory went higher though giving us 1.9 vdimm +.06 would be nice heck even 1.85 +.06 would be decent. At least that would be the same they gave for the nf7-s.
Just so some of you have a reference my k8nsultra 939 only allows to 1.7 vcore and the msi only gave 1.85 so 1.91 is a nice allowable voltage. MY guess is it will max out at 1.90 because im sure that the +01 to +60 setting is + or - .01 volts
So far we have this.
pros
looks good
5.1 audio daughter card(nf4 audio is its weakpoint IMO)
Rock stable at stock
Stable voltages(not alot of fluctuating)
Northbridge has good placement(If you read around people are having trouble using aftermarket heatsinks/waterblocks due to vid card interference.)
Temps appear to be accurate.(**update there are reported issues of temps innacurate after third reboot after resetting bios**)
Vtt tracks good
Pci and Pci-E locks are working
cons
Max vdimm 1.85
mutipliers are not acessible(**Beta bios has fixed this issue**)
Uguru does not clock atm(goes hand in hand with multis locked)
an8 and fatality max vcore 1.75 with winnie 1.85 with newcastle(If anybody reaches higher without mods let me know ill update this)
an8 vanilla does not like tccd(**Beta bios has now fixed this issue**)
floppy ide is not a desirable location
If anyone is wondering why I'm including both boards just look at the pics. It looks like the same pcb layout and I believe the boards are identical minus NF4 ultra chip and I believe that the fatality bios will work on this. If it doesnt i will start a seperate thread on AN8.
Anyone with Issues please feel free to post as I will eventually start a AN8 Bugs tips tricks mods thread as we get more info.
Max clock to date on fatality an8
3500+ @ 2550 memory topped out at 255(note this just may be memories max not boards)
Max clock to date on vanilla an8
3200+ @ 2350 10X235 cpu topped out at 240(note this may be cpu's max not the boards)
Max Htt at this time with fatality an8 is 375.
It doesn't like TCCD? Bugger, I have G.Skill 4400LE and plan to use it on a new nF4 board.
Gitsum, if they send you a special BIOS can you keep us updated with voltages please? I like this board and I may purchase this next month with a new Winchester. Its a toss up between this and DFI at the moment and I'm not bothered about SLi just yet so this may be my choice, hopefully it is a great overclocker like the NF7.
If there is a special BIOS and it does well with TCCD then I'll be able to test the sub-zero capabilities with my Mach II GT.
I did order the AN8 Fatality but GAME VE is on backorder thank god i got my refund .
I just ordered the DFI NF4 NON SLI for 150 bucks and will be shipped quick .
I am also using TCCD PC4400 RAM
Cant wait