ASUS P5Q-E (P45) pre-view

[OC_Newbee]

Cool, it's nice to know that the bios tells defaults, that will help. I'm not looking to have an "xtreme" system (water cooling, maxed out, full throttle) per se, but I would like to reach what seems to be simple 3.4Ghz on my Q9550. I think that is a good medium that will last up to 3-5 years before the next computer build. My current system is an AMD 2800+ to give you an idea... I will be skipping the i7 generation.

I'm in the same boat as you are. I don't upgrade much (from generation to generation) as you can see in my sig. I went from what's in my sig to this,

P5Q-E
Q6600 @ 3.880
2 x 2gb DDR2 Gskill PC8000
ATI HD 4850
Watercooled

That right there gave me hugh performance increase for the program I use it for, not much of a gamer maybe once it a while. What's that like 4-5 years before an upgrade, matter of fact I still have my system in sig (for my 11 year old daughter), I too will be skipping all this i7 generation.

[Flip_Lx]

just play magical computers with your family members.... :-p

i did my rig overhaul(in sig) and the old p35/2140 combo budget went to the sister, whose old p4/9800 pro(my older old rig) went to be the web surfer at my dads place (whose running my old opty170 for his gaming rig) notice a trend?

anyways whats the story with bios? i've been using 1103 since it was released but now i see 1003 is the only one listed on asus site, there a specific reason? something to be worried about with 1103?

[ScottDaMan]

anyways whats the story with bios? i've been using 1103 since it was released but now i see 1003 is the only one listed on asus site, there a specific reason? something to be worried about with 1103?

Geez, I don't know what to say. I just downloaded P5Q-E-ASUS-1201.zip on 08/22/2008 and it had the 1101 on there as well. I guess that settles it, I won't be updating the BIOS when it arrives. LOL

[ScottDaMan]

I just used some creative "header following" with firefox and discovered the 1103 and 1201 are still on their server, they just aren't linking to it for some reason.
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...-ASUS-1003.zip
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...-ASUS-1103.zip
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...-ASUS-1201.zip

[ochero]

I had my 6750 to 4ghz(500fsb) at 1.56vcore.Are you sure the wall is on your 6750?

Yeah, I just got a E8500 w/ P5Q-E and I'm able to post at 533+ FSB.

I put my old E6750 in the P5Q and the board wouldn't boot at 480 FSB (or anything past that), all settings were identical.

I had the E6750 paired up with the DFI P35 T2R before, so to test things out, I put the E8500 in the DFI board to make sure that it wasn't the DFI hitting an FSB wall and the DFI too posted at 533 without any problems (although it wasn't stable like the P5Q).

Anyway, for what it's worth, the P5Q is a MUCH easier board to OC than the DFI P35 T2R, and the P5Q too needs minimal voltage increases from stock... unlike the DFI which needed quite a bit of a voltage bump and LOTS of minor tweaks to remain stable at higher FSB. Maybe it's the P45 vs. P35, but that's just what I noticed.

[ahmad]

Yeah, I just got a E8500 w/ P5Q-E and I'm able to post at 533+ FSB.

I put my old E6750 in the P5Q and the board wouldn't boot at 480 FSB (or anything past that), all settings were identical.

I had the E6750 paired up with the DFI P35 T2R before, so to test things out, I put the E8500 in the DFI board to make sure that it wasn't the DFI hitting an FSB wall and the DFI too posted at 533 without any problems (although it wasn't stable like the P5Q).

Anyway, for what it's worth, the P5Q is a MUCH easier board to OC than the DFI P35 T2R, and the P5Q too needs minimal voltage increases from stock... unlike the DFI which needed quite a bit of a voltage bump and LOTS of minor tweaks to remain stable at higher FSB. Maybe it's the P45 vs. P35, but that's just what I noticed.

I can post 575MHz+ easy. Getting that HCI 600%+ stable is a different challange..

However I do like this board. Much easier to work with than my last gigabyte.

[siyah]

their is a new bios 1306 for asus p5QE i will test it

[ScottDaMan]

Wow, sheesh. Let us know how that goes.

Edit: Where did you find that? Their driver pages only has 1201?
Edit2: Was able to get the download link from your version number:
http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/...-ASUS-1306.zip

Do you remember what 1306 fixed?

[Zeus]

The dreaded BSOD with LLC enabled problem is still present in 1306.

Couldn't get 600FSB stable either with this bios.

I didn't see any improvement over 1103 or 1201 to be honest.

[Dee]

Anyone know what 1306 is meant to fix or improve?

Also, does anyone else have problems with DVD drives reading very slowly? It took over 18 minutes to copy 3.17GB of data from a DVD to my hard drive today. Ridiculous. Thread here:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/sho...php?t=17912267

[ahmad]

Anyone know what 1306 is meant to fix or improve?

Also, does anyone else have problems with DVD drives reading very slowly? It took over 18 minutes to copy 3.17GB of data from a DVD to my hard drive today. Ridiculous. Thread here:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/sho...php?t=17912267

Check IDE channel settings in device manager, do you have DMA enabled?

[Dee]

Transfer mode is set to "DMA if available".

Oh, and the new BIOS apparently fixes some RAM compatibility issues and detects EPP profiles.

[Seanie's Show]

1306 once again as the last two do is supposed to improve RAM compatibility personally I dont belive that this is all its supposed to do, so far the only two bioses that have been any good on my -E baord are 0803 and 1003, everything above that causes me nothing but RAM problems.

I am now on my 3rd kit of RAM, just testing it at kinda stock settings, with the timmings slightly tightened to 5-5-5-15-2T tRFC @ 60 1150mhz, stocks are 5-5-5-18-2T tRFC 78 @1150mhz.

the previous 2 kits of RAM were a 4gb kit of GEIL EVO ONE 1066mhz which worked fine at stock settings, but as soon as I started to overclock my system, even keeping the RAM at 1066mhz or below, I was getting memory errors all over the place, I dont know if this is something to do with the LLC problems you guys are talking about ? but the 2nd kit had the same problems which was a 4gb kit of G.Skill 1066mhz PQ.

I am falling out with ASUS and this board very quickly now, and looking at either moving back to my Gigabyte X38-DS4 or grabbing a DFI LT X38-T2R at the weekend, this board has a few more days of testing to aviod being thrown across the room.

[thehinge1]

The saga:
I liked bios 1201 until I accidentally set the NBv too low at around 665fsb and did not have one single instance of needing to clear CMOS jumper or any bios corruption until that one boot. 1201 became crap for me after that, and I had to reflash 1201 followed by 1103 (at stock clocks using afudos-I'm extra paranoid). After that 1201 was no-go period, and I finally had fairly normal behavior after that where I could properly power off/reboot & use F1 to reset bios again when re-clocking in 1103. This thing does not like to go over 533fsb ever since the 'great kaboom', but I've switched RAM so no biggie now as the new stuff won't go ape-crap speeds like my 1150's did on this board.

Anybody think swapping the bios chips and flashing the backup would change anything to get me back to 'easy 550'? My shipping/backup bios 0605 is utter crap on this rev1.01g mobo anyhow so I was thinking of making it v1003 or 1103.

I tried ASUS official 1306 - same inconsistencies from boot to boot as 1201 did & went back to 1103. I tried my current 4GB (2x2) Reaper1066 kit, a 2x1GB Reaper1150 kit, and a 2x1GB Platinum1066 kit.

However: Ket's modded 1306 seems fine so far with the 4GB kit to at least DDR1120 at decent timings and PL-8 with all pull-ins enabled - will do DDR1140 but timings too loose for my tastes. I may even get brave and try to see if I can get the 1150's over 1220 again on 5:6 divider, The 1066 Platinums did 500fsb/DDR1200 fwiw (but did get warm at only 2.04v setting.

If it helps anyone - I use tRFC of 50 with the 2x1Gb kits up to DDR1200 and 55 with the 4GB kit up to DDR1140. My board doesn't like PL-7 but runs PL-8 on anything except 1:1 where I usually have to go to PL-10 or PL-9

I'm thinking a nice E0 8400/8500 might do really sell on this board - the E7200 runs 3800 fairly easily but I gotta pour on the Vcore to get 4GHz+ with high bandwidth settings.

[Dee]

Seanie, get Ket's modded BIOS. They rock.

[Seanie's Show]

Seanie, get Ket's modded BIOS. They rock.

Thanks mate, looked it up this morning as I noticed the modded bioses earlier when reading the post above yours.

Just one thing, if Ket's bios give me what I want, ie, Memory Stability, then I think we should all have a vote and get Ket hired by ASUS, the first suggestion I will give him once he gets his foot in the door is to fire their bios writters.

[ahmad]

The saga:
I liked bios 1201 until I accidentally set the NBv too low at around 665fsb and did not have one single instance of needing to clear CMOS jumper or any bios corruption until that one boot. 1201 became crap for me after that, and I had to reflash 1201 followed by 1103 (at stock clocks using afudos-I'm extra paranoid). After that 1201 was no-go period, and I finally had fairly normal behavior after that where I could properly power off/reboot & use F1 to reset bios again when re-clocking in 1103. This thing does not like to go over 533fsb ever since the 'great kaboom', but I've switched RAM so no biggie now as the new stuff won't go ape-crap speeds like my 1150's did on this board.

Anybody think swapping the bios chips and flashing the backup would change anything to get me back to 'easy 550'? My shipping/backup bios 0605 is utter crap on this rev1.01g mobo anyhow so I was thinking of making it v1003 or 1103.

I tried ASUS official 1306 - same inconsistencies from boot to boot as 1201 did & went back to 1103. I tried my current 4GB (2x2) Reaper1066 kit, a 2x1GB Reaper1150 kit, and a 2x1GB Platinum1066 kit.

However: Ket's modded 1306 seems fine so far with the 4GB kit to at least DDR1120 at decent timings and PL-8 with all pull-ins enabled - will do DDR1140 but timings too loose for my tastes. I may even get brave and try to see if I can get the 1150's over 1220 again on 5:6 divider, The 1066 Platinums did 500fsb/DDR1200 fwiw (but did get warm at only 2.04v setting.

If it helps anyone - I use tRFC of 50 with the 2x1Gb kits up to DDR1200 and 55 with the 4GB kit up to DDR1140. My board doesn't like PL-7 but runs PL-8 on anything except 1:1 where I usually have to go to PL-10 or PL-9

I'm thinking a nice E0 8400/8500 might do really sell on this board - the E7200 runs 3800 fairly easily but I gotta pour on the Vcore to get 4GHz+ with high bandwidth settings.

What NB GTL are you running?

[thehinge1]

'Auto' after playing around at and on both sides of 0.63 without any noticeable improvement.

What NB GTL are you running?

And I agree re: Ket!

ATTENTION ASUS: HIRE KET AND FIRE YOUR CURRENT BIOS anti-ENGINEERS!!!

[ahmad]

'Auto' after playing around at and on both sides of 0.63 without any noticeable improvement.

I got very noticable improvements when I lowered it slightly (x0.610).

[Dee]

Just one thing, if Ket's bios give me what I want, ie, Memory Stability, then I think we should all have a vote and get Ket hired by ASUS, the first suggestion I will give him once he gets his foot in the door is to fire their bios writters.

Agreed!

[thehinge1]

Thanks, I got to x0.615 & gave up, am trying .610 now at 533fsb with 4GB RAM running 1:1. PL-12was fine all-around, trying PL-11 now. I've never seen 6,833MB/s in Memtest before (at least without errors)!

I got very noticable improvements when I lowered it slightly (x0.610).

[OC_Newbee]

By the way, I got my E8400 E0 up to 4.3ghz at 1.320v rock stable on my P5Q-E. Just posting here to confirm that Load Line Calibration on the P5Q-E *does* cause instability (reboot on Orthos load!) compared to similar load vCores (post drop/droop) without LLC.

Yeah I hope that the LLC on the P5Q-E get fix on the upcoming bios (modded or asus) without it this board droop way way to much, something like .08 idle and .14 load...very bad.

[mathewgx]

Can anybody give me his stable settings for the 2x2gb corsair dominator 8500C5DF at 1066MHz? I mean voltages , timings etc.

Thanks.

[Quad-Damage]

I just bought the P5Q-E with 4 gigs of G Skills 8500 ram. I have a very nice water cooled kit and I want to run it at 4.1ghz 24.7

Can i please get what setting others are using to get this

Thanks

[ahmad]

Can anybody give me his stable settings for the 2x2gb corsair dominator 8500C5DF at 1066MHz? I mean voltages , timings etc.

Thanks.

If you tell me what chips they use, it could be similar to what I have.