ASUS P5B-Deluxe; Problems & Fixes

[unclewebb]

mine: I have no idea why the northbridge requires so much voltage with 45nm but it does seem to help overall stability. I found 65nm Quads were similar needing more chipset voltage than 65nm Dual Cores. Maybe with the next bios release they will have figured something out and I'll be able to drop it from 1.65 volts but until then, I'm leaving it.

As you said, it cures a lot of problems but it doesn't fix everything. I still have a resume from Stand By issue when the FSB is at 500+ MHz but with the 9.0 multi on my E8400, I can survive with 450 x 9.0

Most people are running their new ATI 4850 cards at 80C so I don't get too worried about temp numbers as long as things are stable. The shutdown temperature for Intel Core CPUs is approximately 125C so even though 80C or 85C sounds like a big number, it probably won't hurt anything. What did you use to measure the temperature? I just checked the heatsink on the NB with an IR thermometer and it's presently showing only 48C. I know it can get a lot hotter than that. Next time I feel the heatsink with my magic finger and some skin comes off I'll try another IR measurement. Do you have any software that reports NB temps? I didn't think Asus Probe reported that last time I checked.

Using a program like SPDTool might help give you some control over your SPD memory timings. It's pretty easy to use. Minimum Refresh to Active/Refresh Command Period... is where you can make adjustments to tRFC in the SPD table. I'm not sure if the Asus bios will respect your request or if it will be ignored if it is out of the range that it can handle.

Edit: I just ran Prime Blend for about half an hour. The NB voltage was at 1.65 volts and the IR measured temp of the heatsink was about 55C. I was really surprised when I pulled my heatsink off and noticed what poor contact it was making. Pull it off, put it on a flat surface and bend the heat pipe a little until it allows both ends of it to sit square. I don't have any before and after numbers but a heatsink that is making full contact with a chip has to be better than one only making contact on the corner of a chip. I'm usually not the type of person to check stuff like that out but I'm glad I did.

Now that I stopped Prime, the NB measured temp is about 49C to 50C and the southbridge heatsink is measuring 58C to 59C. No worries.

Edit#2: 57C measured on the NB heatsink is equivalent to being able to hold two fingers on the flat side of the heatsink closest to the graphics card for about 10 seconds. Your mileage or fingers may vary. Try holding your fingers on a Gigabyte DS3 NB heatsink and you'll find out what hot is all about!