Asus K8V SE Deluxe Question and Advice Requested

[AU]

Does anybody own or have any experience with the Asus K8V SE Deluxe
motherboard? I know that the first version of this board (not SE) had some
issues, and it seemed like it was more than just bad capacitors on limited
shipments. Though the Asus K8V Deluxe earned many positive reviews and
recommendations, there are several forums which show many frustrated people
having great difficulty getting it to run acceptably - or even to run at
all, in some cases. Memory problems, IDE problems, frequent crashing and
general instability... it all leaves one feeling somewhat less than
enthusiastic about the original K8V.

I didn't come across most of these forums until after I ordered my Athlon 64
system (though I had heard of the capacitor issue with the first revision),
which uses the Asus K8V SE Deluxe as the MB. I have not heard nearly the
same amount of horror stories with the SE version, but perhaps that is
because it hasn't been on the market as long. It would be great to get some
feedback from owners of this model. Also, if anyone knows of any
incompatibilities with the board and the parts I chose, please let me know!

ANTEC SX1040 PERFORMANCE II TOWER
ASUS K8V SE DELUXE
AMD ATHLON 64 3000+
OCZ DUAL CHANNEL OPTIMIZED 2X256MB DDR PC3200 CAS2 (OCZ400512ELDC-K)
SEAGATE BARRACUDA 40GB 7200.7
1.44MB BLACK 3.5IN FLOPPY
MSI GEFORCE FX5200 TD128
CREATIVE LABS AUDIGY 5.1
LG GCE-8525B BLACK CDRW 52X32X52


And just in case I do encounter a lot of trouble with the Asus, what would
you recommend as a replacement: MSI KT8 Neo-FIS2R (nobody seems to have any
problems with this one) or Abit KV8 Max3 (another excellent board which
apparently doesn't cause many headaches).

Thanks very much,
Al

 

[Andreas Bittner]

Does anybody own or have any experience with the Asus K8V SE Deluxe
motherboard? I know that the first version of this board (not SE) had
some

i have the se-less one.

issues, and it seemed like it was more than just bad capacitors on
limited

and what do you mean with issues? there are not issues at all i can tell
you. suse 9.0 x86_64 or 9.1 x86_64 is running just fine on it. and i
thought that the se edition some some kind of "light" release of it, as
i think asus have had several se versions of their motherboards, all
lacking some capabilities and features that the se-less versions all had
if i am not mistaken.

shipments. Though the Asus K8V Deluxe earned many positive reviews and
recommendations, there are several forums which show many frustrated
people having great difficulty getting it to run acceptably - or even
to run at all, in some cases. Memory problems, IDE problems, frequent
crashing and general instability... it all leaves one feeling
somewhat less than enthusiastic about the original K8V.

not me. it is running pretty neat.

did you actually check the exact features and differences between the se
and the "se-less" ?

i dont really see the differences

http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=K8V Deluxe&langs=01
http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=K8V SE Deluxe&langs=01


cheers,
andy

 

[Ian Hastie]

i have the se-less one.

Same here.

and what do you mean with issues?

The only issues I know of withe the original K8V Deluxe were to do with a
bad batch of capacitors. This was solved before the one I have was made.

there are not issues at all i can tell
you. suse 9.0 x86_64 or 9.1 x86_64 is running just fine on it. and i
thought that the se edition some some kind of "light" release of it, as i
think asus have had several se versions of their motherboards, all lacking
some capabilities and features that the se-less versions all had if i am
not mistaken.

I compared the description in their manuals. The only difference I could
see was that the SE has it's ethernet chip from a different supplier. The
chip itself is the same though. I've also read that some people have had
problems with the SE ethernet chip under Linux. Apparently there is a
problem with it's firmware.

I have come across a bigger list of differences, but can't remember where.
Most of them were fairly trivial. Certainly no missing capabilities.

not me. it is running pretty neat.

Same here. Very nice board.

did you actually check the exact features and differences between the se
and the "se-less" ?

i dont really see the differences

http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=K8V Deluxe&langs=01
http://www.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=K8V SE Deluxe&langs=01

None that should matter anyway.

 

[AU]

not me. it is running pretty neat.

Same here. Very nice board.

I'm happy that both of you have had such a positive experience with this
MB - it sets my mind a little more at ease, too. I was only concerned
because of what I had read on some internet forums (particularly this one:
http://forums.anandtech.com/message...1226300&STARTPAGE=1&FTVAR_FORUMVIEWTMP=Linear).
Perhaps these were just isolated incidents; maybe it was human error...
whatever the case, I was probably worrying about it more than I should have
been (however, all versions of the Asus board are more sensitive to memory
modules than the Abit and MSI boards - I don't think anybody would dispute
that).


What did you have to go and say that for!! Just when I was feeling better
about my purchase...
Seriously, I did my research before I bought it and the only difference I
could find, like Ian, was the onboard ethernet controller. Also, the price
is nearly identical (10$ approx.) -- wouldn't they charge a lot less if they
had neutered the board? I certainly hope you are mistaken, because if the
board lags in performance (or features) compared to the non-SE Deluxe, then
it is going back.
The main reason I chose the SE was because it was released after the non-SE,
and motherboard manufacturers tend to iron out any bugs in later revisions
(also, the online store I buy from was offering a special deal on it - that
played a part in my choice too!). In the end, all I want is excellent
performance and stability; doesn't matter which board is the one to provide
it.

Me neither.

None that should matter anyway.

Hmm... what exactly do you mean by that? I don't care if the new Marvell
ethernet chip isn't quite as good as the 3Com, but if there is another
difference you noticed please tell me.

Thank you both for replying. Oh, if either of you read this, would you be so
kind as to tell me what brand/type of RAM you're using? That would be
helpful.


Al

 

[Andreas Bittner]

Hmm... what exactly do you mean by that? I don't care if the new
Marvell ethernet chip isn't quite as good as the 3Com, but if there is
another difference you noticed please tell me.

im just reading that some other guy with the se edition has some serious
trouble making his lan work. check the suse amd64 mailing lists

http://lists.suse.com/archive/suse-amd64/2004-May/0007.html

i never had any trouble with the real 3com chip on the se-less board.
although if i remember correctly, marvell and 3com are somehow related
or something, not sure....

Thank you both for replying. Oh, if either of you read this, would you
be so kind as to tell me what brand/type of RAM you're using? That
would be helpful.

im running 2 pieces of

corsair CMX512-3200LL 512MB DDR400

i had to exchange them one time, as both of my old sticks hat bit errors
with memtest86 / memtest+
maybe u want to run some extensive tests over night or for a few days
right after you assembled your system.

http://www.memtest86.com/
http://www.memtest.org/

back then when i was testing the system, memtest86 didnt really fully
support/detect x86_64 systems, so i tried memtest+ which is based on it,
but now i see that memtest86 came out with a new build also which also
detects amd64, didnt try that one yet.

i simply took the disk/bootable binary of memtest+ and made a bootdisk
with it

http://www.memtest.org/download/memtestv111.zip

or for windows with rawrite

http://www.memtest.org/download/memtest86p111_floppy.zip

have fun and good luck.

 

[Ian Hastie]

I'm happy that both of you have had such a positive experience with this
MB - it sets my mind a little more at ease, too. I was only concerned
because of what I had read on some internet forums (particularly this one:
http://forums.anandtech.com/message...1226300&STARTPAGE=1&FTVAR_FORUMVIEWTMP=Linear).
Perhaps these were just isolated incidents; maybe it was human error...
whatever the case, I was probably worrying about it more than I should
have been (however, all versions of the Asus board are more sensitive to
memory modules than the Abit and MSI boards - I don't think anybody would
dispute that).

Well, my previous board was an Abit KR7A-133R. It would regularly fail to
access memory properly. It was almost impossible to get it to run
memtest86 without errors. The OS would seem to run OK, but I think that
was mostly because the type of operation that failed in memtest was an
uncommon one. I also found that if you had to reboot it too many times it
became necessary to power cycle it before it would read it's RAM again and
POST. It also never ran in uni-processor IO-APIC mode.

Me neither.


Hmm... what exactly do you mean by that?

I'm not aware of any changes that lower the specification.

I don't care if the new Marvell
ethernet chip isn't quite as good as the 3Com, but if there is another
difference you noticed please tell me.

It's a bit more than "isn't quite as good." With the K8V SE Deluxe the
driver was not able to initialise the chip due to bad BIOS data. Should
be fixed by an upgrade, if it hasn't been already.

Thank you both for replying. Oh, if either of you read this, would you be
so kind as to tell me what brand/type of RAM you're using? That would be
helpful.

Two sticks of Crucial CT6464Z40B, as recommended by their selector. Just
for a bit of extra information. When I installed them I noticed the chips
were Infineon RAM. Didn't take a note of the model number though.