P3V4X Cold Boot and AGP 4X issues......Are they for real?

[ninjazed]

I've spent a little time over at the Aussie Overclockers forum and there is much talk there about the P3V4X having problems cold booting (a power issue) and AGP 4X problems with GeForce cards (wants to default to 2X with no fast writes). I haven't installed this m/b yet but I find it curious that not much is said about these issues on AnandTech. The Aussies are still thrilled with the board and have taken to some drastic measures (in my opinion) to correct some of the problems. My question, are these issues prevalant and how likely am I to encounter problems with my new Hercules 3D Prophet II GTS Pro? I'm surprised that AnandTechers haven't addressed these issues. I'd hate to find that this board had nagging deficiencies before I even install it! :frown:

 

[lifeguard1999]

AGP 4X does not really gain you that much over AGP 2X. I understand the fact that it should work, and it drives people to go to lengths to fix a problem that should not exist on the board. For the record, I have a Radeon that does 4X with no problems. Sorry I cannot help you there.

The Asus P3V4X motherboard is a good one, but to get the most out of it, you need to do some tweaking. For example:

I have an Asus P3V4X board with a 700E o/c to 933 @ 1.65V (from compuwiz1) that is currently undergoing stress testing. I can get into windows at 1.008 GHz (144 FSB) but it is a bit unstable. I suspect that it is because of the heat that the clock generator puts out. A heatsink on the clock gen. should fix that problem for me (I hope).

Another one is setting 4 way memory interleaving using H.Oda's utility or by setting yout memory to SPMD in the bios.

You are correct, the Aussie Overclockers forum is the best place to go for P3V4X issues.

 

[Jwyatt]

Im currently having these issues. Using a CL Annialator2 Ultra im seeing my FPS with similar benchmarks about half that of similar equiped PC's. My rig consists of P3V4x Cel600@945 256mb infinion pc133 and other stuff not related. The G2 is oced to 510/280. Im not able to get 4x agp to work. Not sure if that will make the HUGE difference or not, but would like to get that part working. The fourway interleaving util your talking about where can i find that? Where is this aussie site your speaking of too?

 

[lifeguard1999]

Just some links for P3V4X owners...

For a program that is like a combination of SoftFSB and Motherboard monitor, use CPU Cool. This allows you to adjust your FSB while in Windows.

CPU Cool

Australian O/C site:

Overclockers Australia

Asus P3V4X forum at Overclockers Australia:

P3V4X Forum

Asus P3V4X web pages:

P3V4X.com

P3V4X

Link to Voltage Mod for AGP 4X

 

[Jwyatt]

Thanks Lifeguard. Your a life saver

 

[NoSpeed]

ninjazed, the cold boot issue is very prevalent with GeForce II cards. I would recommend against trying a P3V4X with your new Hercules 3D Prophet II GTS Pro. I have had the cold boot problem since day one, Jun 00, with a Hercules 3D Prophet II GTS 64 Mb card. Odds are against you. However, if you wish to modify the new board to overcome the cold boot issue or need a registry hack to enable 4X, go here. Good Luck.

 

[ninjazed]

Hey NoSpeed, R U still around? Would have sent you a PM but.....anyway, wanted to send you a shout. I just installed the 3D Prophet II GTS Pro on the P3V4X. I enabled the 3.6 VIO jumper and have RAM set at 2-2-2-5. No cold boot problems and Q3 is kicking at 93 FPS (1024x768). BIOS says AGP4X but I'm not sure. I enabled a prog (coolbits I think?) that supposedly forces AGP 4X in Via chipsets but it caused major problems (i.e. system instability, Q3 hangs, etc.) so I ditched it. ASUS tells me the board defaults to 2X with NVidia chips so who knows. I'm pretty happy so far, everything is stable but I can't get my SANDRA RAM benchmarks past 413. What are you running? Anyone else out there with better numbers or experience here? I haven't o/c'ed yet but may have to in order to see better numbers. Thanks all.

 

[Gos]

I have the cold boot problem with my P3V4X. It took me a great deal of time to find out what was happening. Asus was of no help, until I stumbled on to the Aussie we site. I called the place where I purchased mine and to my surprise they said to send it back for for a refund or credit on another a different MB. It sounds as if great many of these motherboards have this problem.

 

[ninjazed]

I don't think there is a motherboard made on this planet that doesn't have some kind of quirk about it. I'm not defending Asus mind you, but the P3V4X is a great board IF YOU ARE PREPARED TO TWEAK IT A BIT! If you're looking for PNP simplicity than I agree, look elsewhere. I was happy to get rid of my P3C-2000 after the MTH horror and have found the P3V4X pretty damn fast and stable. The AGP 2X/4X issue had me annoyed at first but the numbers don't lie, there is virtually NO difference. I'm o/c to 950 MHz so far which isn't a big deal but the 7260 3DMark I got today sure put a smile on my face. The P3C-2000 WAS a stable platform most of the time but it could never achieve numbers like that!

 

[Gos]

Maybe someone could give me some advice about the cold boot problem. The P3V4X I have will not start on the first boot up. I need to shut it off by holding the start switch down until the power supply goes off. When try booting again after it has been running about 3-5 minutes it boots up with an error message stating that it hung due to an improper CPU setting.(the setting was correct however) If I then save the 800 setting and enter it reboots normally and seems to run well. I asked on this forum but no one could give me an answer. As I searched around I found that it was due to a problem with the voltages on the MB. A soldering mod was needed to remedy the situation. Some of these boards do not have this problem. If you read the Abit forum though there are many complaints about this same problem I described. I would like to find another solution rather soldering. Any advice?

 

[ninjazed]

Gos,
1-Make sure you have a stable power supply (250W min-300W pref) If you have a boatload of peripherals, this is especially important.
2-Enable the undocumented VIO power jumper (next to the CPU fan pwr.) from the default 3.3 to 3.6 volts.
3-Use high quality RAM, bogus generic stuff won't do for this board.
I did the above and have had no cold boot issues. Well, maybe once every ten starts I have to reset on first boot of the day but I don't consider that much of a problem. I was warned against using GeForce GPU's too but it was too late, I already had my mitts on a new 3D Prophet II GTS Pro. The VIA chipset will automatically default to 2X but trust me, it's no big deal, the number difference is negligible. There are hacks that force 4X but I found the instability issues more trouble than they were worth. I saw the Frogmaster mod before I got the board and said "WTF" myself. I haven't found it necessary though with the above precautions. There are a bunch of other little things you can do to tweak the board, just cruise Aussie Overclockers for starters, they have tons of info and experience. The P3V4X is a great board if your willing to fiddle with it a bit. I have a 933 o/c to a measly 950MHz and get 7260 3DMarks while I run Q3 at 93FPS in 1024x768 32 bit. Not too shabby, eh?