Phenom support with 590 SLI chipsets.

[Pyrokinetic]

Last year I bought a Foxconn 590 SLI board thinking at the time that upcoming Phenom support would only be a BIOS update away. Was I ever wrong. The ASUS Crosshair is the only 590 SLI board to date to support Phenom.

I contacted Foxconn about the issue and here is their response:

"Just verify with our R&D team from headquarter and this C51XEM2AA will not support Phenom. It is not that we don't want to support Phenom with this board. We would love to have Phenom support however, it would required a major hardware modification."

Major hardware modification -- really? I responded asking for clarification as to what the major hardware modification was. I really wonder if I will get a response.

If I have to update my system yet again, I am definitely going with Intel -- should have done that to begin with. Bought the Foxconn board because it had a really great rebate (that I have yet to see from Foxconn) and that I thought I had decent upgrade capability. So much for saving a few bucks.

Anybody have ony thoughts on what that "major hardware modification" might entail?

UPDATE -- Response from Foxconn on 2/25/08: Verify with R&D again and they said it is chipset limitation and also the BIOS ROM size is too small. There will NOT be any plan to make this board Phenom ready.


What a load of crap. If there is a "chipset limitation" issue, how is it that the ASUS boards (with the same chipset) do support Phenom? Also, BIOS ROM size issue? Stupid area to go cost cutting on when designing an "enthusiast grade" product. Forget Foxconn as a provider of anything enthusiast grade. They suck. In the future, I am sticking with ASUS -- as least they know how to properly design stuff.

 

[BlueAcolyte]

Well, maybe they don't feel like it... You know, you shouldn't have assumed that the BIOS update would be there, it makes an a** out of u and me.

 

[Pyrokinetic]

Originally posted by: BlueAcolyte
Well, maybe they don't feel like it... You know, you shouldn't have assumed that the BIOS update would be there, it makes an a** out of u and me.

Oh so true .... I gotta stop rooting for the underdog. I did a similiar thing with my original socket 939 rig -- chose a VIA K8T890 chipset over nForce 4 and got stuck with a chipset that would not support socket 939 X2s. Sheesh, you'd think I would learn.

 

[Extelleron]

Originally I bought my current AM2 setup figuring I could drop in a Quad-core Phenom late last year.

Phenom just isn't very compatible with AM2, there are few motherboards that have a BIOS which supports Phenom and of those that do, the support is not optimal. It'll run fine at stock but you can't really overclock Phenom on an AM2 board. I suppose this makes sense, because Phenom is fairly different than Athlon 64 and AM2+ incorporates many new features. Older LGA 775 boards weren't compatible with Core 2, so I guess we shouldn't expect Phenom to be compatible with old AM2 boards.

 

[tvdang7]

by any chance did you buy the abit ax8? cuz i was in the same boat.

 

[rchiu]

Well, my Asus m2n32- pro supports phenom too, not that I actually tried it, but the latest bios stated the support. I really doubt C51XEM2AA needs "major hardware modification" to support phenom. Both my and your board are 590sli board, and unless Foxconn deviate alot from the reference design, the hardware shouldn't be all that different.

I think Foxconn just don't wanna spend the money to write the bios, test the bios and support the new bios. They are cost conscious company, (who wanna by Foxconn if they were not cheap), so it's an cost issue, not a hardware issue. Just my 2 cent.

 

[lopri]

AMD really dropped balls on this. I really don't mind Phenom's less-than-desirable performance, but I do have a problem with the mess they've caused with the platform. To OP, I feel for you but it looks like even the new boards are have problems dealing with Phenom. I know it doesn't solve a bit of your problem but just to remind you that it's not your fault at all.