- Jul 25, 2006
- 1,202
- 2
- 81
My third A8n32-sli Deluxe crapped out in May/June. I told tech support I've had enough of the board, and in light of the number of rma's I've had and the new SP3 problems, they offered me a P5N-D today. I have to RMA my DDR and get some DDR-2, most likely 2gb.
When I was giving the tech the necessary info for the case, he told me XP-MCE wouldn't work on the board- something about it being very hardware specific, not supported by Asus, and how they haven't made a board to run it in three years (really, because it's called MCE 2005, and I doubt it has been unsupported by a tier-1 manufacturer since it's release. Plus, that board I have has been running it since summer '06; except, of course, when it wasn't dying every 6-9 months)... He also said MCE was a stripped down version of Home Edition...
I'm pretty sure MCE is built off of Pro, less two features; but, I don't know what to make of the rest of what he said. I thought the XP logo meant a part was qualified to run any flavor of the os- any quirks would be in TV-tuners and gfx. As far as compatibility or required hardware, I've been under the assumption it was all a matter of capabilities/power of the system, ei: processor speed, amt of ram, dx9 gfx, hdd space and such. I don't much feel like installing vista- from the perspective that I have a valid OS which suits my needs. If I did I'd probably buy 4gigs of ram, and an ide->cf adapter to run readyboost so vista doesn't kill my HDD so much for the first month with prefetch.
I'm planning on buying a 45nm dual-core; either the 8300 or 8400, unless a E4XXX or E5XXX 45nm variant comes out. Are those expected anytime soon? I plan on overclocking, and supposedly the 750i can manage a 425-450 FSB with some mild tweaking. I figure 3.8ghz-4.2ghz on a Core2 should be pretty good- esp compared to my current OC'd 2.6ghz 1mb L2 X2. I'd also stick with my 7600GT for now too, until the 8800s, 9600s, or 9800s bottom out and I can run SLI with a pair.
I guess I'll have to get a new HSF too. Is the thermalright u-120-ex a must to get those clocks from a E8XXX? I was also looking at the freezer-7. What might I expect from that?
I'm pretty sure this tech was blowing smoke where it didn't belong... if anything he should have been kissing ....
He tried to just give me an AM2 board. Then he said it would run a phenom (don't you need AM2+ to use any of the good phenoms?). When I played dumb and said I might like to try an intel board, he told me how Intel and AMD chips are currently like comparing apples to apples... maybe he meant the kind you buy in the store vs the small ones on wild trees that make you really sick? I countered by saying I didn't want an AMD board unless it had the sb750 chip, which I doubted was on the table. Then he said of the 'top-10' processors, AMD had about 4 on the list. I don't know where this list came from- maybe etched on a bathroom stall? Then he tried to go on about how for ages the cpu-wars have gone back and forth, so it all didn't really matter, and how intel's most expensive chip is >$1000 where AMD's is ~$350. I don't see how my responsibility to buy a new cpu reflects whatsoever on what motherboard they give me.
I just asked him flat out, what criteria are you using to decide what to give me? What do I have to choose from?
Then he skirted the valid questions with how he can find out how much I paid for my board from the retailer (I'll tell you now, it was $170- I can see the invoice) and kept asking rather antagonistically if I thought I'd be getting a $300 board out of this: because if I thought that, I had better be prepared to find myself SOOOO wrong!
So when I asked him again what my choices (P35? P45?) were another time, he got all whiffed because he was doing me a favor or some such and I was being all meticulous about the process. I mean- COME ON.... Sorry if I want to get the best option for my needs within their offerings- it was already made abundantly clear to me that if I was going the intel route I'd have to get a mortgage, when I don't even own a house, and tomorrow the entire lineup will be trumped by AMD. Heaven forbid I ask about warranty information, or where the board came from ('engineering' btw, as opposed to a rma part- 'it hasn't changed hands over and over'). I was waiting for him to offer me a board that was top in the industry and ran coppermine chips.
Then I got transferred to rma to talk to someone with either a bad bladder or even worse memory- as I was on hold every 15 seconds. In the end somebody named kimberly, or karen, or kelly; who apparently walks through marshmallow-white clouds as she descends to take your call; was supposed to call me- "definitely by the end of the day." Tomorrow morning should be lots of talking to k-kim-kar-kell-k-k-k-k-could you just give me a friggin board I'm happy with, and you're office space manager is okay with letting go of? I don't know if I'm even going to mention or ask about the possibility of cross-shipping.
When I was giving the tech the necessary info for the case, he told me XP-MCE wouldn't work on the board- something about it being very hardware specific, not supported by Asus, and how they haven't made a board to run it in three years (really, because it's called MCE 2005, and I doubt it has been unsupported by a tier-1 manufacturer since it's release. Plus, that board I have has been running it since summer '06; except, of course, when it wasn't dying every 6-9 months)... He also said MCE was a stripped down version of Home Edition...
I'm pretty sure MCE is built off of Pro, less two features; but, I don't know what to make of the rest of what he said. I thought the XP logo meant a part was qualified to run any flavor of the os- any quirks would be in TV-tuners and gfx. As far as compatibility or required hardware, I've been under the assumption it was all a matter of capabilities/power of the system, ei: processor speed, amt of ram, dx9 gfx, hdd space and such. I don't much feel like installing vista- from the perspective that I have a valid OS which suits my needs. If I did I'd probably buy 4gigs of ram, and an ide->cf adapter to run readyboost so vista doesn't kill my HDD so much for the first month with prefetch.
I'm planning on buying a 45nm dual-core; either the 8300 or 8400, unless a E4XXX or E5XXX 45nm variant comes out. Are those expected anytime soon? I plan on overclocking, and supposedly the 750i can manage a 425-450 FSB with some mild tweaking. I figure 3.8ghz-4.2ghz on a Core2 should be pretty good- esp compared to my current OC'd 2.6ghz 1mb L2 X2. I'd also stick with my 7600GT for now too, until the 8800s, 9600s, or 9800s bottom out and I can run SLI with a pair.
I guess I'll have to get a new HSF too. Is the thermalright u-120-ex a must to get those clocks from a E8XXX? I was also looking at the freezer-7. What might I expect from that?
I'm pretty sure this tech was blowing smoke where it didn't belong... if anything he should have been kissing ....
He tried to just give me an AM2 board. Then he said it would run a phenom (don't you need AM2+ to use any of the good phenoms?). When I played dumb and said I might like to try an intel board, he told me how Intel and AMD chips are currently like comparing apples to apples... maybe he meant the kind you buy in the store vs the small ones on wild trees that make you really sick? I countered by saying I didn't want an AMD board unless it had the sb750 chip, which I doubted was on the table. Then he said of the 'top-10' processors, AMD had about 4 on the list. I don't know where this list came from- maybe etched on a bathroom stall? Then he tried to go on about how for ages the cpu-wars have gone back and forth, so it all didn't really matter, and how intel's most expensive chip is >$1000 where AMD's is ~$350. I don't see how my responsibility to buy a new cpu reflects whatsoever on what motherboard they give me.
I just asked him flat out, what criteria are you using to decide what to give me? What do I have to choose from?
Then he skirted the valid questions with how he can find out how much I paid for my board from the retailer (I'll tell you now, it was $170- I can see the invoice) and kept asking rather antagonistically if I thought I'd be getting a $300 board out of this: because if I thought that, I had better be prepared to find myself SOOOO wrong!
So when I asked him again what my choices (P35? P45?) were another time, he got all whiffed because he was doing me a favor or some such and I was being all meticulous about the process. I mean- COME ON.... Sorry if I want to get the best option for my needs within their offerings- it was already made abundantly clear to me that if I was going the intel route I'd have to get a mortgage, when I don't even own a house, and tomorrow the entire lineup will be trumped by AMD. Heaven forbid I ask about warranty information, or where the board came from ('engineering' btw, as opposed to a rma part- 'it hasn't changed hands over and over'). I was waiting for him to offer me a board that was top in the industry and ran coppermine chips.
Then I got transferred to rma to talk to someone with either a bad bladder or even worse memory- as I was on hold every 15 seconds. In the end somebody named kimberly, or karen, or kelly; who apparently walks through marshmallow-white clouds as she descends to take your call; was supposed to call me- "definitely by the end of the day." Tomorrow morning should be lots of talking to k-kim-kar-kell-k-k-k-k-could you just give me a friggin board I'm happy with, and you're office space manager is okay with letting go of? I don't know if I'm even going to mention or ask about the possibility of cross-shipping.
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