is the ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe a good mobo for oc'ing?

T

thenerd

Limp Gawd
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Jul 19, 2004
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like can i adjust the multiplyer and fsb using this mobo? (oc'ing 2500+m to 3200+)

and is this mobo worth the extra money over the non deluxe version?
 
I bought one of these for my bro last x-mas. It's quite a nice board. Has just about everything you'd want except maybe extra integrated storage controllers. Ie- bunch of SATA ports instead of 2 (I think that's right), Raid 5 w/ dedicated processor, SCSI, etc.
The difference between the Deluxe and non-deluxe are just extra features. One of them is really nice though: The Deluxe has SoundStorm. I haven't really played with it much, but from what I've heard there isn't much point to using a sound card if you've got SoundStorm onboard. The deluxe also gets you SATA w/ RAID, dual lan (one gigabit on the -E), and Firewire, so if you need/want any of these get the deluxe.
It's got all the OCing options- multi, fsb, voltage, PCI lock etc. I've heard other boards are better though (will take higher fsbs). Still, you should be able to get a good OC off this board, particularly if you're using a Mobile & can adjust the multi.
 
thx for the response!

btw, so do i have to buy special hard drives and special speakers if i want to use SATA and sound storm?
 
thenerd said:
btw, so do i have to buy special hard drives and special speakers if i want to use SATA and sound storm?
Click to expand...

For SATA you'll need SATA hard drives. Of course it's also got 2 regular PATA connectors. Converters to attach a PATA drive to an SATA controller are also available, but you're generally better off using the drive's native interface unless you have no other choice or have more than 2 opticals or other non-HD PATA devices. I've heard of people having problems w/ the adapters.
As for the Sound Storm, you don't need special speakers. It's got both 5.1 analog and digital outputs, so any 5.1 or 4.1 speaker set should work. Normal stereo speakers or headphones work too, obviously.
 
To really use SoundStorm, you want a Dolby Digital receiver. If you don't have one, I picked up a decent 5.1 receiver and spekaers at Walmart for $80. I don't see it on their site anymore, but they must have something similiar.

If you use the anlog outs, then the sound is going through the Realtek AC97 chip, but if you use the coax out, it's "pure" dolby digital.

Soundstorm is actually the only thing that stopped me from upgrading to a A64 system, since I realized I'd have to buy a Auidgy and new speakers, which adds another $200-500 to the system cost.
 
hmm i have no clue what a dolby digital reciever is, nor do i want to spend another $80 on my build (i'm already pass my limit due to psu issues).

so if i don't have a dolby digital reciever, is it still worth it to have sound storm?
 
Regular PATA (40 pin connector/80 pin ribbon cable) is the most common type in use. I'm not sure what's getting more sales lately though, as I'm not sure what Dell, etc. are using.
I haven't looked in a while, but last time I did PATA was ATA/100 for most drives, ATA/133 for Maxtor. Most mobos support ATA/133 these days. There really isn't a real speed difference between SATA and ATA/100 or 133 unless you're attaching 2 drives to the PATA connector, which results in the drives sharing the bandwidth plus a performance hit just for having 2 drives attached. There aren't any ATA or SATA drives out that I know of that'll hit 100MB/s. Last I checked there weren't any SCSIs either.
If you want or need a new disk I'd get an SATA one, if you have an existing PATA drive I'd just run it off the first PATA channel.
 
not a very good motherboard to OC at all. little to no voltage options for the CPU and RAM, plus its very picky about the RAM you put in it.
 
zandor said:
For SATA you'll need SATA hard drives. Of course it's also got 2 regular PATA connectors. Converters to attach a PATA drive to an SATA controller are also available, but you're generally better off using the drive's native interface unless you have no other choice or have more than 2 opticals or other non-HD PATA devices. I've heard of people having problems w/ the adapters.
As for the Sound Storm, you don't need special speakers. It's got both 5.1 analog and digital outputs, so any 5.1 or 4.1 speaker set should work. Normal stereo speakers or headphones work too, obviously.
Click to expand...

I'm thinking of runnign a RAID on that mobo.. but i have an IDE HDD.. the RAID controller is only for SATA drives.. so if i use the converter.. would i be able to set up a RAID with IDE HDDs??? would that be a good idea?
 
thenerd said:
hmm i have no clue what a dolby digital reciever is, nor do i want to spend another $80 on my build (i'm already pass my limit due to psu issues).

so if i don't have a dolby digital reciever, is it still worth it to have sound storm?
Click to expand...
It is still worth having soundstorm even without a dolby digital reciever. The sound is still very full, lots of bass and highs.
I'm not sure if i believe that Soundstorm+Analog is 100% ac97 and 0% soundstorm and i'll tell you why:

I have a few Nforce2 mobo's with Soundstorm (mcp-T southbridge) running analog and their audio is pretty much identical: very full with lots of presence, nice highs and lows and very low cpu usage.

I have another Nforce2 mobo with Non-Soundstorm audio (MCP ac97) and it sounds like crap (higher cpu usage too), no bass, presence and poor highs, it even gets the hiss sometimes. I've tried many audio drivers, mcp and ac97 and none of it helped...this is just how ac97 sounds to me.

In other words, Analog Soundstorm still sounds much better than straight up ac97 alone, and is a worthy feature to consider imho.
 
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