p4p800 with Coolermaster case HELP

[Marcus]

Hi,

I have bought a Asus p4p800 deluxe and a Coolermaster Centurion cac-t01
case.

The front firewire connector doesnt fit into the mobo? Yes it is the same
connector but 1 pin is blocked so it cant pushed in.

The dealer say, yes ist normal, sorry but use the backside firewire.

Hmm is that so or other solutions?

Marcus

 

[Paul]

Hi,

I have bought a Asus p4p800 deluxe and a Coolermaster Centurion cac-t01
case.

The front firewire connector doesnt fit into the mobo? Yes it is the same
connector but 1 pin is blocked so it cant pushed in.

The dealer say, yes ist normal, sorry but use the backside firewire.

Hmm is that so or other solutions?

Marcus

CAC-T01 Web Page:

http://www.coolermaster.com/index.p...rial=CAC-T01&other_title=+CAC-T01+Centurion 1

This is the manual for the case. It is a large GIF file.
The Firewire connector seems to match the 1394 header information
in the P4P800 Deluxe manual.

http://www.coolermaster.com/installation_manual/6d76d6f531ee6561f1779db364b7f73a.gif

So, even with the "block" in place, it should still line up with the
nine pins soldered into the 1394 header on the motherboard. The 1394
header is red in color and is located near the bottom edge of the
board, in the center.

The difference between the two pinouts, is the pin 10 on the Asus
motherboard is GND and pin 10 on the case is NC (no connect). Asus
put the GND there for use if there was a shield foil on the cable,
and if there is no shield, it is OK for the case to simply NC the
connection. Some cases will connect all the shields of the case
connectors in some other, sneaky way, so if you were concerned, you
could use an ohmmeter, to verify whether or not the shield of the
connectors is joined to the rest of the case metal or not.

Since case manufacturers are notorious for getting connector wiring
wrong, it pays to at least verify that the power and ground pins on
the firewire connector are correct. You could, for example, trace
with an ohmmeter, that the appropriate pin on the case 2x5 connector
goes to the correct pin on the front of the case. Bad things would
happen if the +12V or greater on the power pin, were connected to
one of the four TPxx pins. Since most Firewire devices are expensive,
a little detective work now will save you having to get your Firewire
device repaired later.

Here is the pinout for Firewire according to an Apple Computer hardware
manual (as Apple invented Firewire, AKA IEEE1394). Page 34 gives USB
pinout, while page 37 has Firewire pinout.

http://developer.apple.com/document...ntosh_CPUs-G4/PowerMacG4Sept02/PowerMacG4.pdf

Here is another picture of pinouts...
http://www.networktechinc.com/technote.html (pinouts here also)

Looking into the firewire connector on the case, this is what you
should see. You want to make sure the PWR and GND pins are what they
say they are. Nothing would get fried if the TPxx signals are mixed
up with one another.

 

[Preferred Customer]

This is a copy of an e-mail I just sent to CoolerMaster regarding the
Firewire issue, move the blocking pin to the correct corner and follow
the instructions/pictures attached to make the port work. This is
totally unacceptable in my opinion....................................

I received the wiring you sent which was wrong, I was sent the USB
wiring
and not the 1394 wiring. At that point I gave up on getting any
satisfaction. Frustrated I did some research on firewire ports and
went at
the board and wiring with an ohmmeter what I found was quite
disturbing. The
port on the circuit board was completely backwards, in order to make
the
front firewire port work I had to rearrange the pins in the existing
harness, the power pin to the port had no continuity
through the board (possibly because whoever designed the board thought
that
this was a ground) I had to solder a wire onto the board and run it to
a
wire removed
from the connector. I find this very disturbing as the misdesigned
port
could very easily damage whatever is plugged into it, fortunately this
did
not happen to me. To top it all off this board is only USB 1.0
compatible
and not USB 2.0. Attached are digital pictures of the necessary
modifications to make the front 1394 port work. I feel that this sort
of
poor craftsmanship from a respectable company such as CoolerMaster is
inexcusable and the case should be replaced with a model that has ALL
advertised features working correctly. At the minimum the board and
wiring
should be replaced with a redesigned part that works correctly and is
USB
2.0 compliant.Thank you for your prompt attention to this matter.