Asus P4P800E - Deluxe Problems?

[R. Chamberlain]

Hi,

I just read a review at the below link
http://www.epinions.com/content_141363285636 and the person said,

"I turned to Google to do some research and found other instances of the
same issue. It turns out that this revision of the board (1.2) has an issue
telling that the extra 4-pin connector from the PSU is connected, so it
thinks it's not and doesn't attempt booting. They also reference that rev
2.0 of the board has no such problems. The only hitch - rev 1.2 and rev 2.0
are sold interchangeably as the revision number is not marked anywhere on
the packaging and they have the same UPC - so getting a 2.0 board is a roll
of the dice."

Asus refused to replace the motherboard with a rev 2 board even though Asus
knows this is an issue with the rev 1.2 board. Not only do I find this
disturbing on Asus's part but totally unacceptable customer service and
makes me really question whether I want to purchase a product from a company
that exhibits behaviour such as this! I have had enough crappy service and
issues with big computer companies and I don't want to buy a product with
empty promises of customer service and warranties when in reality there
aren't any!

Anyway if people could shed both good and bad experiences with this
motherboard and whether I need to worry about buying this motherboard or not
that would be very helpful!

Thanks

RC

 

[Paul]

Hi,

I just read a review at the below link
http://www.epinions.com/content_141363285636 and the person said,

"I turned to Google to do some research and found other instances of the
same issue. It turns out that this revision of the board (1.2) has an issue
telling that the extra 4-pin connector from the PSU is connected, so it
thinks it's not and doesn't attempt booting. They also reference that rev
2.0 of the board has no such problems. The only hitch - rev 1.2 and rev 2.0
are sold interchangeably as the revision number is not marked anywhere on
the packaging and they have the same UPC - so getting a 2.0 board is a roll
of the dice."

Asus refused to replace the motherboard with a rev 2 board even though Asus
knows this is an issue with the rev 1.2 board. Not only do I find this
disturbing on Asus's part but totally unacceptable customer service and
makes me really question whether I want to purchase a product from a company
that exhibits behaviour such as this! I have had enough crappy service and
issues with big computer companies and I don't want to buy a product with
empty promises of customer service and warranties when in reality there
aren't any!

Anyway if people could shed both good and bad experiences with this
motherboard and whether I need to worry about buying this motherboard or not
that would be very helpful!

Thanks

RC

Asus doesn't need to replace the board. As this thread explains,
Asus had to figure out what the problem is with the 1.02 revision
of board, so that when the board is RMAed, they could change a
component value so it would work with the Antec power supply. You
get back a 1.02 rev board that works, and everybody is happy.

http://abxzone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=71612&page=3&pp=15

As was pointed out, their policy is to "not do free upgrades". This
is because the overclocking community would have a steady flow of
boards going through RMA, so they could have the latest and greatest.
It is precisely because the RMA process has so few restrictions on
it, that "rev bumping" has to be made a strict no-no.

Looking at the ADP3180 voltage regulator datasheet, it has some
sophisticated overcurrent detection circuits. The power up sequence
is complicated, by the fact that different power supplies have
slightly different characteristics (ramp up waveform, ramp time,
rail sequence, sensitivity to inrush current demands from the
motherboard). It sounds like the 1.02 revision of the P4P800-E Deluxe
had the delay circuit set to a too low threshold, such that a
power supply that ramps +12V slowly, causes the Vcore converter
to fail to achieve a "power good" condition, before the timer that
detects trouble trips. In other words, a power supply that develops
a "rock hard" 12V output instantly, would cause no problem for the
motherboard. A power supply that gently raises the output, causes
the ADP3180 to declare there is a problem, and because it is a
latch-off device, the only way to recover from the problem, is
to shut off the power supply (and, of course repeat the same sorry
mess).

There is a spec for ATX power supplies (formfactors.org usually
has these, haven't checked to see lately if the specs are still
there). I have rev 1.3 of the spec here, and the max time for a
supply to ramp is 0.5 seconds. If the Antec (Channelwell
Technologies) supply is taking longer than this, then Channelwell
is at fault. If the delay circuit on the ADP3180 of the rev 1.02
board was tripping at less than 0.5 seconds, then Asus is at fault.

I don't think I'd describe it as "the motherboard didn't recognize
the connector". Reading the datasheet, the converter shut down
within a very short time, because it thought there was a fault,
and considering the power levels involved, and the fact that you
can burn a hole in the motherboard with that circuit, it is a good
thing that the shutdown function works.

HTH,
Paul

 

[R. Chamberlain]

Asus doesn't need to replace the board. As this thread explains,
Asus had to figure out what the problem is with the 1.02 revision
of board, so that when the board is RMAed, they could change a
component value so it would work with the Antec power supply. You
get back a 1.02 rev board that works, and everybody is happy.

http://abxzone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=71612&page=3&pp=15

As was pointed out, their policy is to "not do free upgrades". This
is because the overclocking community would have a steady flow of
boards going through RMA, so they could have the latest and greatest.
It is precisely because the RMA process has so few restrictions on
it, that "rev bumping" has to be made a strict no-no.

Looking at the ADP3180 voltage regulator datasheet, it has some
sophisticated overcurrent detection circuits. The power up sequence
is complicated, by the fact that different power supplies have
slightly different characteristics (ramp up waveform, ramp time,
rail sequence, sensitivity to inrush current demands from the
motherboard). It sounds like the 1.02 revision of the P4P800-E Deluxe
had the delay circuit set to a too low threshold, such that a
power supply that ramps +12V slowly, causes the Vcore converter
to fail to achieve a "power good" condition, before the timer that
detects trouble trips. In other words, a power supply that develops
a "rock hard" 12V output instantly, would cause no problem for the
motherboard. A power supply that gently raises the output, causes
the ADP3180 to declare there is a problem, and because it is a
latch-off device, the only way to recover from the problem, is
to shut off the power supply (and, of course repeat the same sorry
mess).

There is a spec for ATX power supplies (formfactors.org usually
has these, haven't checked to see lately if the specs are still
there). I have rev 1.3 of the spec here, and the max time for a
supply to ramp is 0.5 seconds. If the Antec (Channelwell
Technologies) supply is taking longer than this, then Channelwell
is at fault. If the delay circuit on the ADP3180 of the rev 1.02
board was tripping at less than 0.5 seconds, then Asus is at fault.

I don't think I'd describe it as "the motherboard didn't recognize
the connector". Reading the datasheet, the converter shut down
within a very short time, because it thought there was a fault,
and considering the power levels involved, and the fact that you
can burn a hole in the motherboard with that circuit, it is a good
thing that the shutdown function works.

HTH,
Paul

Thanks for the answer.
Anyone else got experiences with this board?

Thanks,

RC

 

[Jaz]

Hi everyone

I have this board and im having hells own trouble with it
now im not the brightest person when it comes to all of this but none the
less built my own new system about 2 weeks ago and have regretted it ever
since
im running it with a p4 2.8e and 512 RAM 400w win 98 se (i hate xp with a
passion) .. not using the raid controlers tho as i only have my dodgy old
80g on ide for now .. but all the bios is set correctly for this as
outlined in the manual

im having slightly different issues with it ... hanging and reseting of its
own accord and RAM errors with 3 different perfectly good sticks .. oh and a
grumpy bios that wanted to be reset from the disk - i nearly cried when i
saw that one flash up.. i did
however have quite a good response from their customer service team ...
saying simply if the store that i purchsed it from varified that it was
faulty but was unable to replace it that ASUS would (i still have the guys
name and phone number in sydney ifanyone is interesed hahaha)

just another tid bit of info there for the interested

 

[Ken]

My +12v rail is reading about +12.89v (Antec TruePower550) which is high?,
also the vCore readings from MBM5 are. . . . . .hmmmm. . . . . how do I say
this. . . . . .all-over-the-shop !!!!! But the machine has been rock
solid stable so far, maybe its a problem with MBM5?

There is a fault in MBM5. I have 11.93V and MBM5 says 12.54V.
I got digital multimeters to compare with.
Other programs don't tells that high voltage.

 

[Wayne Youngman]

"Ken" <wrote

There is a fault in MBM5. I have 11.93V and MBM5 says 12.54V.
I got digital multimeters to compare with.
Other programs don't tells that high voltage.

Hi,

ok thanks for the feedback!