Maybe it's a directx 9a thing. When i first put my old system together it would not play Medal of Honor. Doesn't matter now since you can't easily uninstall directx 9a. Yeah there are ways to do it, but no official microsoft ways. I'm going to try to play Medal of Honor again with directx 9a on my new system and seee what happens. I'll let you guys know.

Maybe ATI ought to rename their control panel applet "DumbGart" or "Dont touch anything here Gart" or "Ha Ha Ha that wont work either Gart" wait...I got one...."You should have bought NVideaGart"

hahaahhaahahahaha!!!!
You're right! How about enabling CrashRight!
Guaranteed to crash your system in 15 minutes or less or double your money back.
Tried to play MOHAA, the game (not the o.s.) crashed, applied latest patch to MOHAA, game wouldn't even load. Can't uninstall Directx 9a, so i guess i'm stuck not playing Medal of Honor.
I'm throwining in the towel guys, tomorrow there's a computer show and im buying a Leadtek Geforce 4 ti4800. Yeah i know that's its not as powerfull as the 9500 PRO, but i can't take this crap anymore.
Anyone heard anything bad about Leadtek? Was good last time i purchased from them, anything recent? Please to me alls good. I don't care at this point, Nvidia makes the drivers.

well the ti4800 is actually more powerful I believe...

so go for it

But it's not only the Radeon's who are troublesome.

The Radeon's power really shows when enabling 2X, 4X, 8X with AA.
At this point i don't care. I'd rather remove my spleen with a can opener than buy another ATI card.

i don't know why people keep blaming ATi (or Asus) .....

it is plain easy .... it is intel E7502 chip that causing the trouble ....

either Nvidia or Ati, the problem will still remains if the mobo is base on the granite bay chip ......

you obvioulsy didnt read up very far. There is a poster named "ricky" who just bought a nre P4C800 mobo, and is still having the same problem.
This is a DIFFERENT chip set. 875p or cantyerwood. Not Intel's "Granite Bay e7205"

So, with that in mind...it almost has to be a video card issue dont it?

I just got off the phone with PixelUSA, where I bought my system with the P4G8X mobo. They're letting me exchange for the P4C800, and letting me exchange my 266 MHz memory sticks for 400 MHz, I just have to pay the difference. Problems solved!!!
Sorry, I just had to share my joy. I hope all you guys have as much luck as I have with this. And if any of you are in the SF bay area, buy your systems and components at PixelUSA!

Its not ATI -its the Dual - DDR feature, this feature is new and hardly tested much less with crappy ram. You NEED high quality RAM and FAST RAM, faster than what it says it supports. I am using two sticks of 512 Samsung pc3200, even though my P4G8X only supports pc2100. Also make sure you installed it correctly - put two sticks right next to each other on one of the paired sockets

Hey....JUST to let you know....Ricky's problems are probably stemming from no new bios coming out yet for the P4C800....remember it took them over a month to come out with new bios for the P4G8X....I ordered the P4C800 and should be able to give you all my update near the end of next week....damn...even with two day it seems far away....ANYWAY...do not be so quick to judge the P4C800....it is brand new and of course...bios will overlook a few things till new bios comes out....The company is hasty for a release and somethings get overlooked...but I would go with the P4C800 if you can...otherwise you all have to just deal with 4X and fastwrite off....but hey...I have been reading A LOT...and most people and professionals say that there is hardly a noticable difference between the two 4X and 8X and fastwrite makes a bit of difference, but only a few games will come out this year that actually use all of the pipelines for 8X....so NEVER FEAR....P4G8X is ok....just not exactly what the doctor ordered so to speak.... good luck

400+ watt PSU is needed too, I use 440 and like i said no problems

To sumarize the events of the last few days:
New P4C800 Deluxe
P4 2.53 Ghz
512 MB PC2100 Ram from Crucial
Built by ATI Radeon 9500 PRO.
Soundblaster Audigy
Bios 1300.005 The latest. But there are is also a beta available.

Yesterday i tried every setting i could think of with:
AGP 8X:
Fastwrites on
Write combining on
Both fastwrites on and write combining on.
Both fastwrites and write combining off.
Upped the aperture to 128 MB and 256MB with all features turned on.
I did not change the AGP voltage from 1.5v in these tests.
Performance difference was neglible, scores were between 12055-12155 in 3Dmark01. So i decided to leave my settings at:
AGP 8X
Write combing on
Apeture 128 MB
AGP voltage 1.5v
It ran stable for most of the day. Way more than my old P4G8X would have. And then during the most predestrian of tasks, web browsing, it hapenned, 16 color mode.
Since then I have turned write combing off but i'm still at AGP8X
Using the ASUS pc probe utility, under system slots/AGP/slot type i see AGP 4X. Yup that's right AGP 4X. Maybe i'm stupid or don't have a strong command of the english (engrish?) language, but why would it say AGP 4X?
I'm tired, i'm going back to my xbox, where modding makes sense.

solidestsnakest@hotmail.com, i.m. if you have any questions

Forgot to add:
I did try the latest beta bios, the only difference that i could see was that they removed the Parity Check option from the bios, it's not there anymore. The reason i bring that up is during the Asus Mylogo boot screen, in this case the AI picture, i hear 2 small beeps. Then when POST completes , i hear another beep but in a different tone. This last beep is presumably the beep that signifies that POST completed successfully. Looking thru the manual 2 beeps signifies parity error, it doesn't mention the third beep. I'm going back their website later and check for an updated manual.I didn't do any more performance tests though.
AGP 8X doesn't mean much now, but i still want it to work when Doom 3 comes out and i upgrade my graphics card again. I think the owners of the P4G8X will be out of luck. I think that has been picked apart enough.

Dude, pc2100 from Crucial -there lies your problem

I have been using 2 sticks of Kingston pc333
p4g8x...ati9500pro, xp, 430w ps, locks up almost immediately in 8x mode
wherein lies my problem?

I Don't think it's the RAM. There were others that chose pc2700 and up but i didn't. People here have used different RAM and there problems go seem to go away as soon as AGP is set to 4X with fast writes off. I ran perfectlly stable for a week using that combo. One more time, there is very little performance difference with these features turned on. The Granite Bay chipset is FUBAR when it comes to AGP 8X, the fix will be a board workground. Intel has acknowledged this. That's the real reason you should exchange your board for a P4C800 if you can. AFAIK the 875P chipset does not have the same problems as the Granite Bay. The board is still new so i expect Asus to release a new bios in the near future. The current E7502 is at the end of it's life as far as i know.

Exactly, I tried recommended ram from both Corsair AND Kingston. BOTH of them have the same problem with the ATi / ASUS combo. So, I am pretty sure it is not the RAM at fault. I also tried a 430watt power supply as opposed to my 330watt power supply, and guess what? Same problem. I RMA'd the Radeon 9500 Pro for another one, and guess what? SAME problem. It is obvious that it is a compatibility issue between the video card and the motherboard (as has been very thoroughly discussed in this thread).

Also, AFAIK other versions of the chipset (Abit, etc) have experienced the same problems.. I remember reading a thread somewhere about that with the Gigabit one as well. Which just brings us back to the conclusions that the chipset is at fault.

Anyhow, the real discussion here should be, How do we get ASUS to hone up to their mistake and give us what we paid for? It is obvious that we are not getting the product that was advertised to us, and if my knowledge is correct on the issue, I believe that could constitute as some sort of fraud or at least false advertising. Just food for thought.

In the P4C800's manual it actually states what brand and model number of RAM is recommended. And they also state what part number Radeon 9500/9700 PRO they recommend. That's a first on me!
I feel for you guys, short of sucking up to your dealer, you're SOOL.

Hmm. Maybe since I bought my board and 9700 pro more recently i have a more stable combination? I'm half way through Half-Life and i've had only one lock up using AGP 8x -i believe it was the game engine's fault though