I have a few questions on the Setup.

1. I am going with the Thermaltake W0049-RUD Silent PurePower 680W Power Supply ATX. Any problems?
2. Why are you using the NVidia NIC, why not the Marvell that has MS driver certification?
3. Why are you not using the Silicon RAID controller vs. nvidia?
4. Why 2.7v for Memory, when RAM GUY states 2.8v?

1. I am going with the Thermaltake W0049-RUD Silent PurePower 680W Power Supply ATX. Any problems?

Haven't tested that PSU, but I'd guess that should be sufficient

2. Why are you using the NVidia NIC, why not the Marvell that has MS driver certification?

NVIDIA NIC runs off of the chipset directly, not off of the PCI bus, also one less 3rd party driver and IRQ to use.

3. Why are you not using the Silicon RAID controller vs. nvidia?

Same reason as the NVIDIA NIC.

4. Why 2.7v for Memory, when RAM GUY states 2.8v?

Depends on your memory, 2.7...2.8v is a safe range. Higher voltages allow higher clockspeeds. But I wouldn't start overclocking until I'm 100% confident the system is stable, then you can try taking it up a notch.

Thanks for the info. That makes sense.

Follow up question:

Since I am already using the Silicon chipset in RAID-0 is there an easy way to swap over or am I forced to reinstall again?

Also, Has anyone had problems with the latest 1004 bios? Anyone see any benefits?

> Since I am already using the Silicon chipset in RAID-0 is there an easy way to swap over or am I forced to reinstall again?

No, you'll have to re-install, in your case I would, as two disks in RAID0 could saturate the PCI bus, thus limiting performance, the Serial-Ata controllers on the chipset offer better performance.

> Also, Has anyone had problems with the latest 1004 bios? Anyone see any benefits?

No, but it is a beta BIOS, so the usual disclaimer applies, I'd stick with 1003 final.

Sanders, I was looking into powering the system and thought that the minimal PSU for these board running a single card would be 423 Watts. I went throught the tech specs for this answer, but I see you have a 400Watt PSU. Is this Just for the single graphics card?

Yes, but stick to the PSUs I listed.

> The power supplies designated with a * are needed if you want to run the A8N-SLI with an Athlon 64 FX 53 or 55 processor, two GeForce 6800 Ultras and two or more high capacity Serial-Ata drives. However they need to be modified in order to convert the 8-pin 12-volt connector, coming off of the 2nd 12-volt rail to two 6-pin PCIe power connectors, this is a simple procedure that means extracting the pins from the original connector and splitting them out to two 6-pin PCIe connectors. These will be connected to the GeForce 6800 Ultras directly, hence powering them off of their own 12-volt rail within the power supply. From our testing this is the only way to guarantee absolute stability. Take notice that when running SLI the EZ-Plug must also be connected to guarantee stable operation.

HI, I am interested in purchasing the Antec TruePower 550 EPS12V to power my fx55, 2 raptors, asus a8n-sli dlx and 2 6800 ultras. Can you please explain how the 8pin 12volt connector is split? I can use the pci-e connectors (which i can take off) from the adapters that came with the cards

Also, does this psu has 6 molxes only? No satas?

thanks for any info

just asking, but i have question for sassen, and anyone else who may be of service, but it would be great if the writer of this killer FAQ could help me out.

I cannot make a dos boot disk, can i use asus ez-flash (ie alt+f2) and have only the bios 1003 on the floppy then flash using that method or is it known to cause problems thank you all for helping me out... im currently in the process of building my system .

top FAQ Sander..... solved my friends problems with the board.... I do believe ur bios settings was what did it. However can they use cool and quiet??.. u've set it to disabled, is there a reason for this?.

Hi Anthony,

> HI, I am interested in purchasing the Antec TruePower 550 EPS12V to power my fx55, 2 raptors, asus a8n-sli dlx and 2 6800 ultras. Can you please explain how the 8pin 12volt connector is split? I can use the pci-e connectors (which i can take off) from the adapters that came with the cards Also, does this psu has 6 molxes only? No satas? thanks for any info

Please take a look at the below URL on how to properly configure the 6-pin PCIe power connectors.

PCIe video card power connector
http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/image/11419/

The Antec TruePower 550 EPS12V has Serial-Ata connectors as well, two of them to be exact.

Dave,

> cannot make a dos boot disk, can i use asus ez-flash (ie alt+f2) and have only the bios 1003 on the floppy then flash using that method

Yes, that should work just fine.

Varun,

> However can they use cool and quiet??.. u've set it to disabled, is there a reason for this?.

No, current Cool 'n Quiet drivers from AMD cause the system to crash with Windows XP SP2, or run the procressor at 1/2 its rated clockspeed all the time, with no way of clocking it to its full clockspeed. So we'll have to wait until they release new drivers.

Hi Sander,

thanks for the reply

I noticed the pci-e connector has 2 yellow and 2 black wires. Are the 2Y are interchangeable? and the 2B ?

regards

> I noticed the pci-e connector has 2 yellow and 2 black wires. Are the 2Y are interchangeable? and the 2B ?

Yes, as long as you use the wires coming from the 8-pin connector on the Antex TruePower EPS12V power supply or the Fortron Source FSP550-60PLN.

Did someone test the Enhance Invasion 460W psu?
(Winni-3500, 2x6600GT)

Guido

Thanks for the great FAQ.

I was wondering if anyone has come across problem with the nVidia NIC just randomly dieing after X hours? I have had this happen quite frequently and the problem remains until I reboot. Switching to the other Onboard NIC seems to reduce the problem but I have still had it happen to me once.

I have a new Plextor SATA DVD burner installed. I found that Windows XP SP2 (MCE) would lock up whenever I tried to access the drive forcing me to reboot. Switching to the other onboard SATA solved the problem and allows me to use the drive. Just FYI,

Lastly, has anyone managed to get a working system up and running using the new Windows 64b PR?

Bad news-Geil Ultra X PC-3200 (2-2-2-5) is not supported in dual channel mode.n00b question-if i update bios is there any chance to run it?

Sorry for this total n00b question, I'm a first time builder.

Which case would you reccomend for this board? I want to get full use of all the ports.