any users with experience of asus via

[+Erik.+]

I bought a new board for my second PC. It's an ASUS A7V8x-x with VIA KT400/333 chipset.

Northbridge chipset is VIA KT400 and the Southbridge is VIA VT8235.

Before I decide that my old MSI K7N420 with NVIDIA nForce 420-D chipset is worth replacing in my DAW machine I'd like to hear any opinions on these chipset or board before I undertake the tedious task of transplanting each board and reinstalling XP for both the PC's.

The reason I am a little unsatisfied with my current DAW board is that the extra PCI IDE card I have doesn't perform write operations at it should due to a bug in the nvidia chipset. It writes slowly and causes jitters when listening to music while copying from one drive to another. The reading ability is fine.

Anyway, my previous experience of VIA left me with jittering audio all the time so I am a bit more wary of them.

[maggotcontrol]

That's a mighty fine board with minimal fuss although I still prefer the nF2 Ultra boards.
It should be faster than the 420 you have.

Yoshi
www.studiokobari.com (http://www.studiokobari.com)

[+Erik.+]

thanks for the reply.

it was the cheapest in the store, but i guess its old hat now.

[habibbijan]

I've used a Gigabyte board with a KT400 chipset now for about a year. No problems. Some of the older VIA chipsets had issues, but so far I've been lucky. You should be fine as well.

[+Erik.+]

that's good enough for me, surgery undergoes today http://www.audioforums.com/forums/biggrin.gif

[dawboxpro]

That boards fine Erik my friend I have one running a XP chip for a Giga System with no problems.

Via used to be a nightmare now it's ok. Kobi is right though Nforce2 would be my choice like an A7N8X.

Mine works kill though, no complaints yet!
www.dawbox.com (http://www.dawbox.com)

[Keaves Sharpi]

I've been using boards with Via chipsets for years, at least as far back as my amd k6-3. I like Via. Bios updates and driver updates almost monthly, if not more often at times.

I'm sure I'll get laughed at, but I use Soyo boards, and they make me happy.

[+Erik.+]

well so far this has been the most painful board transition in my life.

first off i got it up and running ok so then i went and plugged in my ide card and attached the hard disc to it. XP refused to set up.

after some sodding around i discovered that if the hard disc was plugged into the IDE card it wouldn't work, so i took it out and got xp installed no probs.

i put the drive back on the card and then xp refused to boot. so i juggled one of the cd writers to it and the hard disc onto the actual IDe and that worked.

to cut a long story short i had to rethink my entire ide configuration and the phyiscal positions of everything, which took all night.

finally i got it all working.

but no, to really sink a nail into my coffin, every time XP kicks into the desktop i get this really strange high pitched sound emitting from the motherboard (i think).

i've had every fan disabled (including the CPU) and every hard disc out again and i've even checked over the case psu and still this nosie emits, but only when XP is on. there is no noise until the desk top has kicked in.

it appears that the noise is electrically emitted from somewhere but i have failed to narrow the exact spot.

all i know is that it is not the PSU, the CPU fan or any disk/drive.

any ideas? i am totally exasperated now.

[Mab]

Erik,
I know you know computers and am not here to say anything about your via decision, but I recently went for the Asus P4P800 Deluxe. High pitched sound from vga maybe?

[This message has been edited by Mab (edited 01-04-2004).]

[+Erik.+]

Like i said, this board was supposed to support my 2nd machine which doesn't even have speakers and it was working great in there so i decided it might be better in my main machine.

i reinstalled XP and the noise has gone (so far). I am using an AGP card anyway and all the extras (bar LAN) are turned off.

So it seems, at the moment, things have settled.

Nightmare weekend though, total waste of time.

The system runs a bit smoother though and my PCI card is working great with just the cd writer on it, no more stutters or glitches.

thanks for everyones input.

[habibbijan]

Glad to hear that you're back in action. Whew!

A motherboard swap is very delicate surgery, and like you, I've wasted countless hours on stupid issues when I should have been making music. My KT400 board has been running fine for over a year with Windows 2000, and I don't plan on upgrading the mobo until progress forces me to or until it just can't handle my needs anymore.

[+Erik.+]

well i spoke too soon. the bloody noise is back again and i have no idea what's caused it.

[TimZ]

Sorry I can't help you +Erik.+, but it certainly sounds like another "TZ Experience". See, just talking to me gives you the curse http://www.audioforums.com/forums/smile.gif

TZ

[+Erik.+]

i think, but i am not sure, that it might be cpuidle that's causing it.

[+Erik.+]

and Timz, this is exactly the sort of problem i'd expect from you http://www.audioforums.com/forums/biggrin.gif

[dawboxpro]

Windows XP will not let you switch to a PCI card like that after loading windows from a on-board IDE connection. You simply get the black screen of death from that almost every time.

Strip your system down to simply one hard drive on the primary master ATA.

Put your CD-Rom/CDRW on Secondary Master.

Set the boot to CD-ROM only and dissable everything below that in the bios.

Strip out all PCI cards.

Set system to plug N Play and Monitor to VGA in the bios.

Load windows and do a fresh install with a NTFS Quick format and do not do too many partitions on the OS drive.

Push down on your ram hard!!! And all your other connections ATA/Power ect.

Reseat the CPU and heatsink and fan..

You could also try taking out the motherboard and being sure all your stands are tight and it is rock solid.

"Good Luck"

That boad under "Kingston Ram" and Seagate Drives gave me no problems like that so look into the config or the connections, power supply or ram.

Could just be a bunk drive as well but the high ring does not point to it, the driver load delay in start up does. Try removing the PCI ATA-100 controler to another slot and un-plug anything connected to it, or remove it until you have windows up and put in in slot 3 or 4.

Justin
www.dawbox.com (http://www.dawbox.com)




[This message has been edited by dawboxpro (edited 01-05-2004).]

[+Erik.+]

thanks for the info but you misunderstood. the hard disc on the pci card has always been ther (in the old board) and does not host xp, its just a backup drive.

i cannot load that drive on the pci card at all , hence the reason the cdrw is on there. the drive is just a spare with files on it, nothing else.

all is fine now.

cpuidle was causing that electrical noise to be ommited from the motherboard. very strange.

will get ´back to you on the other reply.



[This message has been edited by +Erik.+ (edited 01-05-2004).]

[bubba freaktree]

it's a good board. echo products actually like via chips, so if you are planning to use an echo card, that's a good way to go.

[Polaris]

I have my 4th Via board sitting in my puter. Works great with my Echo Mia. I've built many Via-based computers for friends, and have them running with Tascam US series stuff, Digidesign, and Echo stuff.

M Audio, RME, and Aardvark I'd still stick to nVidia though.

I can't wait to start experimenting with the A64 stuff.

[This message has been edited by Polaris (edited 01-06-2004).]

[+Erik.+]

well system is working fine now and is stable. No other problems that i havent resolved.

incidentally, that noise emitting from the motherboard was indeed CPUIdle. weird huh.