All 8RDA+ Owners please read [Retired sticky]

[EluSiOn]

Retired Sticky

All things comes to an end. 8rda.com has closed for good! For more detail, please check the site. I have bought a new Abit NF-S 7 which is more reliable than 8rda or the Epox corporation

Epox 8RD does have PCI lock, it is stated in the 8RDA+ FAQ section on epox.com

Official Response from Epox about Fried GF4

Epox Tech USA issued a caution today on AMDMB Forum about GF4 installation on 8RDA+/8RDA and also they have updated their website FAQ as well.

EP-8RDA/+ FAQ: Use caution when installing long video cards.

Use caution when installing long video cards. -
Use extreme caution when installing long video cards, such as Geforce 4 TI4600, to avoid damage to the video card. Install your memory modules before installing the AGP video card. Avoid bending or inserting your video card into the AGP slot at angles and watch that the video card does not contact the white memory clips. Quickly secure the AGP card to the case after inserting into the motherboard.

http://www.epox.com/motherboard/support/faq/8rda-memory-clip.jpg

Source:
FAQ# 479
http://www.epox.com/html/support-article.asp?Article=P43Tk3b41Fv43hH0C1x0B10M0I3O2n1Oz03Z3K

These info are gathered from AOA Forum

Damaged GF4 List

• Stanley Jobson : Leadtek A250TD - GF4 Ti4400 Rev. A
• Soldier2000 : Leadtek GF4 Ti4400
• Caper : Visiontek GF4 Ti4600 Rev. A
• ramirez : Leadtek GF4 Ti4400 Rev. A
• eliteone : Gainward GF4 Ti4600
• Corn : Gainward GF4 Ti4400
• kuzma : Visiontek GF4 Ti4600 180-10083-0000-A02 Rev. B
• Marvin : MSI GF4 Ti4200 128mb rev A
• rocky500 (2) : Leadtek GF4 Ti4600 x2
• xgman : EVGA GF4 Ti4600
• bradmax57 : Leadtek A250TD GF4 Ti4400
• RacerX1 : MSI GF4 Ti4600 A02 Rev. A
• coolman888 : Albatron GF4 Ti4200 Turbo
• youthemandan (2) : Albatron GF4 Ti4200 Turbo and Chaintech GT-60 GF4 Ti4600
• RacinJason231 (amdmb forum) : Gainward GF4 Ti4600 Goldem Sample

This list will no longer be updated

Standard Procedure installing your GF4.

• Use a wrist band. ground yourself. touch the psu.
• Install your RAM first before you install your GF4 (install the card last so prevent you from bending your gf4 when install RAM)
• Install your GF4. Make sure you do not bend the GF4 card or rub off any small tiny capacitor against the dimm clip
• Boot the system and flash the bios with the latest official release 8rda2C10.bin
• If you need to swap out your RAM or move it to a different slot, take out your GF4 card first.

One explaination of fried GF4 due to layout.

Originally posted by PiLsY
Take a look at your board. Now take a look at the clearance between dimm slot 1's clip and the card. Thats right, about 0.2mms. Now look at whats missing off your GF4.....

Because of the length of the GF4 and the proximity of the dimm socket clip theres a tiny transistor that gets knocked off if you install the card straight. What you have to do is bend the back of the card slightly away from the dimm slot when you put it in so the edge of the dimm clip clears the transistor on the GF4.

The 8RDA isnt killing boards - but the design leaves a lot to be desired. Its kind of hard to explain without my camera handy to take a picture and sho you all, but I had the same thing happen to my friend yesterday. Perfectly working card, installed in the 8RDA+ and it was dead. Tried another board - dead. Examined the card against a known working Ti4600 after I noticed how close it was to the dimm clips and sure enough the transistor had been knocked off it.

Spread this knowledge around please lads or a lot of people are going to be VERY upset over christmas.

Ill say again, all you HAVE to do when installing a GF4 is to bend the back part of the GF4 slightly away from the dimm clips (about 1mm if that) when you plug it in. When its in the transistor is below the dimm clip and not being touched at all. Remember to do the same if you take the card out too btw.

Corsair XMS PC3500 and NForce2 chipset Compatibility issue

Epox 8RDA+ High FSB club

Epox 8RDA+ VDD Mod

I follow that thread did that vdd mod, but I didn't solder. I use two SMD Grabbers instead.

The POT

The SMD Grabber

The Pots is 1K ohm from Radio Shack and I set it at 700 ohm which gives me 1.80v for VDD

Active cooling on MOSFET

Twinmos PC3200 256mb & 8RDA+ success

Ways go over 200mhz FSB SYNC.

• Corsair PC3500 or Twinmos PC 3200 needed
• CPU Interface set to Optimal
• Active Cooling North Bridge (It does get hot)
• Remove JP1 Jumper which sets 100/133 mhz FSB or 166mhz
• Do the VDD mod to increase VDD to 1.80v (Voltage for North Bridge)
  Warning! at least two people fried their mobo with this mod because they go over 2.00v
• No Fan connect to CPU fan header on the mobo.
• Set your Memory at relax timing then move up.
• Use Bios version 8rda2c10.bin or 8rda2c31.bin
• Lower your multiplier first then try to move up

Tips and Tricks

• Do not use PCI slot #2 and #6, it shares IRQ with AGP Video Card
• Disable Serial and Parallel Ports if you don't use them.
• Disable onboard Sound if you want to use your own sound card. Make sure you disable the onboard game port and midi port as well.
• If you use WinXP, make sure apply SP1 before install nVidia unversial driver 2.0
• USB Keyboard does not work during Driver Updates.
• AC97 at Post : Disable [disable pc speaker sound send to your speaker]
• Disable AGP Fastwrite to get more 3Dmarks2001se points
• Set AGP frequency = 66mhz
• Back up your HD image using Norton Ghost
• Use Winflash.exe which is in the magic bios install directory to flash your bios. Make sure you are not OC when you flash your bios
• When system OC too much won't even post, hit the reset botton and hold the INSERT key and then hitting the DEL key to get into bios [easier way to clear cmos]
• Come Back to check this sticky for updates

 

[Liquid3D]

I'm going to post a Link to this Page at a few forums I frequent. I just happened to be reading the 8RDA posts, as I had been consiering the Epox as a nForce 2 platform. I've already read about five seperate posts on other forums where people are having all sorts of problems.

 

[EluSiOn]

The C1 check sum error is not only affect Epox but all NForce2 board. It is a memory issue and Corsair is taking RMA for those bad PC3500/PC3200 RAM which didn't programmed correctly.

However, frying other hardwares might be Epox manufacture and quality check issue.

 

[eliteoneXP]

I RMA'ed my fried gf4 card. If my next one does the same thing (and im guessing it will)...then this board is definately to blame for all the dead gf4 cards.

 

[WerewolfX]

I have an 8RDA+ Prommy/Koolance setup (Kooleteia, Prommance or something like that ) I have had none of the probelms listed above It is a Version 1.0 board production date was Nov 28 2002. I also have the 2 sticks of Corsair PC3200C2 512mb Ram running at 400DDR FSB with 4-3-3-2 Timings at 2.63v. This may not have the probelms due to the recent production date.

BTW the board was purchased from newegg.

And one stick of ram from Newegg and the other from Googlegear.

 

[youthemandan]

Have one and its been great. Running 2-2-4 at 224 with one stick of of pc3200 xms

 

[WerewolfX]

What voltages on the ram youthemandan?

 

[youthemandan]

2.9

 

[EluSiOn]

Corn, eliteone and kuzma are fully aware of this issue because they have read the posts on AOA forum about this issue. They took extra precaution (ground themselves, wrist bands) and still their GF4 card got fried. I am using GF4 too with 8RDA+.... it makes me believe I am the lucky one. Remember, those people were cautious when they put their GF4 card in. They tried to boot up their system the first time and they got no video signal.

Edit: Remove the list to the top.

 

[Pinky]

I hope we can get this stickied, just asked a mod.

 

[EluSiOn]

Orginally post by ED in front of overclockers.com

Epox 8RDA+ I have a couple copies of emails sent to me from Epox technical support saying that the board 1) doesn't have a PCI lock and 2) has a maximum PCI divisor of /5. So that's the big secret.

I don't how to interpret it and I will leave it to you all. In my experience Ed is almost always right.

It doesn't have a PCI lock (1) physically on the board (2) in the bios option. :confused

 

[EluSiOn]

New development!!! I email Epox myself a few days ago about this PCI lock issue, here is the email I just received from them:

"Dear Customer

The PCI is locked at 33MHz. I tested using an oscilloscope to measure the bus at CPU clocks 100, 133, 140, 150, and 166Mhz. The scope measured 33Mhz at each setting.


Thank you for your interest in EPoX products and contacting our support department. If you reply ensure to include all previous E-mail text. It will prevent unnecessary delays and guarantee the fastest possible response.

Attention AOL Users: AOL software prevents you from simply replying with all previous text history. Workaround by highlighting he entire message then click on the Reply button.

Best Regards,

=================================================
Technical Support (47)
EPoX International, Inc. USA
E-Mail: [email protected]
Web: www.epox.com
Please provide previous E-mail text if replying.
Specifications subject to change without notice.

Have you registered your EPoX motherboard? http://www.epox.com/html/register.asp
=================================================

-----Original Message-----
From: Scott Bushkin [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, December 09, 2002 9:08 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: EP-8RDA+: Does this board have a locked ...


---Technical support form results---

Name: Scott Bushkin
E-mail: [email protected]
Submitted: 12/9/2002 9:7 PST
IP address: 24.126.113.1
HTTP Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.22; Mac_PowerPC)

Model: EP-8RDA+
REV: (not provided)
Serial #: -
Vendor: (not provided)
Purchased: (not provided)
Bios: (not provided)
CPU: (not provided)
RAM: (not provided)
VGA: (not provided)
Drive: (not provided)
O/S: Windows XP
Other: (not provided)

--Details--
Does this board have a locked PCI bus? I keep getting Hard drive corruption at high FSB.

 

[Jstic]

LOL, of course it measured 33 mhz each time. The board has up to a 1/5 divider! What a fool the person who sent that email must be. The only time the PCI bus will be out of spec. is when the fsb is beyond 166!

Very convenient way to answer the customer email. If he had tried the board at 200 fsb and gotten 33 mhz PCI frequency, then his email would have meant something.

 

[Jstic]

Good information here Elusion. This really sucks because I want to buy this board, but will not unless I know that the PCI is locked. I am hoping to get one to test soon, as I have the PC geiger device to measure PCI speeds.

 

[bldegle2]

clockage

u r clocking out of spec, he provided answers for CPU's within spec.

it is a sneaky way of telling you they support up to 166, anything above that and you are in clocking terrritory and left to your own devices.

in all of this, i think everyone is forgetting something, these boards run fine up to 166, the accepted standard for the high end XP's right now. Epox has provided a fine board.

push it, some will have problems, some won't. pretty much the same for any board out of spec. you could line up ten M/B's, all identical, then clock with the same CPU, RAM, harddrive and vid card. then you would see what i am talking about. i can guarantee the ultimate stable clock will be different from board to board, some will be the same, others radically different. yes, components on each board may have been checked to be within spec, but each part is different and when fired up can react differently than its identical neighbor.

i don't see a problem here, except for the vid card fryage, everything else reported on the list is small.

if watercooling, i guess you have to doublecheck the attachment to make sure things are lined up, something any good clocker will do automatically, right?

anyway, onward, and don't lose any important data sleeping on it.

smiles

baldy

 

[tragic_monkey]

LOL, of course it measured 33 mhz each time. The board has up to a 1/5 divider! What a fool the person who sent that email must be. The only time the PCI bus will be out of spec. is when the fsb is beyond 166!

Very convenient way to answer the customer email. If he had tried the board at 200 fsb and gotten 33 mhz PCI frequency, then his email would have meant something.

Yea but usually a 1/5 divider will only kick in once the FSB is above 166 so when running it at FSBs of 140 and 150 it would still be on the 1/4 divider, or am i wrong?

 

[SpoonMaN]

your right about that monkey at 140 it would be at something like 38Mhz
after 133 it wouldnt be back to 33Mhz till it hit 166

 

[Caper]

Hey EluSiOn...update that list will ya

 

[EluSiOn]

updated.... wow.. now the count is 12... that is... scary... I am really lucky that my GF4 didn't got smoked

 

[Caper]

Yeah, and also the guy that did the review at theinquirer.
His Ti4600 died also, but since I decided to base my list on users at AOA I don´t count him.

To keep some kind of control over it I chosed that way.
God knows how many more there are?