ASUS M2A-VM HDMI

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Fri Jun 15, 2007 2:16 pm

Steve_Y,

After read your comment we verified that we underestimate the work to install the Thermaright HR-03. The process to install the Zalman was very time consuming and required a lot of trials. It was a painful process. That is the reason that we consider the new installation easier.

Installing the HR-03 required to bend the clip previously to adjust to the proper width. It shall be noted that the hook on the motherboard is inverted. You need to make a curve at the end of the clip. In addition, we installed the cushion foam on the chipset. We cut this piece for proper adjustment. It allows a proper chipset cooler stabilization. Asus did not help nothing with this chipset cooler. It is completely out of any standard.

You need to be careful, because the spring force of the clip is very high. If not, we could damage the motherboard chipset installation hooks.

We will downgrade the driver version until a better version is released.

NX3,

Let's hope also that Asus releases very soon a better Bios. Currently we were using the 703 Beta.

Thanks by your comments.

Best Regards,

Marcos,

Q.J.A

[/quote]

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Sat Jun 16, 2007 8:03 am

I forgot to ask one important questions ! All videos, mpeg, mpeg2, dvd, real video, divx, xvids, TS, mkv play at double speed or as fast as the pc can go on the high def stuff. Does anyone else get tis ? Even if I change which codec is used to play back e.g FFDShow or CoreAVC it still does it. Its not the codec it seems but some timing issue. Anyone else experienced this ?

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Sun Jun 17, 2007 11:44 am

FYI the unknown device is AMD Awaymode. I found an MS driver but its Media Centre, works on XP. I can't find it officially anywhere but its sorted now

I've got Cat 7.3 installed now, then latest ffdshow and still all videos run way too fast

Steve_Y · Post by **Steve_Y** » Sun Jun 17, 2007 4:53 pm

AMD Awaymode? To be honest I've never heard of it. Nice to know that it isn't some kind of hardware fault.

As for the weird video problem you're having, I'm afraid I can't be much help. I've tried a few different video formats on my PC and they all play without any problems.

I imagine most people here are connecting this to a TFT screen, that's what I'll be doing when the new one I've sent for arrives, but at the moment I'm using it with an old CRT.

I've noticed that the image quality is very poor, much worse than it was with the same display connected to a PC with an old Matrox Millenium 2 PCI card. Image quality seems better at a low refresh rate, but set it to my normal CRT refresh rate of 85Hz and the screen is noticeably blurry, with small text difficult to read.

I assume that quality will not be a problem once it's connected to a TFT via its DVI port, but it's perhaps a cause for concern for anyone still using a CRT.

Has anyone else connected this board's onboard graphics to a CRT and seen the same thing?

Edit: I've had a play with my monitor's settings and tweaking the moire cancellation options has made a significant difference to image quality. It's still not as sharp as it is when connected to my other graphics hardware, but at least now I can read this text as I write it. Before small text was a blurry mess, now the defect is significantly more subtle.

Strange that this wasn't an issue with the other graphics cards I've used, but maybe it's more a problem with my particular CRT monitor than with the 690G's onboard graphics.

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Mon Jun 18, 2007 12:12 pm

If you want the AMD Away driver PM me and I'll email it, its very small.

Per my media problem I stripped all the drivers tried Asus, 7.2, 7.3, 7.5 and the various south bridge drivers as well. No joy. So I bit the bullet and updated the bios from 503 to latest 703 beta. Bingo !! Video, no matter what codec all play back properly

2 problems sorted

I'm running over VGA at the moment, my main PC is on DVI but this will be replacing it when its all working. On VGA the screen image quality is good but I've not tried DVI or HDMI yet. Connected to a Dell UltraScan 1905 fyi.

yefi · Post by **yefi** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:11 pm

mtavares wrote:We are trying to use the Zalman ZM-NBF47. However, the loop clip does not fit and interferes with the capacitors. We will try three "t-wrap's" tonight.
We are having stability some problems with this motherboard due to this "underated" northbridge chipset cooler. During the boot and occasionally the monitor flickers (gets blank), without reset the machine. We installed a nexus 80mm fan blowing over this chipset and the flicker during the boot dissapeared.
I suspect that the "underated" chipset cooler is the reason why this motherboard does not have any option to overclock.
We measured the temperature on the chipset yesterday, and the results were:

I wish I had seen this thread before I ordered this Mobo (or Mofo more like). Did you get artifaction at higher resolutions or did your mod sort that? I run at 2560*1600 and whenever I view an image, there is snow, a blizzard in fact. The NB heatsink burns to the touch, but ASUS Probe reports a dubious 37C. FanSpeed won't detect the MB temp either, it just has a temp1 stuck at 40C.

I have another problem concerning RAM at 4G. 4*1GB Kingston PC5300 ECC with ECC enabled in BIOS. The system keeps blackscreening, and if I run ASUS probe it's guaranteed. At 2G there's no problem, however.

Ironically, the reason I chose this board was because it could handle Dual-Link DVI and 4GB ECC RAM.

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 1:46 am

yefi, what version od ati cat drivers are you using ? Stick to 7.3 or below.

yefi · Post by **yefi** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 7:29 pm

NX3 wrote:yefi, what version od ati cat drivers are you using ? Stick to 7.3 or below.

Thanks. I tried 7.3 but the problem still persists. It's visibly worse when the machine has been running awhile, which leads me to believe it's the infernal Northbridge, something I believe my memory problem is related to. I will try a dedicated graphics card and see how things go. It doesn't bode well for stability though.

Another note about this mobo is the poor temp monitoring. I get two temps for the core, one from fanspeed, one from pcprobe. The latter reports an optimistically low reading for the NB, and I haven't got SMART polling to report the temps of the drives yet. Not good.

dhanson865 · Post by **dhanson865** » Sat Jun 23, 2007 7:19 am

My biggest complaint is that the board has no built in fan controller. Speedfan won't even control the CPU fan on this board. (note I have M2A-VM not the HDMI version)

Moogles · Post by **Moogles** » Sat Jun 23, 2007 6:56 pm

yefi - I'm quite interested in using a 30" screen with this motherboard as well, but your reports are discouraging.

According to Asus' specifications, the motherboard should support 2560*1600, but this link says otherwise; http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Pro ... 64,00.html

"Supports a maximum resolution of 2048x1536 @ 32bpp"

Maybe your problem isn't heat related at all, but rather an issue with the Radeon X1250 simply not being able to support a 2560*1600 resolution?

blackbox · Post by **blackbox** » Sun Jun 24, 2007 5:50 am

Just to let you know, the AMD away mode driver is on the Asus CD, i think its in the utilities folder rather than drivers.

It's probably the Asus Cool N Quiet Util that's listed under utilities on the menu on the cd.

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Sun Jun 24, 2007 8:28 am

Based on everything we tried and read, it seems that this board has problems with resolutions of 1680x1050 and higher. The chipset runs hot, but the flickering problems seems not be related to the overheat. We sent a message to Asus regarding that without any feedback up to this moment. It seems that this issue is not only related to this board, but to any implementation using the 690G chipset.

In our personal opinion, if you are planning to use higher resolutions, it is better to avoid this chipset or add a discrete graphics video board. It seems also that ATI/AMD is so focused in the launch/improvements of the 2000 family cards that this chipset was left aside. This problem has been discussed for so long without any real sign something is under way to solve it.

Let's hope that a fix could be find in a near future. However, we are starting to believe that the only solution to the flickering problem at higher resolutions is to add a discrete graphics card.

Best Regards,

Marcos

Q.J.A

Moogles · Post by **Moogles** » Sun Jun 24, 2007 5:52 pm

mtavares: thanks for your comments. Do you know of any other motherboards that are capable of supporting a 2560*1600 resolution? I've scoured the web a bit, and Asus is the only one making the claim that their M2A-VM supports this resolution.

I had some vague plans of putting this thing in a HFX mini with a Samsung SSD and a 30" screen for completely silent operation. Although a seperate graphics card is an option, I'd rather use integrated graphics since no 3D acceleration is required at all, and a graphics card would add a lot of heat.

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 1:08 pm

Just to let everyone know bios 0801 is on asus website and used in combination with ATI drivers 7.6 the system is very stable

I'd recommend updating to 0801.

The mobo has IDE mode enabled by default and if I enable AHCI then XP crashes. How can I switch to AHCI without a reinstall of XP ?

yefi · Post by **yefi** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 2:03 pm

Moogles wrote:yefi - I'm quite interested in using a 30" screen with this motherboard as well, but your reports are discouraging.

According to Asus' specifications, the motherboard should support 2560*1600, but this link says otherwise; http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Pro ... 64,00.html

"Supports a maximum resolution of 2048x1536 @ 32bpp"

Maybe your problem isn't heat related at all, but rather an issue with the Radeon X1250 simply not being able to support a 2560*1600 resolution?

From what I understand, there are two iterations of the 690 chipset from AMD, V and G. 690V has integrated graphics from a Radeon 1200 which supports QXGA (2048*1536) max, but the 690G has a Radeon 1250 which supports QXWGA (2560*1600).

As to heat, it definitely worsens the problem, but I found even booting from cold with an 80mm fan blowing directly over the NB there was still some artifaction. Therefore, it makes sense that it's to do with some sort of electrical interference, either on chip or on the mobo.

I found my screen would black-out after so long as well. I never had chance to test if this was heat related, as I just got impatient and threw in an 8600.

So in sumation, no, not a very good choice for the Samsung methinks without a dedicated card. I will have to purchase a passively cooled 7300GT myself now, which I think is the lowest powered one available with the dual-link needed for these big screens.

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Tue Jun 26, 2007 4:46 pm

At least in our case, the Bios 0801 and Catalyst 7.6 did not solve the flickering problem.
It shall be considered that our configuration is a LCD monitor 1680x1050@60Hz and Windows Vista Home Premium 32 bits.
Please, inform in case of successfull results the monitor resolution.

Best Regards,

Marcos

Q.J.A

Mats · Post by **Mats** » Thu Jun 28, 2007 10:43 am

My Experiences with M2A-VM HDMI and the AHCI mode:

1 - Installed Vista in non-AHCI mode, boot time is 23 seconds.

2 - Activated AHCI in Vista.

3 - Activated AHCI in BIOS, boot time is 12 minutes and Windows recognizes the new hardware and installs the drivers. Another restart is required to complete the install.

4 - Boot time is 14 minutes. I guess that everything should be properly installed now. Restarting...

5 - After 3 minutes and still not in Windows I give up.

Disabled AHCI and now it boots at 23 seconds again.

What are your experiences with AHCI enabled?

Athlon 64 X2 3600+, 2 GB RAM, Samsung 320 GB SATA

hirafu_boarder · Post by **hirafu_boarder** » Thu Jun 28, 2007 8:52 pm

Hi,
I'm very interested in this board with a 22" LG LCD.

Can anyone confirm if there is a problem with 1680*1050 resolution setting with onboard graphics?

That would be a dealbreaker for me.

Thanks,
Jeff

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Sat Jun 30, 2007 9:09 am

Jeff,

Based on our experience, we did not recommend the use of onboard graphics for this resolution.
We are struggling for a long time with a flickering problem without success. We also contacted Asus and ATI without response.
In our opinion, it is better to use a discrete graphics card solution. We are moving in this direction also.

Best Regards

Marcos

Q.J.A

russp · Post by **russp** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 12:34 pm

mtavares wrote:At least in our case, the Bios 0801 and Catalyst 7.6 did not solve the flickering problem.
It shall be considered that our configuration is a LCD monitor 1680x1050@60Hz and Windows Vista Home Premium 32 bits.
Please, inform in case of successfull results the monitor resolution.

Best Regards,

Marcos

Q.J.A

Hmm... This is the only forum I've found this exact complaint on so far (ie: the flickering at 1680x1050 and above). Over at Rage3D it seems like 7.6 and the new bios have solved their problems. However, I have a 22" lcd with 1680x1050 so I would like more detail here if possible on exactly what you are seeing? Also, are you using the dvi connector or vga?

Thanks,
- RP

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 2:43 pm

russp,

We are seeing basically two problems:

1) At the boot process the monitor starts to flicker. If we enter the bios setup the same problem remains. Sometimes, we receive a message of the monitor that it is operating out of range.

2) In the Windows Vista 32bits Home Premium, sometimes we observe the same flickering problem. It stays off from 2 to 7 seconds. At least in our case we have never a reboot. Every time the image returns. The problem is randomic. Sometimes we can stay a hours without any problem. Sometimes it makes the use of the computer very annoying.

We are using the DVI output. We are considering the use of the VGA. We prefer to use a discrete card in the future instead. We are waiting for the 2400/2600 availability to workaround this problem.

In our configuration we have two points that are not recommended by the users:

a) OCZ memory (at least in our case it is working very well)
b) high resolution 1680x1050 (DVI).

As we told you before, we contacted Asus and ATI and up to now, without any response.

We are trying to verify if anyone else is having the same problem or not with this resolution without any success. But it seems to me that after the release of the Catalyst 7.6 and bios 0801 all the problems were solved for people using lower resolutions.

The motherboard is very good, however we are starting to believe that we are pushing it beyond its limits. The only complaint we have with this motherboard is the 690G chipset cooler. It could be better.

In case of any additional information, let us know.

Best Regards,

Marcos

Q.J.A

SpaceNerd · Post by **SpaceNerd** » Mon Jul 02, 2007 10:15 pm

Today I should receive the components for my new workstation. Among them is a M2A-VM HDMI, which I'm planning to use with my Samsung 225BW via DVI at the problematic resolution 1680x1050. I won't use Vista but XP and Kubuntu. I'll post my experiences here once I'm done...

Csoszi · Post by **Csoszi** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 1:38 am

Just bought this motherboard with an X2 4400+ and 2 GB Geil Value + Windows XP Prof SP2. Allocated 64 MB RAM to integrated video. Clean Windows installation.

I have problems when playing back WMV files: the output looks very surrealist, just big moving green, red, yellow and blue pathces on the screen (LG L1710B at 1280*1024, DVI connection). Upgraded to the latest bios (0801) and catalyst, but nothing changed. I used either the latest Media Player Classic or the built-in Windows Media Player 9, with the same results.
The WMV files are 'normal' resolution and HD (720p); they played back without any problems on my old rig (Asus K8N, 2800+, Radeon 9200).

DivX and Xvid file playback is fine.

Any suggestions? I am totally lost and upset.

Steve_Y · Post by **Steve_Y** » Tue Jul 03, 2007 3:40 am

Csoszi wrote:I have problems when playing back WMV files: the output looks very surrealist, just big moving green, red, yellow and blue pathces on the screen (LG L1710B at 1280*1024, DVI connection).

To me that sounds like an issue with the codec rather than problem with the hardware or drivers. I've tried a variety of videos, including WMV files, and they all play without any issues. The only thing I can think of is that you reinstall the relevant files and see if that helps.

Gino · Post by **Gino** » Wed Jul 04, 2007 12:22 am

[quote="NX3"]I forgot to ask one important questions ! All videos, mpeg, mpeg2, dvd, real video, divx, xvids, TS, mkv play at double speed or as fast as the pc can go on the high def stuff. Does anyone else get tis ? Even if I change which codec is used to play back e.g FFDShow or CoreAVC it still does it. Its not the codec it seems but some timing issue. Anyone else experienced this ?[/quote]

Hi NX3,
I had the same problem. Installin g the most actual audio (Realtek_ALC883_Audio_V51005391_V6015391) driver helped.
With best regards,
Gino

SpaceNerd · Post by **SpaceNerd** » Fri Jul 06, 2007 12:13 pm

SpaceNerd wrote:Today I should receive the components for my new workstation. Among them is a M2A-VM HDMI, which I'm planning to use with my Samsung 225BW via DVI at the problematic resolution 1680x1050. I won't use Vista but XP and Kubuntu. I'll post my experiences here once I'm done...

Damn! My order got delayed

But it should finally arrive next week. In the meantime, I discovered that a new beta BIOS has been released. Maybe someone having the flickering problem at 1680x1050 can give it a try: Global ASUS Server Download

mtavares · Post by **mtavares** » Fri Jul 06, 2007 1:20 pm

SpaceNerd,

We tried beta bios 1001 and the flickering remains.......

We would much appreciate if anyone else could try 1680x1050 resolution. We would like to confirm if we have another type of problem.

Regards,

Marcos

Q.J.A

NX3 · Post by **NX3** » Sat Jul 07, 2007 2:04 am

I installed XP with AHCI mode enabled in bios. Install went fine, boot times are fast and the overall XP experience when using the hard drive is fast and good and I'd recommended it. However as other posters have pointed out in Vista is slow and causes problems.

Gina, I had bios 0501 when I had fast video play problems. I didn't update the drivers but flashed a bios update and it worked fine then.

Does anyone know whats new in bios 1001 ? I loaded 1001 and it seems ok, not much new that I could tell. The vcore volts are up a tiny bit according to Asus CnQ and this seems to vary the volts now as you'd expect running CnQ mode.

russp · Post by **russp** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 10:28 am

No flickering. Just set up Vista Home premium, 2 GB of the approved Corsair memory, AMD 4600+ dual core. 1001 or whatever the latest bios was on Asus site and latest graphics drivers (think they are 7.6 version). Driving 22" Samsung LCD via DVI at 1680x1050 and no issues so far. Hence, sounds like the flickering issues are due to config, possibly a memory issue?

SpaceNerd · Post by **SpaceNerd** » Sun Jul 15, 2007 10:45 pm

russp wrote:No flickering.

I don't have any flickering either, neither on XP nor on (K)Ubuntu. I use a 4400+ (65nm), 2x 1024MB takeMS RAM and Samsung 225BW at 1680x1050 via DVI. I use the latest BIOS mentioned above (1001).