After careful consideration I have decided to transfer all hardware review activities to a new domain. I purchased Hardwareasylum.com in 2012 and have been working hard to build a new and improved Ninjalane on that domain. If you are reading this you have reached one of the archived articles, news, projects and/or reviews that were left behind during the site migration.
Please update your bookmarks and be sure to visit the new and improved Ninjalane at Hardwareasylum.com
Epox EP-8RDA+ Motherboard Review
Author: Dennis Garcia
Published: Monday, March 24, 2003
Review Note - BIOS Issues
Editor's Review Note:
You may have noticed that we used Corsair TwinX paired memory for this review and even though this is some of the fastest memory you can buy it would appear to be too fast for the Epox bios to handle. Here is the situation. If you start the board from a CMOS reset with the TwinX installed you will get an O1 error on the digital display, and the system won't boot. nVidia is aware of the problem and has left it up to the motherboard mfgs to fix. Having flashed to the latest Epox BIOS (3/5/2003) and not seeing an improvement we can only conclude that Epox doesn't see this as a major problem.
There are two work arounds to this situation; the first involves taking the TwinX out of the board and booting with a slower stick of ram. Once you enter the bios you can then shutdown and boot back up with the TwinX installed. The other option is a little easier and involves booting with all of the memory banks filled using one module of a slower speed. The BIOS will then see the combined memory as being slower and allow it to boot. As you can imagine this can be very tedious and time consuming since many attempts to overclock will fail requiring a CMOS reset.
There are two work arounds to this situation; the first involves taking the TwinX out of the board and booting with a slower stick of ram. Once you enter the bios you can then shutdown and boot back up with the TwinX installed. The other option is a little easier and involves booting with all of the memory banks filled using one module of a slower speed. The BIOS will then see the combined memory as being slower and allow it to boot. As you can imagine this can be very tedious and time consuming since many attempts to overclock will fail requiring a CMOS reset.
Another problem that plagues almost all nForce2 motherboards is BIOS corruption resulting in a dead board. For some reason the BIOS's are very weak and can become easily corrupted while doing the most simple of tasks (like restarting). We have discovered (with some input from Epox) a fix that might save you from RMA'ing your Epox or Soltek nForce2 motherboard.
Shut the power off to the board
Move the CMOS reset jumper to "Clear"
Remove the CMOS battery
Carefully remove the BIOS chip from the socket.
Let the parts sit for about 15min and reassemble
Special tools may be required but I've found that an eyeglass screwdriver works pretty well.
Word of warning: (This can damage your equipment and even yourself so please exercise caution, and as always you are responsible for your own actions.)
Move the CMOS reset jumper to "Clear"
Remove the CMOS battery
Carefully remove the BIOS chip from the socket.
Let the parts sit for about 15min and reassemble
Special tools may be required but I've found that an eyeglass screwdriver works pretty well.
Word of warning: (This can damage your equipment and even yourself so please exercise caution, and as always you are responsible for your own actions.)
Just be sure to move the CMOS jumper back to "Hold" before restarting your system. This board was saved numerous times using this technique and it may just work for you as well. Especially since you can corrupt the bios by simply hitting the reset switch while the system is overclocked. grrr)
