Older nForce 2 Motherboards Capable Of 200Mhz FSB - Asus A7N8X

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nForcer's HQ has been speaking with Bryan Del Rizzo, Nvidia's Platform PR Manager, and Scott Baker, nForce Senior Product Manager. They discussed a number of hot topics including the '400FSB chip v motherboard' confusion, driver development and future updates for the nForce line. The bottom line is that even 'old' motherboards like Asus A7N8X and A7N8X Deluxe (since revision 1.04 that is) are capable of running a 200Mhz FSB. Here is why:

NVIDIA has a BIOS that cleans up a lot of the "noise" and would allow some older boards to hit 400FSB. However, it is still up to the board maker if they are going to use that BIOS and validate their board for official 400FSB support. NVIDIA feels that the board makers will vary on their response to this. Aggressive companies such as ABIT will release the BIOS and state you can overclock on most of them and support it on others. More conservative companies - like Asus - will probably use the BIOS for stability, but will only certify the newest boards to support 400FSB officially or unofficially. Note: It is not mandatory for hardware vendors to use the BIOS that Nvidia is offering. Adding 200Mhz FSB support is a decision of the motherboard manufacturer. For the Asus boards named above you just need a BIOS update to 1004 Beta 02 or later. Naturally Asus Taiwan today released 1004 Final. The BIOS is only valid for PCB revisions 1.03, 1.04 and 1.06: A7N8X Deluxe A7N8X Asus CPU support website