ASRock Golden caps

[Behemot]

Seen these caps on ASRock's website. Did anybody have hands on that? I am curious who is the OEM and whether they have some specials specs, or just the casing meaning ASRock jumped on the empty PR bullshit from ASUS, GB and so on.

Cause what else is 16-phase VRM with less and worse FETs per phase (which is quite common) over 4-5 phase VRM, right

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

Have bought myself the 890FX Deluxe5. There are Nichicon LF capacitors, 2000 hours at 105 °C. On input, 16 V with 100 or 270 uF capacitance, output is 820 uF for 2,5 V.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

I'm not sure if you are asking something or reporting something.
.
Where did you see a 16 phase VRM?
That would be a little silly so I think maybe you are counting MOSFETs and not phases.
One phase can have many MOSFETS. (I've seen 5 for sure and I think 6 for # of MOSFETs in one phase.)
More likely it's 4-phases with 4 MOSFETs per phase.
.

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

First post asking, nobody replied, second reporting.

http://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Int...75/P5Q_Deluxe/ IIRC it has tiny FETs with higher losses. Having phases basicly in parallel efectively minimizes this, but than it is the same as having some 6-8 phases with higher-quality FETs in parallel. Seems like PR bullshit to me…

[PCBONEZ]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

First post asking, nobody replied, second reporting.

Probably people weren't sure what you were saying. I wasn't.

Seems like PR bullshit to me…

I have to agree.
After about 4 phases the benefits of adding more is almost nil and reliability will start to suffer from too many parts.
[Each phase requires it's own PWM controller and feedback.]
Considering it's Asus that's too many -cheap- parts.
.
Besides which there are plenty of 3-phase VRMs (and probably some 2-phase) for socket 775 that use quality parts that are perfectly stable.
[Intel boards typically use a 3-phase VRM for socket 775. I've ~never~ heard of a problem with that layout.]
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IOW: A 16-phase VRM is just shinny bells and whistles to attract technically challenged gamers that dunno squat.
- It's like chrome plating a plastic toy. If it's pretty it's better - right?
.

.

[severach]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

Chips like the Fairchild FDMF8704V have combined the 4 mosfets and the dual buck controller in one package. 16 FDMF8704V, 16 chokes, 16 caps, and 1 PWM controller with a few phase sequencer addons and you have 16 phases.

But I agree. There are plenty of minimalist 3 and 4 phase designs that are stable, efficient, and can power 140W CPU. No need for 16 phase bling.

Some of the gamer boards have variable phase controllers that will run from 1 to 8 phases to meet the load. I haven't seen any of them run anywhere but the maximum phase count. I was hoping those shiny LEDs would do something.

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

Anyway, when I have already opened this: any of you guys have an idea about these "x+y" phase power design? For example, 880FX Extreme5 states 8+2, 880GXH/USB3 4+1.

I have the 880GXH/USB3 just right here and I am totally not wise out of it. There really are 4 phases with 12 FETs at all. They share 4 caps and 4 coils. However, there is also fifth "phase" with independent cap, coil and two FETs which are connected to different electrodes of the 12 FETs in 4phase design.

There are also what appears to be two PWM drivers what would really indicate two stand-alone "phase sets". Is that some aditional single-phase driving over the 4phase design?

Will take photos, wanna me to indicate what is connected with what into the image?

ADD// here it is, hopefully you will have something from it. The red ends somewhere in the black chip near socket, which is ST Micro L6176, SW managable controller. I guess connected with BIOS over I2C.

The two PWMs are ST Micro L6743D.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

That has 4-phases for the CPU and one other [the red] is for the RAM.
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It's not too unusual to see a dedicated full VRM for RAM on server boards.
- It's just shinny bells and whistles on a board with only 4 RAM slots though.
Server boards that use it have far more than 4 RAM slots.
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"SW manageable controller" just means you can adjust voltage in the BIOS.
Same ole shit - fancy name.
.

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

But, well, RAM has it's own VRM, I am sure of that. Although I haven't find it's driver (lol), there are two FETs sucking power from +5 V rail. Their output is connected with caps arround slots and with some RAM pins directly.

[Scenic]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

From how I understood this, there's a seperate phase just for the integrated memory controller (since there's no "chipset" anymore for modern CPUs) which in the end, powers the RAM.

The same thing with the extra phase got me confused when recapping a Biostar GF7025-M2 TE (socket AM2).
There was an extra phase a bit distanced from the main CPU ones which a completely different output voltage. After some digging it turns out that it powers the CPU integrated memory controller

edit:
Red = CPU
Orange = Memory controller (in the CPU)
Yellow = "Chipset" (Geforce 7025 / nForce 630)

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

Oh, good to know, thanks!

[Scenic]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

Notice the edit. Took me a bit to find a pic of the board that wasn't avatar-sized..

[Behemot]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

One interesting thing I found on the 880GHX/USB3 is that southbridge is powered directly from +3,3 V rail. NB is powered from +3,3 V as well but has its own VRM.

[PCBONEZ]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

But, well, RAM has it's own VRM, I am sure of that. Although I haven't find it's driver (lol), there are two FETs sucking power from +5 V rail. Their output is connected with caps arround slots and with some RAM pins directly.

RAM usually has 2 or 3 power sources with IC's that select which by system state or load.
.
Those feed to another VR that steps it down to the actual RAM voltage.
.
I traced it out one board where it looked like this:
[Yeah, looks like over-kill to me too..]
.

[Scenic]

Re: ASRock Golden caps

One interesting thing I found on the 880GHX/USB3 is that southbridge is powered directly from +3,3 V rail. NB is powered from +3,3 V as well but has its own VRM.

Hmm.. a crappy PSU could easily kill the southbridge and thus trash the whole board.. ouch