Like the ASUS M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 I tested a good while ago the A9DA-S uses the same 890GX chipset which stands it in good stead for a decent overclocking performance.
Stock speed of the 1100T is a fairly heady 3.3GHz so I was aiming for 3.8GHz as a good clock.
Stock clockspeed.
One initial observation I made was that the inbuilt auto voltage adjusting system on the board seemed to function with both 'cool and quiet' and 'C1E' disabled. Initially this meant that a 150mv boost in BIOS which should have manifested itself as a 1.50v core voltage actually got to 1.55v on occasion. Not ideal if you're not aware of the high voltages as the life of the chip may well be limited by such increases.
Obviously once identified I worked out how much of an additional boost each incremental increase returned. For example an additional 120mv in BIOS (which should give 1.47v) actually gave around 1.52v.
Obviously once identified I worked out how much of an additional boost each incremental increase returned. For example an additional 120mv in BIOS (which should give 1.47v) actually gave around 1.52v.
Now, onto testing! I tried pushing the FSB initially with 3.5GHz coming and going with no voltage increase. Pushing a little higher to 3.63GHz (220MHz FSB) the clock did require an extra 0.1v but ran stably and benched without issue. After this point I could not get FSB stable beyond 220MHz - there may well have been a FSB hole apparent but nothing changed up to 240MHz so I began working the unlocked multiplier.
Returning FSB to 200MHz and upping the multi to 18.5x I achieved a 3.7GHz overclock. 1.48v was used here for stability although with a bit of careful tweaking 1.45v/1.46v would probably have been perfectly useable.
I then added 10MHz to the FSB, pushed the multiplier up a further 0.5 to 19x and upped voltage to 1.52v to try and guarantee stability.
This proved to be suitably stress and bench stable and @ 3.99GHz had eclipsed my 3.8GHz goal I chose to run this clock for the remainder of the testing.
3.99GHz overclock.
Installation
Obviously I'm installing onto a bench table which is a doddle compared to virtually any other type of case. That said the layout of the board did suggest that Foxconn's engineers had put a decent amount of thought into its design.
As mentioned before the 8-pin12v socket is well away from other components in the power section meaning it's much less fiddly to plug and unplug.
The proximity of the DDR3 slots to the heatsink will mean careful thought will have to be given to the install of tall DIMMs and large heatsinks but it's no different to the vast majority of designs so no great shakes.
The three fan headers are also nicely located with two nestled in a reasonably open space above the top most PCI-e slot next to the northbridge and the third sat at the extreme base of the board next to the USB headers. The USB headers and the power and reset switches are also very accessible being situated at the very edge of the board. Here they're about as far away as they could get from any potentially interfering components.
As for PCIe and PCI expansion cards the selection of slots available means you could comfortably install a variety of setups without worrying too much.
The A9DA-S.
Sound
A combination of passive heatsinks and board monitored fan headers lends itself once again to quiet operation.
PWM control of the CPU fan was impressive. Under load it spooled up gradually and when idling would spin down to virtual silence. Of course a lot depends on the efficiency of the installed heatsink and the audible signature of the fan but overall I would rate it alongside any other quality motherboard.
Temps
With average case airflow I would say board components will be absolutely fine. I had one slow spinning 140mm noctua fan aimed roughly at the northbridge which never got more than just warm to the touch. The mosfet heatsink was just the same with virtually no airflow. The southbridge was warmer but certainly not hot - all the while over half of it was sat beneath the installed GTX260.
