PC Building problem (again)...
04 May 2001, 08:46 PM
#1
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Yes - I've FINALLY got the system back from the shop (don't ask - suffice to say "Parcel Farce")
I've now built the system, and 'Hey Presto' - it actually booted (MUCH to my suprise
)
But just a couple of problems -
1. When I restart the PC, it crashes - no POST beep. Nothing. Even the monitor shows no signal. Almost as if the graphics card (ATI Rage 128-based) has turned off.
The only way to reboot is a physical ON/OFF at the PSU. But this only eventually works after about 10 attempts or a wait of about 10mins.
This leads me to the assumption that there is a overheating problem.
2. When it does finally load, well, the speed doesn't impress (Athlon 1 GHz) and any games do not load, returning a blue screen with a 'FATAL EXCEPTON' error to do with the VXD cache.......
I've managed (just) to get Win98se, along with some modem and ATI drivers operational (how I'm writing this message) but that's it.
The only thing I can think of now is to get a couple of fans for the case (ATX) - one to suck and one to blow.
Is there anything else I can do?
Any suggestions, as I'm beginning to wish I'd never upgraded....
As a last resort, anybody in the Midlands who'd be willing to help me build this Albatross and get it operational (for financial recompense of course).....
"Help me ScoobyNet - you're my only hope"
Dan
I've now built the system, and 'Hey Presto' - it actually booted (MUCH to my suprise
)But just a couple of problems -
1. When I restart the PC, it crashes - no POST beep. Nothing. Even the monitor shows no signal. Almost as if the graphics card (ATI Rage 128-based) has turned off.
The only way to reboot is a physical ON/OFF at the PSU. But this only eventually works after about 10 attempts or a wait of about 10mins.
This leads me to the assumption that there is a overheating problem.
2. When it does finally load, well, the speed doesn't impress (Athlon 1 GHz) and any games do not load, returning a blue screen with a 'FATAL EXCEPTON' error to do with the VXD cache.......
I've managed (just) to get Win98se, along with some modem and ATI drivers operational (how I'm writing this message) but that's it.
The only thing I can think of now is to get a couple of fans for the case (ATX) - one to suck and one to blow.
Is there anything else I can do?
Any suggestions, as I'm beginning to wish I'd never upgraded....
As a last resort, anybody in the Midlands who'd be willing to help me build this Albatross and get it operational (for financial recompense of course).....
"Help me ScoobyNet - you're my only hope"
Dan
04 May 2001, 09:21 PM
#2
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Luke, I am your father ! LOL
First things first !
This is gonna be painful! LOL
Take all the additional components out, CPU memory, graphics, modem etc, and re insert them ! its possible one hasnt seated properly ! It is also possible the memory or processor could be faulty !
One other thing to check, and then double and triple check ! make sure the bus speeds and processor speed settings are correct on the motherboard, and also all the voltage settings, also if you dont have a processor fan, get one ! Athlons run very hot ! and need all the cooling you can get ! if the fan you have isnt approved for athlons, get it replaced, if its an auto set motherboard, just make sure its set right anyway !
Hope this helps !
[This message has been edited by Ian Cook (edited 04 May 2001).]
First things first !
This is gonna be painful! LOL
Take all the additional components out, CPU memory, graphics, modem etc, and re insert them ! its possible one hasnt seated properly ! It is also possible the memory or processor could be faulty !
One other thing to check, and then double and triple check ! make sure the bus speeds and processor speed settings are correct on the motherboard, and also all the voltage settings, also if you dont have a processor fan, get one ! Athlons run very hot ! and need all the cooling you can get ! if the fan you have isnt approved for athlons, get it replaced, if its an auto set motherboard, just make sure its set right anyway !
Hope this helps !
[This message has been edited by Ian Cook (edited 04 May 2001).]
04 May 2001, 11:07 PM
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Sorry to hear that it is still b*ggering about after the last episode on here........
Shame that you can't ship the beast down here. Not blowing my own trumpet but I am somewhat renowned for my building skills amongst my set. I know that you may well not agree, but those 750 chipset boards really are not that great. Were run for a short period of time when released. Via basically came out with a more stable, better performing solution and took the reigns from AMD, as they were too busy with the main CPU race to concentrate on good chipsets at the time.
Your Rage 128 is probably fine. Great old board, but unless you are using the 'right revision' of drivers then can be a bit tempremental. Would not have anything to do with bios cycling problem though. What options AGP-wise are set up in the bios, sidebanding (if there), aperture size, AGP speed ratios etc..?
Does the Mobo have a built in CPU temperature sensor?? If so, when she is busy, what temperatures show up on the CPU?
Comfortable zone for them is 38-48 degrees C.
Above 50 and they get a little flaky, at least with the Athlons in particular in my experience...
Also, the Wattage output rating of the PSU again? Built one just last week for a freind and they wanted their own litle old case with a boggo 250w PSU, told them cpu would be a problem and what a surprise it was. You could hear the fans slow when the cdrom was busy etc and games were running. Displayed similar errors to yours, bar the bios. Changed the Psu and problem gone These AMD's are hungry!
Is there no way that you can get a better board?? I still swear that your problems would be virtually gone and bet you that the 'Dimm' that you have had to stop using will work perfectly. Unfortunatly, sometimes you cannot get away with compromises...
Do those 750 boards have some really funky memorry tweeking options like some of the 760's do? See if they are playing up, reset their values if poss and see what she does.
Boot the machine from cold. Get into windows and immediatly reboot. Apart from the CPU, it takes most of the components a couple of mins to get up to temperature, so if she has the reboot problem straight away then, your overheat theory could come into disrepute. definate possibility though.
Cheers,
Nick
(Don't let this put you off, you have just been unlucky so far...)
Shame that you can't ship the beast down here. Not blowing my own trumpet but I am somewhat renowned for my building skills amongst my set. I know that you may well not agree, but those 750 chipset boards really are not that great. Were run for a short period of time when released. Via basically came out with a more stable, better performing solution and took the reigns from AMD, as they were too busy with the main CPU race to concentrate on good chipsets at the time.
Your Rage 128 is probably fine. Great old board, but unless you are using the 'right revision' of drivers then can be a bit tempremental. Would not have anything to do with bios cycling problem though. What options AGP-wise are set up in the bios, sidebanding (if there), aperture size, AGP speed ratios etc..?
Does the Mobo have a built in CPU temperature sensor?? If so, when she is busy, what temperatures show up on the CPU?
Comfortable zone for them is 38-48 degrees C.
Above 50 and they get a little flaky, at least with the Athlons in particular in my experience...
Also, the Wattage output rating of the PSU again? Built one just last week for a freind and they wanted their own litle old case with a boggo 250w PSU, told them cpu would be a problem and what a surprise it was. You could hear the fans slow when the cdrom was busy etc and games were running. Displayed similar errors to yours, bar the bios. Changed the Psu and problem gone These AMD's are hungry!
Is there no way that you can get a better board?? I still swear that your problems would be virtually gone and bet you that the 'Dimm' that you have had to stop using will work perfectly. Unfortunatly, sometimes you cannot get away with compromises...
Do those 750 boards have some really funky memorry tweeking options like some of the 760's do? See if they are playing up, reset their values if poss and see what she does.
Boot the machine from cold. Get into windows and immediatly reboot. Apart from the CPU, it takes most of the components a couple of mins to get up to temperature, so if she has the reboot problem straight away then, your overheat theory could come into disrepute. definate possibility though.
Cheers,
Nick
(Don't let this put you off, you have just been unlucky so far...)
04 May 2001, 11:09 PM
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What motherboard are you using? There are a few good places to look on the web that troubleshoot build problems.
Let me know what Mobo you have and I will see if I can find some good resources for you.
I've just had some grief with Abit KT7A not liking the Asus V7700 Geforce2 GTS. Card has gone back to DABS, who reproduced problem and refunded my money. Looking for different video card now
Other than that my build is OK (Athlon 1Ghz based system).
Where in midlands are you based? I'm in Notts area.
Let me know what Mobo you have and I will see if I can find some good resources for you.
I've just had some grief with Abit KT7A not liking the Asus V7700 Geforce2 GTS. Card has gone back to DABS, who reproduced problem and refunded my money. Looking for different video card now
Other than that my build is OK (Athlon 1Ghz based system).Where in midlands are you based? I'm in Notts area.
05 May 2001, 12:05 AM
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Apologies if you have tried this already but....
Make sure you have all the latest motherboard chipset drivers and bios installed. I've trawled through postes on
Make sure you have all the latest motherboard chipset drivers and bios installed. I've trawled through postes on
05 May 2001, 08:36 AM
#6
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Thanks for the replies guys -
Ian - done all of that, in fact I went OTT and installed it component by component!!
However, still had the restarting problem..
Nick - I tried to change the motherboard but the company weren't too keen. I'm going to their stand tomorrow and having a chat face to face......
The operating temp, seems to be fine.
I went out and bought a 350Watt PSU, so that should sort out any power probs....
The memory options in BIOS are nice and easy. You can set it to auto detect, of which it is.....
Hanslow - it a Gigabyte GA71XE4. Beginning to wish I'd never bought it now.
I'm over by J1 M5 (West Bromwich) if that's any help.....
I'm going to check out the restart problem, if it does what Nick sez, I'm won't bother buying more fans.....
Watch this space.
Thanks again guys
Dan
Ian - done all of that, in fact I went OTT and installed it component by component!!
However, still had the restarting problem..
Nick - I tried to change the motherboard but the company weren't too keen. I'm going to their stand tomorrow and having a chat face to face......
The operating temp, seems to be fine.
I went out and bought a 350Watt PSU, so that should sort out any power probs....
The memory options in BIOS are nice and easy. You can set it to auto detect, of which it is.....
Hanslow - it a Gigabyte GA71XE4. Beginning to wish I'd never bought it now.
I'm over by J1 M5 (West Bromwich) if that's any help.....
I'm going to check out the restart problem, if it does what Nick sez, I'm won't bother buying more fans.....
Watch this space.
Thanks again guys
Dan
05 May 2001, 09:09 AM
#7
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I've just tried restarting, and yes, the problem persists.... however, I've left it for a while (off), came back and turned it on, and it loaded up first time.....
I sense a replaced m/board coming on......
Dan
I sense a replaced m/board coming on......
Dan
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05 May 2001, 10:42 AM
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Christian,
A 350 Watt PSU is good enough for the Athlon easily, and also the fact that he is not running that many peripherals either. I Use a 300W PSU (Good One) and have a hell of a lot more components pulling power from it. Rage 128 cards do not pull much power at all. Have got them running in FX,LX,BX,SS7 Motherboards at work and they actually feed less power to the AGP than newer boards.
The only thing with the PSU could be that it's not interpretting the reset trigger correctly, but wouldn't explain the 10 minute power down.
Dan, you can fire one or these up an a 230-250Watt PSU. If you have one, give it a go. Unplug the CD though and anything not really neccessary for a test and try again.
Nick.
A 350 Watt PSU is good enough for the Athlon easily, and also the fact that he is not running that many peripherals either. I Use a 300W PSU (Good One) and have a hell of a lot more components pulling power from it. Rage 128 cards do not pull much power at all. Have got them running in FX,LX,BX,SS7 Motherboards at work and they actually feed less power to the AGP than newer boards.
The only thing with the PSU could be that it's not interpretting the reset trigger correctly, but wouldn't explain the 10 minute power down.
Dan, you can fire one or these up an a 230-250Watt PSU. If you have one, give it a go. Unplug the CD though and anything not really neccessary for a test and try again.
Nick.
05 May 2001, 01:57 PM
#11
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Again, your repsonse to my hour of need is staggering. I am most humbled.
The latest is this -
Called the shop. The owner is bringing down an ABIT KT7a (non raid) M/board to the computer show tomorrow to replace my Gigabyte. Should've really bought this in the first place but 'hey, what ya gonna do'
I've rebuilt my K6/2 450 in the meantime (back to square one!!!)
Fingers crossed that this should be the end of this grief, once I've got the proper board.....
Anything else I should know about the ABIT?
PS the PSU was bought from CPC electronics - just under £40.....
Again, thanks.
I'll post tomorrow with an update.
The daft thing is that this weekend I was going to invest some serious time on caring for one VERY dirty Scoob.....
Dan
I remember now why I bought my G4 Mac & PSX
[This message has been edited by ScoobyDoo555 (edited 05 May 2001).]
The latest is this -
Called the shop. The owner is bringing down an ABIT KT7a (non raid) M/board to the computer show tomorrow to replace my Gigabyte. Should've really bought this in the first place but 'hey, what ya gonna do'
I've rebuilt my K6/2 450 in the meantime (back to square one!!!)
Fingers crossed that this should be the end of this grief, once I've got the proper board.....
Anything else I should know about the ABIT?
PS the PSU was bought from CPC electronics - just under £40.....
Again, thanks.
I'll post tomorrow with an update.
The daft thing is that this weekend I was going to invest some serious time on caring for one VERY dirty Scoob.....
Dan
I remember now why I bought my G4 Mac & PSX
[This message has been edited by ScoobyDoo555 (edited 05 May 2001).]
05 May 2001, 02:10 PM
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Just give me a run through of all the cards you are going to put in her again (vga,sound etc). I can give you some settings and info to boost stability and overal performance. Are the dimms that you will be putting in both double-sided (as in chips on both sides of the sticks)?
Waiting to help, as always
Nick.
Waiting to help, as always
Nick.
05 May 2001, 02:53 PM
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Sounds obvious but are you using thermal compound ? and if so ensure that the Heatsink is sitting "PERFECTLY" flat and in position.
Also is the Heatsink capable of 5500rpm or higher ? With an Athlon, this is critical.
Once had a system with similar problems and after much nashing of teeth and hair pulling it turned out to be the above problem.
Best of luck
Also is the Heatsink capable of 5500rpm or higher ? With an Athlon, this is critical.
Once had a system with similar problems and after much nashing of teeth and hair pulling it turned out to be the above problem.
Best of luck
05 May 2001, 07:39 PM
#14
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Mixit - yeh, there's thermal compound in between the heatsink and chip. Incidentally, it's a CoolerMaster heatsink (approved AMD one) so it should be ok......
Nick - deep breath.....
Dimms - only 1 x 128Meg PC133 (single sided)
* will the ABIT be able to mix & match PC100 & PC133 Ram
SoundBlaster PCI128
ATI Expert 128 (Rage 128 chip)
Motorola SM56 Int modem
Athlon 1GHz (!)
Samsung 6.5Gig HD (small coz I don't like large capacity drives)
Philips CDRW 400
44x CDRom
Formac ProNitron 17/200 17" monitor
I think that's it.... anything else you need?
Again, thanks to everybody who's replied...
I'll let you know how I get on tomorrow
Wish me luck
Dan
Nick - deep breath.....
Dimms - only 1 x 128Meg PC133 (single sided)
* will the ABIT be able to mix & match PC100 & PC133 Ram
SoundBlaster PCI128
ATI Expert 128 (Rage 128 chip)
Motorola SM56 Int modem
Athlon 1GHz (!)
Samsung 6.5Gig HD (small coz I don't like large capacity drives)
Philips CDRW 400
44x CDRom
Formac ProNitron 17/200 17" monitor
I think that's it.... anything else you need?
Again, thanks to everybody who's replied...
I'll let you know how I get on tomorrow
Wish me luck
Dan
05 May 2001, 11:27 PM
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Never had a problem with speed mixing with the Abits before, the older ones used to have fussiness over what slot the dimms were put in, but that's about it. Obviously, you will not be able able to take advantage of the 4-bank interleaving or running the ram/system bus at 133mhz by mixing them. A couple of recommendations for configuration.....
Rage 128 In AGP slot (doh!)
PCI 128 in PCI slot 2
Internal Modem in PCI slot 5
BIOS Config.
Power Management. Select ACPI Function and set to disabled (may only apply to modified BIOS like the one that I run)
Integrated Peripherals. Set COM1 to 3F8/IRQ4 and disable COM2
PCI/PNP Configuration. Set PIRQ_0 to 10, PIRQ_1 to 9, PIRQ_2 to 3 and PIRQ_3 to 11
This will have the cards running as independantly from each other as poss. Might not apply if the ACPI function overrides.
Can't remember where it is (been drinkin, still drinkin) set pnp OS to YES
All that I can think of for now
Let's see how it goes mate.
Nick
Rage 128 In AGP slot (doh!)
PCI 128 in PCI slot 2
Internal Modem in PCI slot 5
BIOS Config.
Power Management. Select ACPI Function and set to disabled (may only apply to modified BIOS like the one that I run)
Integrated Peripherals. Set COM1 to 3F8/IRQ4 and disable COM2
PCI/PNP Configuration. Set PIRQ_0 to 10, PIRQ_1 to 9, PIRQ_2 to 3 and PIRQ_3 to 11
This will have the cards running as independantly from each other as poss. Might not apply if the ACPI function overrides.
Can't remember where it is (been drinkin, still drinkin
) set pnp OS to YESAll that I can think of for now
Let's see how it goes mate.
Nick
06 May 2001, 09:32 AM
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I made a PC (one of many) for a friend and had exactly the same switching on and off and program crashes type scenario. Unbelievably frustrating as nothing appears to be wrong on the face of it.
I will bet my **** that your motherboard is shorting due to faulty manufacture.
I had mine checked by an electrician and then took it back, and guess what they confirmed it was shorting all over the job!!!
New board, no late nights, job's a good 'un.
Good luck.
I will bet my **** that your motherboard is shorting due to faulty manufacture.
I had mine checked by an electrician and then took it back, and guess what they confirmed it was shorting all over the job!!!
New board, no late nights, job's a good 'un.
Good luck.
06 May 2001, 02:19 PM
#17
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D
I NOW HAVE AN ATHLON 1GHZ!!!!
All sorted - WOW it's quick
I'd just like to say a BIG thanks to everybody (especially Nick) for the assistance you've given me over the last few weeks. I was beginning to think that my PC would be an antique by the time I got it working. New M/B and brand new PSU......
Sorted. Also bought a PCI exhaust blower to get rid of and unwanted heat.....
Cheers chaps
Dan
I NOW HAVE AN ATHLON 1GHZ!!!! All sorted - WOW it's quick
I'd just like to say a BIG thanks to everybody (especially Nick) for the assistance you've given me over the last few weeks. I was beginning to think that my PC would be an antique by the time I got it working. New M/B and brand new PSU......
Sorted. Also bought a PCI exhaust blower to get rid of and unwanted heat.....
Cheers chaps
Dan
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