No sure where to start

[Rev_Night]

Ok, i upgraded my system from:

AMD Athlon XP 2100+
Geforce4 4600
1x512 pc 2100 generic Elixar ram


To this:

AMD Athlon XP 2800+ (barton)
ATI 9800XT
1x512 Crucial PC2700 ram

The only common componet between the two system is the mobo (Asus A7V333 (bios rv. 1014))


When i put everything in, i got an error message upon POST forcing me into bios. There i saw a red error message saying something like "System memmory must be at least the same frequency of your front side bus. please make sure your ram is no slower then 333 mhz".

So i'm like wtf? My a7v33 has a 333 fsb, my barton has a 333fsb (i checked using widCPU), and my pc700 (ddr333) goes at 333mhz. SO wherein lies the problem of my ram not being fast? I ran memtest for about 2 hours (1000 cycles) and it said it was 100% error free. I read on Asus's website that the 1014 bios needs to be flased to a 1017 or higher to be able to understand the cpu. SO i went onto their website and downloaded and flashed the latest driver (the 1018). I soon foudn out that this was a beta 1018. Is this a bad thing? Is it safe to flash down to the 1017?

Anyway, after flashing, i still get the same error. When i try to run my computer at the standad 2.083 ghz frequency (and thus using the 333 fsb), it will run just fine. But then randomly, like when i am watching an mpeg or playing a game, the computer will freeze, and put me back into the bios screen with the same red message. To get around this, i declocked my cpu to its medium default speed of 1.667 mhz (which happens to exactly be the speed of my previous process). Ever since i declocked it, it runs flawlessly, not yet had a restart. And when i go into bios with the declocked cpu, the red warning is gone and all is fine. My temp with stock cooling was never above 125F (max temp being 185F).

My question is: Is this a cpu problem, a mobo problem, or a ram problem? How can i fix this?

thanks

 

[o1die]

Check your voltage readings with asus probe. Your power supply or other item may be giving an intermitant low reading. You can also try increasing your ddram voltage to 2.6 or 2.7, and see if that helps. Then manually set your ddram to 333.

 

[Rev_Night]

my asus probe readings are as follows:

vcore: 1.696
3.3: 3.328
5: 4.95
12: 12.192 V

Is this good? My psu is 400wt. How can i change my ram voltage (is it in bios somewhere)? How can i manually set it up to 333mhz?

thanks

 

[endyen]

It is probably a bios problem. Go into the bios and set the memory to auto and by SPD. Then save settings.

 

[Rev_Night]

i did that. by spd, it is 2.5,3,3,6 (default). the error is still there

 

[Coyote]

Man, I could swear I've seen this same exact posting over at Anand's except it was the Asus board for the 64 bit procesor?

Anyway, the response by others with this Asus problem recommended changing the slot the ram is in. Give it a shot maybe

Barton 2500+
Abit NF7-S v 2.0
Maxtor 60GB ATA 133 7200RPM
512MB Corsair Twinx 3200LL
9600 Pro
Win98SE

 

[Rev_Night]

i changed the ram to slot 1, when it was in slot 2. I also manually set the cpu to 12.5/166, instead of letting Auto do it for me. SO far, the computer has been on fo about 2 days straight, and hasn't crashed once. i think this fixed the problem.

 

[grafixmonkey]

I recently built a computer for someone where the processor only worked when it was underclocked. It was so weird... those things are so complex and fragile that you'd expect it to be impossible to damage one without completely breaking it. This processor would boot windows at full speed, but would crash exactly like yours did (but without the memory error message) if it ever ran a serious game. The nVidia Ogre demo crashed it, but the Vulcan demo didn't. Then if I underclocked the FSB by 10mhz, the demo didn't crash. And, if I left the FSB at full speed and took the processor multiplier down by 1, the demo ran fine. But with multiplier at correct setting and FSB at correct setting it always crashed a random amount of time into the demo (between 0.5 and 2 seconds.)

I was about to call it a fault of the Ogre demo, until I heard it was crashing when he ran Need For Speed or Call Of Duty too. A replacement processor fixed the whole problem.

So anyway, maybe you have another processor that's only "slightly bad".