DOA motherboard????

[Guest]

Built new system/Asus A7V133, Duron 800...Installed Win98, ran for a day, let me install programs, then shut completely off suddenly.
reformatted/tried to install 98, this error is given after setup goes to reboot into hardware configuration...
"Invalid VxD dynamic link call to device 3 series B YOUR WINDOWS CONFIGURATION IS INVALID PLEASE RUN SETUP AGAIN TO CORRECT
THIS PROBLEM. "
Try, try, try everything and same error everytime. Swapped out all hardware with hardware from machine with same mobo/processor...same error. Video card swap, ram, HD, everything. Configured bios with tech support/book...Microsoft support no help at all. 3 techs same error. Punching keyboard was of no help. Going insane here/work machine down/12 hour days/spent big bucks so far, don't want to spend anymore.
Does anyone know if it is the mobo or processor (both remained in machine through swaps). Seems odd it ran for a day. No one seems to know what this error is, what device 3 is...help, new machine should be working fine but is about to find itself smashed on sidewalk.
Please please someone help, need this machine to do job on.

 

[stable]

I may be wrong, but at this point I would assume device 3 is equal to whatever is in your PCI slot #3. If you have onboard Audio (and it is enabled in the BIOS) this will be sharing an interrupt with the device in PCI slot #3. This could definately cause problems. Typically, we put any new audio card in this slot (and nothing else) and disable the onboard settings in the BIOS.

Finally, you should try to run in safe mode. I would be curious as to WHICH driver is conflicting in the first place. Booting into safe mode should allow you to enable the device drivers one by one until you find the culprit.

My A7V crew suspects that Interrupt Sharing (Control Panel, System, Device List, System, PCI BUS, Middle tab for Interrupt sharing) is enabled. We have found disabling this and forcing hard Interrupts in the BIOS FIRST, then re-enabling this feature (which creates a new auto-discovery and automatic re-assignment of usable interrupts) fixes the problems.

Good Luck
Steve Benoit



Stable Technologies
'The way IT should be!'

 

[Guest]

Video card slot 1, NIC slot 2, nothing in slot 3. Cannot get to safe mode cos windows won't finish installing cos of error. Windows loads fine until it goes to reboot to start the initialization of hardware then the error. I'm using the onboard sound, instead of my sound card.
The tech guy where I bought the mobo/processor ran us thru the bios and the settings are fine, unless the video card NEEDS to be in slot 3? That doesn't seem right though.
I am having the company where I bought the equiptment send a new mobo/proc and I will have a tech on Sunday try it again. He owns the exact same equiptment and had no problems installing his and used his other hardware he runs with mobo/proc and still the error.
If we still get the error with the replaced mobo/proc, I don't know what to do...we have trouble shooted the heck out of this thing. Tried swapping HD again last night and now it just beeps, with both HDs beeping (both HDs are good plus it is not the beep when the HD is bad).
I appreciate your advice greatly!

 

[Ncogneto]

1) hard drives don't beep, that is your bios telling you something is amuck. This is either usually a memory error ( check to make sure memory is firmly seated) or a video error ( do the same with video card.)

2) When you say nic is in slot 2 do you mean that it is in the first pci slot and your video card is in the agp slot? this is a big no no if that is the case. Try installing windows with onboard sound disabled, sytem defaults and nothing but your video card installed ( take out the nic). Then report back and tell us your progress. This will go along ways to trouble shooting your problems.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[Guest]

We have already checked and rechecked the slots, memory, video card. The video card is not in agp slot.
Unfortunately it will not boot to bios now, only beeps, so we cannot do anything with it. Sigh...
Thanks though, very appreciated help.

 

[Ncogneto]

If you are getting a beep code it would appear that processor and motherboard are ok. Possible culprits are memory and video card. My guess in this case is bad memory do to the fact that windows was crashing on install. First, consult your owneres manual and reset the Cmos. Try your memory in differnt slot or better yet try another stick of memory if available. Also, try a different video card if you have one. You did not say if you tried to boot up the system without the nic in the computer....did you?

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Ncogneto on 05/05/01 03:58 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Guest]

The 256 chip was bad, but 6 different chips have been used before and after, with the 64 chiop letting us into the bios at least. The 256 was causing the beeps though. So I was able to get into the bios today again and followed your instructions, same error. Tried, once again, to swap HD, same error. Already used diferent video card, ram, HD, CD rom, floppy, everything 6 people could think of. The only things not swapped out were mobo/proc. Tried to boot up w/o NIC, same error. Seems to not boot off HD (the reason for again trying a different HD).
Wish I knew what device number 3 is. It is not the PCI slot, there is nothing in that.

 

[Ncogneto]

Ok that tells me a bit more. The 256 chip was bad thus the beeps. Now you finally got a chip to work to get into bios. One last thing to try and if this does not work RMA the motherboard. At next boot, go into bios and load setup defaults, save and then exit. Boot from a boot disk, fdisk and reformat the hard drive. Then re-install the OS. If you continue to get the same error I would highly suspect your motherboard is bad or at least has a bad memory slot. Have you tried to relocate the memory to a different slot? Again, if this fails take the motherbaord back to where you got it. Another thing, have you gone to abit's website and downloaded the most recent bios for your board?

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[Guest]

I got the same setup, A7V133 W 800 duron, took me two weeks to get the thing running. Just stumbled onto it piece by piece. Make sure that all of your jumpers are set to default for auto bios operation.WITH THE EXCEPTION OF MEMORY VOLTAGE. The manual says that the default is 3.56 and shows a 3.45 default setting, it should be 3.3V. First watch the memory. Use non buffered, non registered, non-ecc PC133 CL2 and is limited to 18 chips. Then take everything out except CPU, heatsink/fan, power on, if beeps then the board and CPU are probably ok. Power off, add memory, power up, if you hear the little relays etc clicking and the single postup beep then you have a successful post up, power off, add the CD-ROM, HDD and video card in pci slot 1. (Regardless of what others said I could not get video on the agp slot until I purchased a pci card and then got into the bios and changed the default to agp.) power up, and go into the bios and set that up and power off. this time turn the power switch off in the back also for full power off. In 5-10 sec power backup with the windows 98 boot floppy and at the prompt, enter fdisk to partition, then format each partition making sure the C: drive is made bootable (Format C: /s) and you should be able to reboot with the win98 CD in the CD-ROM and install the Os. I had all kinds of problems trying to get the PC to recognize the ATA100. Best bet is to initially plug it into the IDE controller slot and you can manually change later. Hope you are not planning to burn CD’s with this board.
Good luck

 

[Guest]

oh yeah i forgot to mention you got to upgrade the bios to rev.1004 or later to get ATA100 thingy straightened out.

 

[Guest]

No, I haven't DL the most recent version of bios cos I can't get to the internet with my computer. I am trying a replacement mobo/proc today and we will see how it goes.
Thanks!

 

[Guest]

I am planning on using my cdrom/burner so I hope I don't have problems with it down the road.
I am installing a replacement board today in a bit and will follow the advice closely.
Cross fingers?

 

[Ncogneto]

The very first thing you should do is to update the bios before installing any OS.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[Guest]

The machine is up and working now (using it now). Just replaced the mobo and processor and worked like a charm. Still don't know which one it was (device 3) but it was a faulty one of them.
Whew, that was fun! haha