GA-7DPXDW+ motherboard faulty or have we got the wrong RAM?

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

In another thread, I described the awful problems that we've been having
trying to get Windows 2000 Server installed on a 7DPXDW+ motherboard. Tried
nearly every single combination but the result is that it fails to install
and then we start getting blue screen. Having removed CD-ROM, HDD and
Windows 2000/SP4 out of the equation, came back to RAM. GOt further using a
single 128MB DDR instead of the 4 x 512MB we'd bought for the system but
still crashed randomly.

So suspected RAM so downloaded MEMTEST86 from http://www.memtest86.com/ and
burnt on CD-ROM. Instantly thousands of errors. Tried with each of the four
RAM chips one after the other and all of them failed with the same kind of
errors.

Two questions:

Have we bought compatible RAM? This is the motherboard manual:

http://tw.giga-byte.com/Server/Support/Manual/Manual_ServerBoard_GA-7DPXDW-P
..htm

And this is the RAM we bought:

http://uk.insight.com/apps/productpresentation/index.php?product_id=DDR51221
00

The manual is rather vague... It mentions:

"4 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/PC2100 Registered DDR DIMM"

I assume this isnt' what we've got as registered DDR is a lot more
expensive.

It then mentions:

"2 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/2100 Un-buffered DDR DRIM"

I assume is what we've bought. However, there is no mention anywhere else
about these two sockets and the sockets are simply labelled DIMM-4. We're
doing the memory test in DIMM-1. The picture of installing RAM is labelled
un-buffered DDR.

Confusing or what!

Regards, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> Confusing or what!

Later... I suspect the motherboard is faulty...

Put on the 512MB chips in DIMM-1 and MEMTEST instantly reports thousands of
errors.
Put the same chip in DIMM-2 and MEMTEST doesn't report any errors, well not
within 10 mins, will leave overnight.
And it also doesn't report errors in DIMM-3 and DIMM-4

I was trying to see if there these 2 slots were (say) DIMM-3 & DIMM-4 and
DIMM-1 & DIMM-2 reserved for buffered only (or visa versa). The fact that
the un-buffered chip works in three out of the four slots suggests it should
probably work in all four slots.

And all the errors we've been getting could be caused by a faulty DIMM-1
slot!

Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

Doesnt this board/chipset require *registered* RAM, this is common on
servers but is rare on consumer PC's, so finding it takes a little longer.

CrimsonLiar

"Rob Nicholson" <rob.nicholson@NOSPAM_informed-direct.com> wrote in message
news:c5hpob$lcp$1@titan.btinternet.com...
> In another thread, I described the awful problems that we've been having
> trying to get Windows 2000 Server installed on a 7DPXDW+ motherboard.
Tried
> nearly every single combination but the result is that it fails to install
> and then we start getting blue screen. Having removed CD-ROM, HDD and
> Windows 2000/SP4 out of the equation, came back to RAM. GOt further using
a
> single 128MB DDR instead of the 4 x 512MB we'd bought for the system but
> still crashed randomly.
>
> So suspected RAM so downloaded MEMTEST86 from http://www.memtest86.com/
and
> burnt on CD-ROM. Instantly thousands of errors. Tried with each of the
four
> RAM chips one after the other and all of them failed with the same kind of
> errors.
>
> Two questions:
>
> Have we bought compatible RAM? This is the motherboard manual:
>
>
http://tw.giga-byte.com/Server/Support/Manual/Manual_ServerBoard_GA-7DPXDW-P
> .htm
>
> And this is the RAM we bought:
>
>
http://uk.insight.com/apps/productpresentation/index.php?product_id=DDR51221
> 00
>
> The manual is rather vague... It mentions:
>
> "4 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/PC2100 Registered DDR DIMM"
>
> I assume this isnt' what we've got as registered DDR is a lot more
> expensive.
>
> It then mentions:
>
> "2 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/2100 Un-buffered DDR DRIM"
>
> I assume is what we've bought. However, there is no mention anywhere else
> about these two sockets and the sockets are simply labelled DIMM-4. We're
> doing the memory test in DIMM-1. The picture of installing RAM is labelled
> un-buffered DDR.
>
> Confusing or what!
>
> Regards, Rob.
>
>
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> Doesnt this board/chipset require *registered* RAM, this is common on
> servers but is rare on consumer PC's, so finding it takes a little longer.

The original 7DPXDW was limited to registered RAM but the -P (also known as
+) version can handle unbuffered as well.

Regards, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

"Rob Nicholson" <rob.nicholson@NOSPAM_informed-direct.com> wrote in message
news:c5hr2j$ag6$1@hercules.btinternet.com...
> > Confusing or what!
>
> Later... I suspect the motherboard is faulty...
>
> Put on the 512MB chips in DIMM-1 and MEMTEST instantly reports thousands
of
> errors.
> Put the same chip in DIMM-2 and MEMTEST doesn't report any errors, well
not
> within 10 mins, will leave overnight.
> And it also doesn't report errors in DIMM-3 and DIMM-4
>
> I was trying to see if there these 2 slots were (say) DIMM-3 & DIMM-4 and
> DIMM-1 & DIMM-2 reserved for buffered only (or visa versa). The fact that
> the un-buffered chip works in three out of the four slots suggests it
should
> probably work in all four slots.
>
> And all the errors we've been getting could be caused by a faulty DIMM-1
> slot!
>
>
1) The manual is quite clear, max. 4 registered DDR modules and max. 4GB in
total.
Max. 2 un-buffered DDR modules and max. 2GB in total. Page 9.

2) The DDR bus frequency on this board is synchronous with the FSB so for
your MP2800+ which is FSB333 you'd need PC2700 DIMMs (or DDR333) (if the
board is capable of 333FSB, see 3))

3) According to the manual this board is only capable of 266FSB so your
MP2800+ are unsuitable.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> 1) The manual is quite clear, max. 4 registered DDR modules and max. 4GB
in
> total.
> Max. 2 un-buffered DDR modules and max. 2GB in total. Page 9.

I agree but it doesn't state which of the four slots should be used, so I
assume it's any of them. It certainly recognises all four unbuffered modules
giving a total of 2GB.

> 2) The DDR bus frequency on this board is synchronous with the FSB so for
> your MP2800+ which is FSB333 you'd need PC2700 DIMMs (or DDR333) (if the
> board is capable of 333FSB, see 3))

If slower memory is used, the system will just not run as fast as it could?

> 3) According to the manual this board is only capable of 266FSB so your
> MP2800+ are unsuitable.

The F5 BIOS was specifically updated for MP2800+ so I assume the manual is
incorrect and that the board can handle this speed.

Cheers, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

here is the info from Crucial's web site I have always found it to be very
useful as the do GUARANTEE the ram they say will work will or they will take
it back no questions the Gigabyte board I have has 3 slots but the third
requires double sided while the first 2 must use single to use all 3 slots.
You can but double sided chips in the first 2 slots as long as the third
remains open! Very confusing they took back the third chip no problem!

a.. 184-pin DIMM Banking: 4 (4 banks of 1)
a.. AGP Support: 2x and 4x
a.. Chipset: AMD 761
a.. DDR SDRAM Frequencies: PC1600 and PC2100
a.. Error Detection Support: ECC only
a.. Max Registered DDR SDRAM: 4096MB
a.. Max Unbuffered DDR SDRAM: 3584MB
a.. Module Types Supported: Unbuffered and Registered
a.. Supported DRAM Types: DDR SDRAM only
a.. USB Support: 1.x Compliant


Wayne


"CrimsonLiar" <trash@trash.com> wrote in message
newsB4fc.6$QB3.1@newsfe5-gui.server.ntli.net...
> Doesnt this board/chipset require *registered* RAM, this is common on
> servers but is rare on consumer PC's, so finding it takes a little longer.
>
> CrimsonLiar
>
> "Rob Nicholson" <rob.nicholson@NOSPAM_informed-direct.com> wrote in
message
> news:c5hpob$lcp$1@titan.btinternet.com...
> > In another thread, I described the awful problems that we've been having
> > trying to get Windows 2000 Server installed on a 7DPXDW+ motherboard.
> Tried
> > nearly every single combination but the result is that it fails to
install
> > and then we start getting blue screen. Having removed CD-ROM, HDD and
> > Windows 2000/SP4 out of the equation, came back to RAM. GOt further
using
> a
> > single 128MB DDR instead of the 4 x 512MB we'd bought for the system but
> > still crashed randomly.
> >
> > So suspected RAM so downloaded MEMTEST86 from http://www.memtest86.com/
> and
> > burnt on CD-ROM. Instantly thousands of errors. Tried with each of the
> four
> > RAM chips one after the other and all of them failed with the same kind
of
> > errors.
> >
> > Two questions:
> >
> > Have we bought compatible RAM? This is the motherboard manual:
> >
> >
>
http://tw.giga-byte.com/Server/Support/Manual/Manual_ServerBoard_GA-7DPXDW-P
> > .htm
> >
> > And this is the RAM we bought:
> >
> >
>
http://uk.insight.com/apps/productpresentation/index.php?product_id=DDR51221
> > 00
> >
> > The manual is rather vague... It mentions:
> >
> > "4 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/PC2100 Registered DDR
DIMM"
> >
> > I assume this isnt' what we've got as registered DDR is a lot more
> > expensive.
> >
> > It then mentions:
> >
> > "2 sockets are designed to support both PC1600/2100 Un-buffered DDR
DRIM"
> >
> > I assume is what we've bought. However, there is no mention anywhere
else
> > about these two sockets and the sockets are simply labelled DIMM-4.
We're
> > doing the memory test in DIMM-1. The picture of installing RAM is
labelled
> > un-buffered DDR.
> >
> > Confusing or what!
> >
> > Regards, Rob.
> >
> >
> >
>
>

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

"Rob Nicholson" <rob.nicholson@NOSPAM_informed-direct.com> wrote in message
news:c5j5sg$k9a$1@sparta.btinternet.com...
> > 1) The manual is quite clear, max. 4 registered DDR modules and max. 4GB
> in
> > total.
> > Max. 2 un-buffered DDR modules and max. 2GB in total. Page 9.
>
> I agree but it doesn't state which of the four slots should be used, so I
> assume it's any of them. It certainly recognises all four unbuffered
modules
> giving a total of 2GB.
>

Any 2 of the 4 sockets. It will recognise all 4 but does not have enough
driving capability to control them properly resulting in memory errors.


> > 2) The DDR bus frequency on this board is synchronous with the FSB so
for
> > your MP2800+ which is FSB333 you'd need PC2700 DIMMs (or DDR333) (if the
> > board is capable of 333FSB, see 3))
>

Here I stand to correct myself. Unlike XP2800 the MP2800 only comes in
266FSB guise and so is suitable for your board.

So it very much looks like the DIMM1 socket is faulty.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> So it very much looks like the DIMM1 socket is faulty.

Yes :-( Just waiting for Insight to get back with return information. They
aren't exactly rushing.

Removed all the upgrade parts and put the original motherboard back in.
Thought "Hmm, might as well put the 3COM Gigabit NIC in there whilst I'm at
it" but that completely locked up Windows 2000 boot. Computers!! <grin>

Regards, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> Yes :-( Just waiting for Insight to get back with return information. They
> aren't exactly rushing.

PS. I'm tempted with all this confusion to try and get them to take the
unbuffered non-ECC ones back at the same time and purchase ECC registered
ones as they aren't that much more. Just to remove that from the equation as
well!

Good idea? I know what ECC does, what's the low down on un-buffered versus
registered?

Cheers, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> Good idea? I know what ECC does, what's the low down on un-buffered versus
> registered?

Answering own question

http://www.corsairmicro.com/main/ttrg-reg.htm

Shame Insight sales weren't as clued up when I rang up weeks ago to check
what RAM I should buy.

Cheers, Rob.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (More info?)

> Have we bought compatible RAM? This is the motherboard manual:

Well even though the manual says non-ECC un-buffered RAM will work and all
the symptoms were faulty motherboard, Insight suggested we return the RAM
and purchase (more expensive) ECC buffered RAM.

This took about 1.5 weeks but new RAM arrived just before the weekend. Put
new motherboard in a completely different old server this time (so different
PSU, HDD, CD-ROM, video card) and exactly the same problem :-( Oh well...

Rob.