Dead P4 Northwood?

[MattM]

I had a frustrating experience the other night and was just wondering if anyone else has some thoughts on this.

My PC suddenly crashed while in the middle of playing some music, and refused to start up again.

The machine (Asus P4T533-C w/ 2.5Ghz P4/533/Northwood with Windows XP) would get through all the BIOS tests to the point where it informed me it was booting the OS, and then the screen would go black. No windows logo, nothing...

I tried pulling out and swapping parts, and have narrowed it down to either the Mobo, or the CPU.

Something else weird though, is that when I tinkered in the BIOS and disabled the CPU Level 1 cache, I was able to boot to the point that windows gives me the safe mode menu, but even when loading safe mode, it will still black-screen when it's going through the drivers.

I tried the CPU in a newer Dell machine, and it seemed to be recognized, but this second machine would also give a black-screen during boot (but we couldn't find a way to test disabling the L1 cache in its BIOS). Though it occurs to me that perhaps a northwood won't work in that particular machine?

One other thing, is that it didn't seem to be a heating problem. The CPU wasn't even in full use at the time of the crash. There were no warning beeps to signify a high temperature. From what I know, it's *very* uncommon for a processor to go bad, especially since it has been running for almost 2 years with no troubles (also, I was not overclocking it). It seemed like it was only a little bit warm to the touch (~40 C).

The only software changes that were made recently was the installation of ASIO4All (virtual ASIO device) and upgrading Windows Update (though I had not installed SP2 yet...).

With the L1 cache difference I mentioned above, and the test in a different machine, I'm fairly sure it is the processor that is bad. I'm just a little bit worried that it might be something more insidious on the Mobo that killed the CPU...

Does anyone have any thoughts concerning what might have gone wrong? Also, is there a high risk that the Mobo is having trouble as well? Getting a replacement CPU shouldn't be a problem since it is easily still within Intel's 3 year warranty, but am I risking frying the replacement as soon as I toss it in?

 

[ZER0]

hmm that's a good question. i've never seen one of those cpu's go bad so i am kinda curious to know why it went bad. it is possible the board could fry another one but what choice to you really have?

 

[Crashman]

I had a similar issue with a customers system, P4S533-X. I pulled the CPU out and put it into a perfectly working system (same board) and found it to be bad. But the CPU wasn't defective: After mounting HIS CPU in the old board, I found the BOARD had problems with the VRM, where it would suddenly kick the voltage up to something like 1.85v!

The BOARD had blown the original CPU, it was Asus's fault! The new CPU had to be removed from the old board before it too would show signs of permanent damage!

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[tangara_02]

i think thats what happened to my athlon 1000

 

[endyen]

It sounds like a psu problem, but you may have already checked that.
Take a look at the capacitors on the mobo. If any are leaking, or have a bulging top (not flat), that is the culprit.

 

[Aidanoridania]

i had exactly the same thing happening and the diagnose was

mobo died

you will have the same thing i had an awefull crash during a simple word edit and went to the store...

i'm now waiting for the new one as it is luckyly enough still under guaranrtee

<font color=purple><i> Enosi and I.... </i></font color=purple>

 

[Chop]

I may be a little late on this , but just FYI .
I have a P4S533 . One day it wouldnt boot . Like you said it got past the post screen then nuthin . Turned out that the plastic plugs that hold the mobo side of the retention had failed . It actually let the HS and fan come away from the chip , while looking normal . It did let me boot to the bios and moniter temps ,,, like I said just FYI .