Hi, Yesterday my new parts finally arrived so i put them together and put a fresh new install of windows on it... Parts: A64 3700+ 1MB L2 Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe 2GB PC4000 Asus EN7900GTX 512mb First i had no probs at all,, it was very fast, graphics were amazing.. but then, when i was downloading something, the machine crashed and gave me a blue screen saying something with "ntfs.sys" ,so i rebooted... Then something like an hour later it gave me another BSOD while i was copying some files... so i rebooted and got a BSOD at startup.. So i rebooted again and it booted fine.. still holding on untill now... So what is this problem related to? I'm running everything @ stock (still) So i was thinking mayB a bad windows install? or is this hardware related?? Also, something i noticed earlier: The sound seems to be a bit strange.. i have onboard sound, when i listen very closely to my speakers i hear strange beeps and cracking noises.. When the machine is loading something, the sound becomes more intens, or like when i scroll down a webpage.. i also hear it in my speakers.. especialy when i turn up the volume a bit... Is this something to worry about? I was thinking it could be the drivers.. since i installed them something like 3 times. And just one more question; I have DDR500 ram which runs @ 250MHz.. in BIOS it says it runs @ 250.. in CPUZ it says its running @ 245,6 ans there's an option called "FSB:DRAM" saying CPU/9 don't know it this is good? Oh, and there's also another tab in CPUZ called "SPD"..don't know what that is? In this tab it says my modules are running 250mhz.. so i'm a bit confused... Anyone can help me with these problems? Any replies would be gretly appreciated:) (sorry for long post) Thanks.

You should write down the BSOD error messages and report them here exactly. they should help isolate your problem/s I used to have a signature but it disappeared and I just couldn't be bothered writing another so please feel free to ingore this.

Manually adjust your RAM to run at 200MHz

After installing XP, did you download the latest / greatest patches from MS Windows Update web page? How about all the up-to-date drivers? Be sure to check the Asus support pages for your mobo to see if they have any patches, drivers, resolutions, etc.

Well.. when i first setup the system, i set command rate @ 1T... but it seems the auto option set's it @ 2T... Could this be it? Does it matter in performance? Maybe my RAM is supposed to ram @ 2T? It's: 2x1GB Dual Channel OCZ Gold GX DDR500 "OCZ5002048ELGEGXT-K" the sound's still crappy at 2T though...

OK, updated my BIOS from 1009 to 1205, put my RAM @ 250MHz, stock timings, volts etc, Removed my HDD's, Ran memtest86 v3.1 for 10hrs... *no errors* So now i know it's not my RAM.. I'll try to reinstall windows, see if it's good...

You don't HAVE to run a 1:1 CPU:DRAM ratio on an A64 system...if you can do it, fine, but it's not a requirement for best performance. Regardless of your RAM being PC4000, run it at 1T @ 200MHz! The only benefit of the PC4000 is for overclocking...so until you overclock, manually configure your RAM to run at the same frequency as the CPU. In other words, don't use the "AUTO" or "By SPD" setting