Tom's Guide | Tom's Hardware | Tom's Games
 |
 |
 |
Had a motherboard failure, and I installed a new one..an ASRock K7S78X. Other hardware of note is an ATI Radeon 9200 SE 64mb graphics card and 120gb hard drive, split into 3 15gb partitions and one large partition 75gb one. This large partition and two of the 15gb ones are formatted in NTFS, while one of the 15gb partitions is FAT32. I also have a cable broadband internet connection via a router.
The machine POSTed ok, but when it tried to boot into XP, I got a quick glimpse of a blue error screen and it would re-boot and do the same thing over again. I had been warned that XP more often than not needs a fresh install after a motherboard change, so I was prepared for this stage.
So, I booted to the XP CD, re-formatted the drive and re-installed clean. I immediately installed my firewall and Anti Virus software (updated that too), then installed all the windows service packs and critical updates. During this process, the machine switched off and re-booted...I simply rechecked and started the process again. Then I installed my motherboard drivers off the installation CD (Sound, LAN and USB). Finally, I installed Direct X 9 and the Radeon card drivers/user panel (I got the latest versions from the ATI site). All went fine so far.
Re-installed several programs, again, all installed ok. Started getting my mail accounts set up up again and the machine just swiytched itself off a couple of times..nothing to pinpoint why..wasn't at a particular point in an operation or anything...An immediate thought might be processor temperature as the board has an auto cut off before it reaches a critical temperature, but on re-booting, I checked the temperature of the processor in BIOS and it was only between 38 and 45c .( I had applied some thermal paste to the processor before re-seating the fan).
These shut downs continued...sometimes when there was absolutely no activity going on, sometimes when I was installing or running a program..no real pattern to it at all.
Did a thorough virus scan..found nothing..I even ran the blaster fix just in case I'd somehow picked that up and my AV software wasn't picking it up..all came back clear.
Sorry if it all sounds a bit vague..I've tried to be as accurate as I can in my description. I've done all I can think of..Anyone got any thoughts what it COULD be??
Thanks
Andy
I then set about re-installing
I just got up so the coffee hasn't hit me yet, but first thought is did you install the chipset drivers off your mobo driver disk? More later after I wake up. ;0)
0 
if you are going to reinstall your software i would recommend unplugging your router from your computer and just install basic xp. leave it for a while and see if the same problem occurs.
possibly may be power supply?
0 0
Hi, I'm back.
A Router is not going to cause your unit to constantly reboot. You got an internal prob.
Based on my experience, the three things I found most common probs for reboots are:
Overheat: sometimes the temp reading is cool, but if the heatsink/fan is not seated properly, or the paste is not applied evenly or has overflowed onto the chip board the unit will shut down/reboot. You mentioned that you applied a little more grease to the heatsink before remounting. You might want to check the proc/heatsink installation, clean off all old grease with a little paint thinner on a clean paper towel, reapply grease and reseat your heatsink.
Lastly, run a test on your memory; random reboots are typical of bad memory.
Wish you the best.
0
I had a similar problem. Don't know what you had plugged in when you installed XP. Found this in Microsoft Knowledgebase. Only Monitor, KBD, and Mouse. Unplug everything else. Worked for me.
gilhouli
0
Thanks for the replies folks...
Ranchhand-hope you've got your cafffine fix now! ..I installed the SISAGP-PCI bridge driver...I know I did the audio..I know I did the Network card..I know I tried to do the USB 2.0 drivers as it just come up with a message saying support for this is in XP SP1 and installed nothing. I also installed adobe acrobat off the disc, thats all I installed and is all that was on the disc.
Simon, thanks for that. It did occur to me to disconnect the LAN and leave it in it's basic state, but the problems hadn't really manifested themselves until I started loading the software.The PSU was my immediate thought two weeks ago when the whole machine just shut down with no warning, but it tested out fine (as did everything else)..instead it was a faulty MoBo (Which resulted in all of this re-installing!) It's a new case/psu (well 6 months old) and it's a 350 watt supply which should be plenty for what I'm running.
My thought was something video card related. I've had problems in the past with ATI cards, and this one had been a pig with my previous MoBo -It didn't like the Chipset on that board (according to the ATI helpfiles) but I did get it working eventually..it installed like a dream on this new one though.
0
Ranchhand..said
"or the paste is not applied evenly or has overflowed onto the chip board the unit will shut down/reboot"
I put a blob on the centre part of the back of the chip (the metal bit) and ran a piece of card over it to thin it down..When you say if it has got onto the chip board-do you mean there shouldn't be ANY at all on the back of the chip except from this central metal bit?
I didn't cover the whole of the back of the chip with grease, but i've seen 'How To' guides that show the whole of the back of the chip with grease on it.
Struggling to run any tests on my memory on another board as i don't have another board or PC that takes DDR memory..any 'In Situ' tests I can do on it?
0
Hi Andy,
Well, it's kind of hard to accurately describe in words, but yes, the entire, small rectagular CPU chip on the center of the little circuit board should be entirely, evenly, covered with grease approximately the thickness of a sheet of normal typing paper. If you miss any areas, the chip may shut down. Sometimes folks put the grease on too thick, it overflows with the heat, literally gets on the contacts on the side of the chip on the little board, etc. I just had one do that after two weeks (!).
Did exactly what yours did except the system beeper gave a signal. I went crazy, because my LED readout said I was running only 40C, very cool. Soon as I removed the heatsink I saw what happened, cleaned the chip & reapplied grease, and it's been fine ever since. The reason I did not suggest the power supply is that the only thing you changed was the mobo, all else was the same and you didn't have any problems before. The only thing that I could see that you did different was reset the heatsink, so...
Hope I helped.
0
Thanks Ranchhand...
It's still doing the same thing, but the frequency has decreased. Where on Thursay it must have been every 20 minutes or so, it will now run for several hours. I switched on at 9 a.m. and it ran perfectly well until for several hours. I'm just trying something with the memory..A couple of people have said it's very likely to be faulty memory...When I had my Asus board in, it occasionally re-booted itself, but nothing like the frequency since I changed the board, and I had put this down to the fact that the Radeon Card I'd bought didn't like the chipset on that Asus board (It is mentioned on the ATi help files). As this is the only machine I've got that takes DDR Ram, I can't test the memory in a different machine, but as I have 2 sticks (512 and 256) I'm currently running with just one stick in to see if that makes any difference.. it seems to be much more stable..it has only closed down on me just once with this one stick in.
I've also just installed and run SiSoft Sandra to see if that gave me any pointers...One thing that jumped out was this warning about the fsb
"Warning 2541 : FSB exceeds Chipset rated speed. Reduce FSB."
Well, the processor is an XP2600 Barton which has a fsb of 333, and I've set the jumpers on the board to the correct positions for 333fsb, so I don't know what that is referring to. I'm not overclocking at all.
I will check the grease..I know there will be some one the top of cpu, but I doubt there will be any that will have spilled over the edge of the processor.
Anyway..thanks for all your help (everyone who's replied)..I enjoy a challenge!!!
0
Updating yesterdays message (see above!).
PC has run like a dream since I brought the FSB down to 266 Mhz-Left it running overnight handling some large downloads and they were still running just fine this morning..CPU is in the low 40's Board temperature mid-30's.
The problem is that the processor is only being identified as an XP2000 Thoroughbread, when it is an XP2600 Barton!!
0  |
 |
 |
This post is quite old and has been locked from receiving new replies. Please create a new posting instead.
| Ads by Google |
