7900GT or the motherboard?

[Bruizer]

First off, sorry for posting in the general hardware but i wasn't get any where in technical support.

Okay, so i just put an eVGA 7900GT KO and an ASUS A8N-SLI Premium motherboard in my computer. So i decided to run 3dmark03 (to compare old scores) and it would freeze in the first test every time. So i tried to play BF2 and it would freeze in the menu. So i went into my bios and changed the speed of my ram from 400mhz to 333mhz. I just decided to try this because i run 4x512 sticks of GeIL Ultra DDR500. Loaded up and bam, everything worked. I don't understand. My old MSI board and 9800pro didn't have a problem like this. I run a San Diego 4000 plus so i know i can do 4x512 400mhz at 2t timings and like i said the MSI could do it. Is this a graphics card problem or maybe a motherboard bios problem? Time to update bios? Help! Please!

 

[LouPoir]

Sounds like the new m/b is not liking the ram. I would try bumping up the coltage on the ram to see if that helps.


Lou

 

[Bruizer]

I've got it running at 2.9 volts. I think it was recommended 2.9 to 3.1 or somethin like that. I ran Prime95 stress testing at 400mhz for about 4 hours and it worked fine. The only time it seems to gives me a problem is when doing something graphics intensive like 3dmark03 and playing games. With my old MSI board i use to run it with 2.7 volts. It wouldn't always get far in Prime95 with my MSI board but it never gave me a problem gaming or anything else. I've also got the times at 2.3.3.6

 

[Boyo]

Try running memtest on your RAM to see if that is the problem. Asus boards in general have trouble with 4 sticks of RAM for some reason too.

 

[Bruizer]

I've got bios 1006, would it be worth my while to upgrade to the latest 1009. I looked at it but in part of its description it reads:

2. Fix unstable under 400MHz-Single channel issue.
3. Modify DDR max speed from 400MHz to 333Hz when full loadinng.

What exactly does this mean? Should i flash or is it just the fact that my board will never like 4x512 at 400mhz despite the fact i have a San Diego core and my MSI K8N Neo 2 Platinum worked with 400mhz and didn't give me a problem when gaming?

 

[Bruizer]

Well i upgraded the Bios to 1009 and still no go! I called the people at ASUS. They told put one stick in, fix the timings, then put the rest in. So i did that and when running 3D mark, instead of stopping on the first test, it would make it all the way to the 2nd sound test which is the next to last test. At this point it was running with the side off out of my desk. So i put the side on and put it back booted up BF2, then when i started clicking in the menu, bam, computer restart. It even froze one time on and started making a high pich squel at me. Then it wouldn't go past the first 3dmark03 test. Reverted back to 333mhz and fine. I even read on their site that its supposed to be able to run at the 400mhz with the new revision cores. Anybody care to comment, i could really use some help.