A7N8X Deluxe 2.0

[Michael0Jackass]

Hi guys,

As you can see im a newbie here, but i have had this problem for over 6months now.

As in the summary, I have an Asus A7N8X Deluxe 2.0 (Bios 1008), I bought it around Christmas time along with my XP 3000+ Barton and have ever since had problems with it. Firstly, rather than detect it as 166*13, it came up with 133*13. Now I have read it does that for the first boot sometimes but it didnt change after the first boot, so i tried to manually in bios to put it to 166*13 and then it jus kept restarting b4 going into windows or froze at startup screen!

After tweaking for ages, i found out that something was limiting the CPU frequency to 2000MHz. The multipler was unlocked on my barton so i guess that was lucky and so currently i hav 200*10 setting. Nothing I have tried will allow me to go above the 2000Mhz barrier and so help!!plz!!

Now i do have twinmos 2x 256mb ram pc 3200 Cas2.5 dual channel, however this is from christmas and is the older stock which is (hopefully) compatible with nforce2 motherboards.

This is what i have on my pc right now:

Windows XP Pro SP1
XP 3000+ Barton~200*9.5(200*10 slightly unstable or heats up too much)1890Mhz
A7N8X Deluxe 2.0(Bios 1008)
Twinmos 2 x 256mb pc 3200 Cas2.5 dual channel( the clips that hold the 3 slot ram(none in there currently) well the clips errm fell off-- i still hav them but i think i hav ruined the slot)
3D Prophet Hercules 9800 Pro 128mb- stock speeds
Audigy 2 OEM
Enermax 460watt PSU
Coolermaster Aero 7 Lite(i dont think i hav fitted this correctly, temps upto 60degC)(summer tho)
Oh and 2x Western Digital 80gb 8mb cache hdds
Samsung dvd drive
Samsung cdrw drive
and tubes LED stuff, temp and fan control stuff, the list is endless....
and Viewsonic VP171b

Can anyone plzplzplz help me with this problem, I can give more info if u tell what very happily. If you've read this far and are not bored thanku and if u r, even then thanks.

Thanks for any replies

 

[jcwagers]

Well, have you tried flashing the bios to a newer one? Perhaps they fixed the issue in a newer bios.....so you might try downloading the newest bios and flashing it to see if it fixes the problem. Also, check your Aero Lite heatsink/fan. If it's not mounted correctly, it could cause all sorts of problems. By the way, are you using any thermal paste? Perhaps some Artic Silver 5 would help lower your temps quite a bit? If all else fails, see if you can take your processor to a friend's house and put it in his/her board(if they have a compatible board) and see if the processor will run at full speed. You might also try borrowing a stick of ram from a friend and see if that will let you run at full speed. You might also try removing one of your ram sticks and see if you can get it to run at full speed with one stick. If so, you have a faulty stick of ram. Try both sticks individually like that and see what you come up with. I'd also suggest trying memtest86 and running that. That can tell you if your ram has errors. What are your ram voltages? Some motherboards allow raising of voltage to the memory. You might try upping that a little. If it runs at 2.5v, try running it at 2.6v or maybe at 2.7v. This stuff is all just a matter of troubleshooting. You need to try to eliminate every possibility that you can to narrow down the problem. Good luck and keep us posted on what you try.

jc

 

[Michael0Jackass]

i hav the newest bios version (ver.1008)

My heatsink already has a thermal pad on it, so mayb if the temps dont fall then i mite remove tht termal pad and use artic silver. is that a gd or bad idea? For now, the weather seems to hav turned colder here so im ok. i dnt think the problem is temperature related because i hav tried loading it with side panel open and fan blowing, and with that the temp is well within limits and still it wont load stock speeds. Point noted however.Hot pc=problematic pc...

Yes, ram swapping, gd idea. unfortuantely i cant try cpu or mobo swapping although i just have to go to my bros room, coz he wont allow it, too much hassle/ mite "break" his pc. However , a while back, i did put my bros Geil Golden Dragon pc3200 Cas2 ram into mine, it was 2x 256 and i tried to run it in dual channel, but pc would not boot up.BUT! when i tried just one stick, then it worked! we mite b onto something here hmm. i will do more ram swapping 2moro i think... any combinations to try in particular?

i have heard of memtest86, but not entirely sure how/what to do, i dnt hav a floopy drive, only a usb one.


I will post the Ram voltages and timings tomorrow.

thanks for all your help

 

[mechBgon]

It's very important to install the heatsink in the correct directon. The base is not symmetrical... one end has extra clearance to accomplish what's shown in the photo here. If you haven't checked that, it's a good thing to start with.

As for the 3000+, all you should need is to set the FSB to 166MHz and leave the mutiplier alone. Lock the RAM to run at 100% of FSB speed, no more, no less, for the best system performance. This means that your RAM will operate at PC2700 speeds, but trust me... better that than having it run outta sync at PC3200 speed. :evil: In this case I think you should also boost your memory voltage to 2.7 volts in addition to locking it to the CPU's bus speed.

The board has a jumper to the left of the northbridge heatsink that sets the CPU FSB ranges allowed, and that is shown on page 21 of your manual. It should have a cap on pins 1 & 2.

 

[Michael0Jackass]

I checked the jumper settings, they are as they should be.

I will check whether the heatsink is correctly installed or not as well, but for now i cant make it do any higher than 2000Mhz, no matter the combination i use.

Ram timings are-8-3-3-2.5

DDR Ref Vol. =2.6V

 

[Michael0Jackass]

Heatsink and fan are installed correctly and they have clips so i cant screw it tighter either.

After some intensive RAM swapping, i have found out that my twinmos RAM works well individually and in dual channel mode in my bros pc, hes got A7N8X-E Deluxe and Prime 95>Torture Test>Blend works ok as well

My bros Geil Golden Dragon pc3200 Cas2 RAM works well in my pc as well in dual channel mode, Prime95>Torture Test>Blend> works ok as well. Perhaps when i tried before i didnt install it correctly.

Hence now i think its safe to conclude that neither my Twinmos Ram or the Slots are faulty as such.

So now its either motherboard or the 3000+barton

Two stupid Questions:
1) is it a gd idea to scrape off a thermal pad and use thermal paste in its place?
2) is there a windows or cd based memtest86?? i dont have a floppy drive

thanks for any replies

EDIT:

When i had my bros ram inside, i tried running it at a higher frequency than 2000MHz- i tried 166*12.5 which gives 2.08ghz which is still slower than stock and it loaded into windows but prime95 torture test resulted in a restart

 

[Michael0Jackass]

ok i worked out the second question- u can get an .iso for cd of memtest86

and after the test was done, no errors were found

now where do i go from here?

 

[Wigwam]

it may be a psu problem, particularly as you have loads connected to your machine; try to disconnet everything excpet, say 1 hdd and an optical drive; leave off the tubes etc.
make the ram in synch 100% and test it on your machine. start at 166*12 [fromwhat you say this should work fine] - boot up with this and do memtest on your machine, as well as running motherboard monitor 5 to test the voltage rails [and hence psu]. prime95 iif you want [you can see what your cpu is hitting tempwise at full load this way as well].

armed with this info, up the speed first to 166x12.5 [again sans all extras] and them 166x13. ram timings should be fine at 8-3-3-2.5 esp for 166mhz.
i wonder if it is temps as you say it is rebooting rather than not booting in the first place which is more usal with cpu-speed-type probs...

also in windows in "advanced" turn off the reboot on error setting so that you can read/print-off any error message and get more of a clue

 

[Michael0Jackass]

hi i just tried prime 95 with MBM 5 running in the background, system restarted, got too hot probs and told me "System has just recovered from a serious error"

it didnt manage to store a log file so i will try again. thanks for ur help.

EDIT:
Heres some data from MBM5 about high/low from my system with prime 95 in background running a torture test - i had to leave the side panel open to prevent it restarting and so the temp data is not accurate.

Oh and i have max power consumption as well right now as i left everything that b left on, well on , so theres a greater range of voltage values.

+-------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|Total number of readouts: 117 CPU Speed: 1983 MHz |
|Running from: 22/08/2004 15:00:17 until: 22/08/2004 15:19:24 |
+-----------------------------+----------+----------+----------+----------+
|Sensor-------------------| Current | Low | High | Average |
+-----------------------------+----------+----------+----------+----------+
|Case--------------------- 20? C | 20? C | 24? C | 22? C |
|CPU Diode--------------| 41? C | 40? C | 53? C | 48? C |
|CPU Socket-------------| 44? C | 44? C | 55? C | 50? C |
|Core 0-------------------| 1.70 V | 1.66 V | 1.70 V | 1.68 V |
|Core 1-------------------| 1.68 V | 1.66 V | 1.70 V | 1.68 V |
|+3.3----------------------|3.30 V | 3.26 V | 3.30 V | 3.27 V |
|+5.00--------------------| 4.84 V | 4.73 V | 4.84 V | 4.77 V |
|+12.00-------------------| 11.67 V | 11.67 V | 11.80 V | 11.74 V |
|-12.00--------------------| -12.20 V | -12.32 V | -12.20 V | -12.26 V |
|-5.00---------------------| -5.12 V | -5.17 V | -5.12 V | -5.15 V |
|Fan 1---------------------| 7336 RPM | 874 RPM | 8035 RPM | 7457 RPM |
|Fan 2---------------------| 0 RPM | 0 RPM | 0 RPM | 0 RPM |
|Fan 3---------------------| 0 RPM | 0 RPM | 0 RPM | 0 RPM |
+-----------------------------+----------+----------+----------+----------+

Can someone tell me what voltages are consider "normal"?

 

[Michael0Jackass]

Something is going completely crazy at this 166*12 setting, voltage spikes and now it cant get any readings!! better do a restart... tubes fans and optical drives are off

EDIT:
seems to be working ok now but last time when i ran 3dmark01 i got voltage spike upto 3.09V in Core 1... and there again 0.70V in +3.3V.... very strange

Edit:
and there again! a spike of 6.8V in +5V....otherwise pc seems stable

Edit: i think the detection seems to gone haywire, my asus probe loses temp sensors and so on every now and again but pc is stable.

No errors found in memtest at 166*12 and 166*12.5,i will do prime95 and 3dmark01 to check stability

Edit: 3dmark01 runs well at 166*12.5 but prime95 crashes and i get a system reboot also 166*13 results in a reboot on windows loading screen

 

[Wigwam]

IIRC +/- 10% on any voltage rail is acceptable and yours [esp the 5V rail] is way beyond that whichsuggests psu probs to me which prob also explains why the system becomes unstable when it needs more juice.
the temps are fine.

strange as you have a branded high power psu.

maybe try swapping out the psu with your bro and see. that way if it works you know you can just buy a new one.
i suggest you leave off everything [all tubes/optical drives] first to check

 

[Michael0Jackass]

the strange thing is my bro gets these same spikes in voltages as well, hes got an Antec 430Watt PSU surely the system would just restart if suddenly there was a surge? im beginning to doubt how good these probes and sensors reli are, but i'll try to swap PSUs with my bro and see what happens.

PS: memtest froze on 166*13 at 55% wierd and keeps restarting at windows load up screen

 

[Michael0Jackass]

yep i got round to swapping my PSU with my bros but still the same problem, 166*13 pc rebooted at windows load screen. only the essentials were left on, rest was off.

so its not PSU, or RAM, as we did test for that earlier.

temp prob? doubtful as it doesnt load at low tempsat 166*13, ie side panel off and a huge fan blowing thru there.

so either a problem on the mobo or possibly the chip...what do u guys think?

 

[Michael0Jackass]

Will a new twinmos 512mb stick pc3200 cas2.5 ,as the other ones still work in there??i wanted to run it in dual channel with the two other 256mb sticks. i heard the new twinmos isnt compatible with nforce2 mobos, is this true?

 

[Wigwam]

yes its true - it says so on their website even

 

[Michael0Jackass]

ah cheers, I will buy some Geil ram then

 

[Michael0Jackass]

FINALLY, SORTED PHEW!

Yeah as suspected it was a faulty mobo, gonna get it RMA-ed, realised that after i i got my new Abit NF7 and problem was solved. cheers for ur help Wigwarm

 

[Wigwam]

no probs - glad you got it sorted