AMD thunderbird and ASUS A7V are a bad mix

[bh3]

Ever since I've owned my AMD (about 1 month) I've had nothing but problems. Whenever I try and play a 3D video game my machine locks up big time, not even a ALT+TAB or a CTRL+ALT+DEL work, the only way to get back into windows is to hit the reset button. Also whenever I'm scrolling in either IE5 or some FTP programs its crashes as well. Seems I'm not alone according to the alt.comp.hardware.amd.thunderbird newsgroup. almost half the posts in there are people complaining of the exact same thing. Now let me run down my setup for you:

AMD thunderbird 900
ASUS A7V
128MB PC133 ram
Creative SBlive
ASUS AGP-V7700 Deluxe 32meg
Windows ME
Microsoft Wheel mouse USB
Dlink 10/100 NIC

Before you ask I have tried all the latest drivers for all of the components. I have the latest Bios, Video, sound driver, etc. I even brought it to the place I bought it and they replaced my video card. I have also tried 3 versions of Windows (98, 98SE and WinME) on 2 different hard drives. I have basically replaced every single piece of hardware in my machine except for the motherboard and CPU. The other day I even took out all my compontents and installed them on 2 different P3 machines. One was a P3 on a CUV4X and a P3 on a CUSL2 all with my hardware hooked up to it. Guess what? It ran perfectly fine with no lockups at all. These are some of the games I had problems with: Quake3, Nascar4 Demo, Mercedes Benz Truck Racing, Swedish Touring Cars, Hitman just to name a few. Quake3 was the most stable but still did crash on me from time to time.

The reason I'm posting this is because I have read nothing but praise from every single webpage that AMD thunderbirds are the best buy and even outscore Intel on most benchmarking tests. Same when I brought it to the shop i bought it from, they said it runs fine on winstone so it must be my fault. 2nd if anyone can help me to solve this problem I would be forever greatful to them

Anyways thx for your time and help in advance.

J.

 

[RSI]

I would suspect the memory.

But, I have a friend who has a K7M and Athlon 550, and it's not too stable. Gets messed up often, and we couldn't load up Win2K on it.

If you replace the memory and motherboard and it still doesn't work, that's seriously messed up.

I had no stability problems with my K6-2, but that's completely different.

Sorry that you've had so much trouble with it, but don't just ditch AMD because of this trouble. Give them a chance...

-RSI

 

[Dulanic]

Use BIOS 1005 or 1003.... 1004 for some reason causes the problem with System Performance set to Optimal. Its a A7V BIOS issue. Or you can go into the BIOS and set System Performance to Normal instead of Optimal.

 

[Dulanic]

Also it only seems to effect lower quality RAM.... I havent seen anyone with Mushkin or Crucial memory have this problem.

 

[CAMS]

Dont blame AMD just yet, some motherboard are just bug riddle pieces of sh!t that need to be recycled.
I had an asus AV7 that I couldn't get stable. Replaced it with a Abit KT7 (98% stable) blame the OS for 2%.

Have heard MSI & Iwill have few returns. Maybe a new MSI KT7 PRO2-A

 

[Xaryht]

It is a problem in the Bios I believe, relates to ACPI, die AGP speed and memory timings. Not sure what Is actually causing the problem, but here is the fix. In the bios change the cpu speed or system speed not sure what, from optimal to normal. The speed decrease is nominal but your system will be rock solid.

This issue has been discussed before, you can search the general hardware forum for more info.

 

[Mem]

I agree you cannot really blame AMD, some boards need more tweaking then others,btw my own MSI K7T PRO is rock stable on gaming & everything else, also using Geforce2 MX card but with high quality Crucial ram,best hardware I have put together.I hope Xaryht tip helps.

 

[Regalk]

Leave settings at optimal
Back down to det 5.45 drivers
Get Bios 1003 modified with Promise ver.33
I have tried just about all the BIOSes out there and found anything higher than 1003 was a POS.
Try and set RAM speed to SPD initially
And pray...
IT IS NOT A RAM thing. I use generic RAM in all 3 slots 128 x 3. One of the SDRAMs is a Toshiba PC133 which refuses to go higher than 136. In fact I fried one of the gold leads when I got a bit careless inserting it in the slot. Put some Loctite and patched the burnt lead and viola everything works like a charm. The burning smell was in the air for an hour. The other 2 sticks are Hyundai and Mitsubishi.

 

[Dulanic]

One day Im gonna smack people who say its not something just because THEY dont have the problem. The fact is I have never seen the BIOS 1004 lockup issue ever effect anyone with Crucial or Mushkin or smiliar high quality RAM.

 

[bh3]

I have tried to set the Bios to normal and no deal it still locks up. I will however try and grab some higher quality RAM i thought that I had some but maybe not. Thanks guys sounds like this is a fairly big issue that hopefully ASUS will fix in one of there BIOS updates.

J.

 

[mans]

I have exactly the same configuration except the CPU (I've 950Mhz). I also had exactly the same problems you described but I solved them all!! HOW? Ok,

1) Cooling and more cooling for both the CPU and the motherboard. I installed 3 extra fans one above the heat sink and two case fans.

2) Use BOIS version 1003 and latest drivers for Win2K.

3) Switch the motherboard to jumper mode.

 

[mcbiff]

Make sure the Live! is in PCI2, it doesn't like sharing. Put the NIC in PCI4.

 

[Regalk]

Hey there Dulanic - How is the A7V going these days. Driving your self crazy still. Myself I settled on the 1003 hacked BIOS for now with ornery OLD SDRAM I salvaged from my older systems..

ASSSUS A7V
duron 600@927
Sweet 4 bay mid-tower
Asus7100 GF2MX 198/210
Vodoo 3 3000 PCI (dual monitor setup)
NIC (cable and NW)
ATI TV Wonder
384 SDRAM whatever
SB PCI128 works great for me in my playbox (SBlive in my main boxes)
2 monitors (15" and 17&quot

 

[OneEng]

Having an ASUS A7V with a Duron 600@800 myself, the only difference in our systems seems to be the video card and RAM. I have Crucial RAM and a V3 card. Heed the post on the sound card placement as I know from past experience with the SBLive! that it indeed does not like sharing interrupt lines with other cards (it doesn't play nicely with other childern).

Try some better RAM also and keep the timing conservative.

It is unfortunate that you have had such issues getting your system up. Keep the faith. My system has been the most stable one I have ever had. I am an engineer and have several Intel rigs at work (5-10 at any given time) that I work with, and my Duron system at home smokes them all and is more stable.

Definately move the sound card. I had the exact same issue you are having on my old Socket7 system. Moving the sound card was the fix.

 

[novon]

I have this exact instability prob with my 1ghz in 2in3k with fop-38. I will try changing that bios setting, but its frustrating, the lockups at default speed

 

[Dulanic]

Im perfectly fine Im running 1005A and im 100% stable..... My OS on the other hand is different.... hehe RA2 keeps making Win98 stutter like hell once I exit the game. But with Win2K im running good and im happy now.

 

[novon]

where do you get 1005A? Asus.com is down and asus.com.tw only has 1004D

 

[ltk007]

Definately try it with higher quality ram, and make sure the cooling is correctly installed on the tbird. My friend was beating himself over the head with a stick cause he couldn't figure out why his tbird kept locking up. The moron didn't know how to install a heatsink right

 

[novon]

I ripped off the goo on the FOP-38, cleaned it, put on G-47 thermail pretty thin, and installed over TB, just like I have done past CPUs, so I don't know if that's it. But it is getting pretty hot.

 

[Jason Clark]

That is defintely an issue with memory, mabye even power supply. I've had a 1ghz on an a7v for quite a while without a single issue. Gaming, programming, 3d apps you name it. It's entirely to easy to blame a CPU. Let's think in reality here bh3, you're telling me that the thousands of people running an A7V and a Thunderbird are all in the same boat as you? Because of a "supposed" bad mix? Not.

 

[ForeverSilky]

<< The moron didn't know how to install a heatsink right >>


Damn, they show you how to do it on AMD.com

 

[bh3]

With all the posts I've seen it seems to be an ASUS problem and not an AMD problem. Also It might be a memory problem as most of you think, but why then does my RAM work fine in 4 different machines I've tried it in?

 

[Taz4158]

I have a P3 700@933 and P3B-F I've been looking trade for a TBird. Let me know if you're interested.

 

[Xaryht]

I do not think it is not a memory problem. I have generic PC133 ram and all my problems disapeared when I turned off ACPI and changed the system speed setting from Optimal to Normal. That setting turns off AGPx4 and changes the memory timings as well. The differance between AGPx4 and AGPx2 is extremely small sometimes the same.

Somewhere in the bios there is a setting: Plug N Play OS installed? Turn that off. This will disable ACPI and fix a crapload of problems. The IRQ sharing problem of the SBLive will be fixed by doing this in most cases. ACPI has a CPU overhead and causes more problems than anything else, in Win2000 it will make all your devices share the same IRQ and that will just spell trouble for some hardware.

If changing those two settings still does'nt fix your problems then you will just have to wait for the next official bios. I had the same problems and ran the system without any devices except the video card and still had problems. The problem is somewhere on that motherboard, either in hardware or software.

Hope you find a solution