CPU passes torture test, but chokes in Photoshop??

[jrichrds]

A 366@578Mhz/2.0v PPGA Celeron was recently replaced with a 600@945Mhz/1.8v FCPGA Celeron. Nothing else changed in the system, and the bus speed also stayed the same at 105Mhz.

The new CPU passes the SiSoft CPU Burn-in Wizard running continuously for an hour, and works fine everywhere else. But it chokes in Photoshop, with simple things like moving the contrast slider, cropping an image, and printing. The PC (Win2kSP3) will freeze up and need a reboot.

I reduced the CPU speed to the default of 600Mhz/1.7v and was able to reproduce the same freezes in Photoshop. So I'm at a loss as to why this is happening, as the only thing that changed in the system was the CPU. Reloading an image of my c: drive from before I switched the CPU doesn't cure the problem, so it doesn't seem to be due to a program I installed later on either.

Any ideas?
Is it possible for a CPU to be able to handle burn-in tests with 100% load, yet freeze in certain programs?

System specs:
Asus P3B-F with Tekram FCPGA slotket
512MB Crucial PC133 (4 128mb)
Maxtor DiamondMax Plus8
Promise Ultra100 PCI
3dfx Voodoo3 AGP
3COM NIC
SBLive MP3+

 

[ChampionAtTufshop]

try prime95 torture test for about 10-12hrs
next try memtest86

it could be a ram problem

 

[THUGSROOK]

SciSoft Sandra is a joke.....

use Prime95 and Memtest86 for at least 5 hours each.

 

[oldfart]

Believe it or not, it's an ASUS bug. It is said to also happen on some Dell PCs. I had the same problem with my P3B-F. Never on any other mobo. Check it out You can get around it by disabling MMX extensions, which slows things down. I still had the crashes.

 

[jrichrds]

Originally posted by: oldfart
Believe it or not, it's an ASUS bug. It is said to also happen on some Dell PCs. I had the same problem with my P3B-F. Never on any other mobo. Check it out You can get around it by disabling MMX extensions, which slows things down. I still had the crashes.

Wow, that sucks. If I had known, I wouldn't have ever upgraded from my previous PPGA Celeron.

Thanks for letting me know. If you hadn't told me, I'd probably be ripping my hair out for the next week figuring out why it's happening.

Did Asus ever come out with a fix for this? (one that wouldn't cause my 945Mhz FCPGA Celeron to perform worse than my previous 578Mhz PPGA Celeron).

The electrical problem on the affected motherboards is triggered by computer operations that use the pathway (called a bus) between the processor and the RAM for an extended number of microseconds. This problem can be triggered by the operating system or other applications; however, it often appears when using Photoshop because few other applications move memory as rapidly as Photoshop does.

This problem occurs with Dell Optiplex GX1 computers and ASUS P2B-F and P3B-F motherboards and may also occur with other motherboards.

 

[oldfart]

I dont know if Asus ever came up with a fix. I haven't had the board for awhile now.