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"General Protection Fault" & XP 2000+...please help

K

KZero11

Junior Member
I just installed a new cpu (Athlon XP 2000+) and a motherboard (GigaByte GA-7VAXP), and I'm trying to install WinXP to a brand new harddrive. However, everytime I boot up the computer it either freezes or displays "General Protection Fault" before it even runs the XP setup disk in my A drive.

Interestingly, when I decrease the cpu speed from 1.67Ghz (133Mhz x 12.5) to 1250Mhz (100Mhz x 12.5) the computer seems to load the XP set up just fine. Is this due to a defective cpu and/or motherboard? If anyone has an idea as to what's causing this, I would really appreciate the help.

Thanks
- KZero11
 
try swapping the ram (its the easiest, and msot often the culprit)

do you have a 2ndary computer?
see if yuou can d/l memtest86 and run it

also, instead of using the xp setup floppy, try booting off the cd
 
Hmm...tried swapping the RAMs but it didn't make any difference. It still gives me "general protection fault" or just powers down on its own before it even gets to the error message. And unfortunately my XP disc doesn't boot on its own.

 
Sounds like your CPU is running hot, check your Temp's and make sure your heatsink is installed correctly.
 
Run a prog called "memtest86" to determine it's not the RAM. I also suspect tht the RAM is @ fault here.
 
I had tons of errors like yours while install the op sys...it turned out to be the Motherboard.

Tuff
 
Originally posted by: KZero11
Hmm...tried swapping the RAMs but it didn't make any difference. It still gives me "general protection fault" or just powers down on its own before it even gets to the error message. And unfortunately my XP disc doesn't boot on its own.
Click to expand...
Do you have the drive the CD is in set as the first boot device in the bios? or is it an upgrade copy or somethin'? Also, what brands and speed of ram have you tried? Are they set by SPD? what PSU as was mentioned that could be the culprit too.
 
Sounds like your CPU is running hot, check your Temp's and make sure your heatsink is installed correctly
Click to expand...

I agree with Silky, it sounds like the chip is overheating when the OS stresses it a bit while trying to install.
 
Make sure you run everything at default speeds when you INSTALL software. Most of the time you will get errors like this especially when you do a First install with the OS. It is critical that you do.


Docs Operations
 
Thanks all...it seems like the thermal material on the heat sink was damaged while the cpu was installed. I'll see if replacing it will do the trick.

- KZero11
 
Try using a good thermal compund like artic silver 2 in combo with a cool heatsink like volcano 9+. You'd be suprised how much these inexpensive steps can increase performance and stabability. BTW I had the same issue with my amd xp 2000+ and right after I swaped my crappy PC Chips m817lr with an ASUS A7N8X, things were running smoothly😉
 
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