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K7T Pro2A Stability Problem FIXED

J

jjlawren

Member
I've got a new system running that seems completely stable, except when accessing my optical drives. For example, installing programs off of my DVD drive causes the screen to go blank in the middle of the installation and halt the system. I am overclocking (Duron 700 @ 950), but this problem existed before I bumped up the speed. Also, some games which require a CD to play crash upon starting (when the CD check is done). If error codes are needed, I'll try and recreate the problem. There's plenty of cooling, so heat isn't a problem. Here's the rest of the setup if it might help:

MSI K7T Pro2A
Duron 700@950
128MB PC100
GeForce 256 DDR
Sound Blaster Live! Platinum 5.1
Cinemaster C DVD Decoder
3Com Etherfast Card

Any suggestions?
 
How are your IDE devices configured? I read that you fixed the DMA problem in the last thread. Anyway, try different configurations and try different cables.
 
Running on Millennium right now. Primary channel has DVD-ROM (Toshiba SD-M1202) and CD-R (Mitsumi 4801TE), and secondary has two hard drives (Maxtor 46.1GB ATA/100 & WD 8GB ATA/66). They're hooked up master and slave in that order on both channels. DMA is enabled everywhere.

Just a thought... Has anyone had any problems installing the bundled games from a Sound Blaster Live! Platinum 5.1 (Unreal Tournament & Thief 2 specifically)? I remember noticing a problem with these games on my setup before this (just built this system last night). If anything else is needed, just post it here. Thanks.
 
try sticking the hard drives on the primary channel and the optical drives on the secondary channel. I have never heard of anyone running with the hard drives on the secondary channel.
 
I had a problem with this. I had the hard drives on the primary, but I was getting random lockups when I transferred files between them when DMA was enabled. When I switched the channels, my problems transferring files vanished. I'm fairly certain that the optical drive issues aren't IDE related.
 
Just set in the bios the boot order:
1) Floppy
2) CD-ROM
3) Hard Drive
4) Etc..

It'll look for a bootable drive in that order. Doesn't matter what channel each drive is on.
 
Oh ok. It seems like your primary port is problematic, because when your hard drives were on primary it had problems, now your CD-ROMs have problems on the primary.
 
Can you get your hands onto a PCI hd controller? If your primary port is bad, you could easily check by installing another hard-drive controller like a promise 66 or 100.
 
So why is the thread title stated as "K7T Pro2A Stability Problem". Doesnt sound like the mobo's fault!
 
I would have to agree with LXi. If you had problems with your Hard Drives on IDE Channel 1, and now have problems with your CD drives on Channel 1, then it's most likely time for an RMA on that motherboard as your primary IDE channel looks to be faulty.
 
jjlawren, have you tried disabling DMA on your DVD-ROM and CD-ROM drives? The drives you have don't even get close to transfer rate of 100Mb/sec, so disabling DMA shouldn't affect the performance at all. Please let me know how it works out for you.
 
Seemed to have fixed the problem. I killed DMA on the optical drives (funny because I remember being able to run DMA on these drives on another system) and everything works perfectly now. A simpler solution than I expected. Thanks andrey and everyone else.
 
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