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new computer build--any advice appreciated

T

twkiv

Junior Member
Hi there

Hope this is the right place to be posting this...

Just built a new system for DAW (digital audio workstation) use only:

Asus NForce2 A7N8X mobo (400/333/266/200 mhz fsb?)
AMD Athlon XP 2.8ghz cpu (333 mhz fsb)
1 gig (2x 512mb) Corsair PC3200xl ddr ram (400mhz fsb?)
Maxtor 80gb hard drive (programs, swap file)
Maxtor 250gb hard drive (audio data)
Asus 64mb video
Antec slk 1650 case w/350 watt ?smart? power supply (quiet)
Windows XP home edition

(hardware purchased from NewEgg?very quick order processing/delivery, btw)

It?s running winxp okay so far (I haven?t installed my Delta44 soundcard or Guitar Tracks Pro v.3 audio interface yet)...her are the bumps I?ve encountered so far...

*On startup, the system information reports a ?memory frequency? of 200mhz...shouldn?t this be 400mhz? Isn?t this supposed to be the FSB? Please correct me if I?m wrong...I have the jumpers set on the motherboard correctly to allow for the higher bus speeds...

*On startup, the system information reports a ?CPU of unknown type?1250 mhz?. The control panel in winXP reports a ?CPU of unknown type?1.24 ghz?. Any ideas on how to make my Bios and winXP know that this machine has an AMD Athlon XP 2.8 ghz cpu?

*When I go into my Bios to try to make adjustments (and even when I make no adjustments), I press F10 to ?save and exit bios? the computer does not continue booting up. Fans are running, blank screen...but nothing else. Monitor is not even reporting ?no signal? like it usually does... What I tried initially was to (hard) power off, then turn the computer back on. Nothing (in terms of bios or OS). Fans running, monitor reporting ?no signal?. No startup info, or anything. What I ended up doing is using the jumper on the motherboard to reset the bios to its defaults. This is not helping in terms of making adjustments to the bios, if needed. Do I need to ?flash? my bios? I?d rather not, without some thoughts from other folks...

Please forgive my ?newbie?-ness...

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
Tom
 
the ram is DDR so it runs at 200mhz, but does work on the rising and falling side of the cycle, so that should be correct. As for the other probs I think the best corse of action is a bios flash. I know it sounds pretty intemedating the first time, but it's really not too bad. I think that will fix most of the problems you're having. 🙂 Hope all goes well, and welcome to the forum!
 
AMD does not make a 2.8Ghz CPU

your ram should say 200, its Double Data Rate (DDR) which gives it an effective clock of 400, but bios reads 200.

what you need to do is set you front side bus of your CPU to 166, right now i think its at 100, resulting in slower clock frequencies.
 
Originally posted by: nick1985
AMD does not make a 2.8Ghz CPU

your ram should say 200, its Double Data Rate (DDR) which gives it an effective clock of 400, but bios reads 200.

what you need to do is set you front side bus of your CPU to 166, right now i think its at 100, resulting in slower clock frequencies.
Click to expand...


I think he meant 2800, and if it is a 2800, then yes the fsb should be 166 (remember DDR, so 166*2= 333 [well, technicaly 332] which is what the 2800 is rated for)
 
Wow, you could have gotten a socket 939 Athlon 64 system instead.... if you just bought all that at todays prices... ah well.
 
Thanks for your thoughts.

I guess I need to start contemplating the 'biting of the bullet', ie; flashing my bios.

If only I could just figure out why the bios won't let me save to it. Oh well...

Thanks again.
Tom
 
Thanks for your thoughts.
Major breakthrough!!!

I was searching around my bios...looking into some of the ideas that folks had offered.
There is a setting there that allows the memory setting to be ?set by SPD? (I don?t know what ?SPD? is?my mobo manual doesn?t say, either...any thoughts???)...the other option is ?auto?. I changed this setting from ?auto? to ?SPD?. I also changed my clock speed to 166 because (as I have been corrected on) the AMD 2800 (yes, 2.08ghz, NOT 2.8ghz as I had originally thought) DOES NOT have a 400mhz fsb, it runs (as people wiser than myself have pointed out) at 333mhz fsb.

Lo and behold, the comp booted right up, no problems whatsoever. The startup system info still says ?cpu of unknown type?, but the speed is correct. System info also reports that the ram is running at 200mhz, but I think that?s just because of the type of ram it is (Corsair DDR 1gb PC3200xl rt).

At this point I need to put it through its paces recording digital audio. I will do this as soon as I get my old comp ready to give to my parents, which is where it?s headed.

The comp doesn?t really seem to be loading programs or running much faster than it had been (running an AMD Athlon 1800, 768mb sdram on an Epox board), but I don?t think I should really be expecting ?leaps and bounds? above and beyond the speed I was seeing with the old system. The main thing I was hoping to get from an ?upgraded? system was stability. I was starting to see ?dropouts? (that?s what Cakewalk?my audio interface?calls them. Not quite ?crashes?, but close) with the older system, as my recorded audio files got larger and more cumbersome for my old comp.

At this point, I don?t think I?ll feel gypped if I get the stability I was searching for. I also have yet to make all the tweaks to Win XP that digital audio aficionados make to our machines. Faster would be nicer though...

We?ll see...

Thanks again for all your thoughts.
Tom
 
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