Problems with Asus A7A266

[MobySlick]

I'm having HUGE problems with my A7A. For one, 90% of the time it locks up getting into Windows ME. And I can't get into Safe Mode at all. Two, I can't get my SB Live to install - I load LiveWare and it looks fine, but I reboot and go into Device Manager and the sound card has the yellow exclamation point over it. No resource conflicts, just doesn't work. I tried three different PCI slots too. Lastly, the chip (Athlon 1.2 GHz) runs at about 61 Celsius, which is too damn hot! I'm using a stock heatsink and fan, but I expected it to be cooler than that!

Here's a question: does anyone think reformatting the HD, flashing the BIOS to the latest, and reinstalling Windows from the ground up would solve my problems (other than heat)? Could the CPU temperature be causing crashes at 61C?

PS Anyone know where to get BIOS version 1005 or 1006? On the Asus site they only have 1004.

 

[Mem]

Leave the SBlive card to last see if you can get it stable first that way you can narrow the problem,61c is too hot and you should try for lower temps,check the heatsink is seated correctly and try it with the case open,you need to find out the exact problem you can always change the heatsink/fan for a better one.SBlive cards have been known to give problems and some people have even changed to a different brand.

I would definetly sort cooling out first since bad cooling will cause problems then take it from there.

 

[AndyHui]

What else do you have in your system?

If you have 2 DDR DIMMs operating at 133/266MHz, make sure that you change the position of the unmarked jumper located at the end of the AGP Pro slot. You will have an unstable system otherwise.

There do seem to be issues with the SBLive on this board.

Try the newest BIOSes,

Version 1005 Final or
Version 1006 Beta 001.

You may want to set IRQ 5 to reserved in the IRQ Resource Exclusion List in the BIOS...that usually seems to help with SBLive problems.