:frown:Starting last Friday, the new PC was essentially complete (faster video pending). NF7-S2G, AMD XP 2800 Barton, two Kingston 256 MB Value RAM PC 3200 DIMMs, Nspire 350 watt PSU, AeroFlow HSF, 80 GB WD800 Primary Hdd, 40 GB Maxtor Secondary Hdd, Liteon CD/DVD Combo, Kingwin KT 424 aluminum case, and a place- holder video, GF TNT to start out. It's my habit to have dual W98/W2K OS's, to have access to my older games. So Win98se goes on first.
But it wouldn't. Numerous odd occurrences. The MS version of a startup floppy would crash, freeze solid, while "Scanning PCI Bus" (Adaptec or Oak Sys CD driver function). Another (www.bootdisk.com) startup would load properly, and give me access to the Win98 Upgrade CD, but the two Setup programs on it then would tell this lie "This program requires Microsoft Windows".
I've often saved time by copying install CDs to a Hdd folder, and almost always do keep such a folder on each system for emergencies. So I'd already made such a folder before putting the Hdd in this new system, and tried to install from there. Numerous fatal errors. What I overlooked at first was the similarities between the memory addresses where the infractions were being reported. And wasted another couple of days on dead ends.
It wasn't a productive weekend at all. I was on the verge of tearing at the few wisps of hair still rooted in their lonely scattered strands across the top of my scalp! Hoping it wasn't a bad motherboard, or some other expensive problem I couldn't get a refund/replacement for. I even had a dream/nightmare last night about this system.
The NF7 has dual channel memory, if desired. I did have the DIMMs in the slots that dual channel is supposed to like best, 3 and 2. I couldn't even get the system to POST with the RAM speed at 200, which should have told me something. Finally, after a cloned install of the C: from this older PC was also getting the BSOD hits, I spotted the repeated memory addresses. Long story shortened -- it runs now, on a single DDR stick in DIMM slot three. It wouldn't even power up with the other DIMM in that slot.
OK, add this in edit. Even with the "bad" DIMM set aside, the other one (or the MB) won't do 200 MHz for memory speed. It acts like it will update, but throws up a large flagged message not to power down while the settings are being saved. And locks up totally right there. On attempted reboot, there is no post. As I recall, there is a key on the keyboard I can hold down and it will ignore settings at first. And that means I have to find the manual. (Where did it walk off to?) OK, found it. Hold down the Insert Key from power-on to get it going.
I'll go back to 166 and see if the Abit CD's drivers change anything!
I have to guess that Kingston made a bad item, probably two. Now, how do I do the RMA, I wonder? Send both back to make sure I have two from the same batch when they replace the bad one? Take a chance that the new one will match up to the one that failed?
:roll:
But it wouldn't. Numerous odd occurrences. The MS version of a startup floppy would crash, freeze solid, while "Scanning PCI Bus" (Adaptec or Oak Sys CD driver function). Another (www.bootdisk.com) startup would load properly, and give me access to the Win98 Upgrade CD, but the two Setup programs on it then would tell this lie "This program requires Microsoft Windows".
I've often saved time by copying install CDs to a Hdd folder, and almost always do keep such a folder on each system for emergencies. So I'd already made such a folder before putting the Hdd in this new system, and tried to install from there. Numerous fatal errors. What I overlooked at first was the similarities between the memory addresses where the infractions were being reported. And wasted another couple of days on dead ends.
It wasn't a productive weekend at all. I was on the verge of tearing at the few wisps of hair still rooted in their lonely scattered strands across the top of my scalp! Hoping it wasn't a bad motherboard, or some other expensive problem I couldn't get a refund/replacement for. I even had a dream/nightmare last night about this system.
The NF7 has dual channel memory, if desired. I did have the DIMMs in the slots that dual channel is supposed to like best, 3 and 2. I couldn't even get the system to POST with the RAM speed at 200, which should have told me something. Finally, after a cloned install of the C: from this older PC was also getting the BSOD hits, I spotted the repeated memory addresses. Long story shortened -- it runs now, on a single DDR stick in DIMM slot three. It wouldn't even power up with the other DIMM in that slot.
OK, add this in edit. Even with the "bad" DIMM set aside, the other one (or the MB) won't do 200 MHz for memory speed. It acts like it will update, but throws up a large flagged message not to power down while the settings are being saved. And locks up totally right there. On attempted reboot, there is no post. As I recall, there is a key on the keyboard I can hold down and it will ignore settings at first. And that means I have to find the manual. (Where did it walk off to?) OK, found it. Hold down the Insert Key from power-on to get it going.
I'll go back to 166 and see if the Abit CD's drivers change anything!
I have to guess that Kingston made a bad item, probably two. Now, how do I do the RMA, I wonder? Send both back to make sure I have two from the same batch when they replace the bad one? Take a chance that the new one will match up to the one that failed?
:roll:
I was aware that the version with the LAN and IDE RAID I ended up ordering was less of an OC-ing dream. I thought that I wanted the additional bits more than the ability to overclock. They don't advertise that it has both RAID capabilities. Only the SATA function is mentioned in their advertising, on their packaging, and on their web site. My initial plan was to get a Gigabyte MB, which did make claims for its RAID of both types.
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