Tyan Tiger MP Boot Problems

[Twinpeaksr]

I have a Tiger MP board and have been using it for about 6 months. It works great when running, but I have been having trouble boting it. i know it is not software, because the problem occurs before Windows 2K even starts to load (well most of the time). i think it may be a BIOS setting but not sure which one. Also there is a significant delay when i boot (this is not from the ECC enabled, because it does it with it disable too, and not on the first virsion of the board). durring this time the monitor is powered down and i do not see any boot image until it starts on my SCSI controller bus scan. System config is below, anyone had this before?

~R~

Tyan Tiger MP 1.04 BIOS
Dual Athlon XP 1600+
512MB Crucial Registered ECC (2 256MB)
Adaptec 29160 SCSI
Matrox G450 eTV
3Com 3C905C-TXNM
SoundBlaster Audigy
NO IDE Devices
Alpha Heatsinks, and 12 Fans (cooling is not an issue)

 

[obenton]

Years ago I had a similar problem - no boot at all (in a BH6, as I recall) if the 3COM NIC and Matrox video card were both in the motherboard. Matrox and 3COM said it was some sort of incompatibility that they were trying to work out. Pull the NIC and see if the problem goes away. It's a longshot, but worth a look.

 

[SUOrangeman]

forums.2cpu.com -> motherboards

-SUO

 

[Pariah]

I had the same problem. Take you Audigy out and see if that fixes the problem. It did for me.

 

[mastertech01]

I had the Tiger and now have the Thunder, and they are simply long booting boards, especially with SCSI. I have 3 SCSI controllers detecting 14 devices so its a pretty long wait in that itself. Almost always the bios goes to SCSI boot first, because it scans so fast that the video doesnt initialize until the SCSI is already being detected. I think these boards use a different order than most anyway. If you want to enter bios you notice you hit F2 and it doesnt enter setup untill everything is detected. I think that is to give a more acurate setting for bootup priority settings. One way to see the initial boot menu is to NOT use fast boot option in bios, but even then you only see it a couple seconds and boom you are at SCSI detection. You might see it long enough to see "entering setup" hit the screen and still you wont enter setup untill all SCSI is detected. Ive used 3 video cards and other hardware changes, but for the most part I think thats just the way it is with these boards and the Phoenix bios...long bootup times. At least it seems long with XP which is supposed to be so fast booting compared to Win2K. I also notice it seems to scan the SCSI controllers twice. Then of course it has to scan networks too.

Give Pariah's idea a shot too and see if that helps, but from my experiences with these boards they just have thier own way of doing business.

 

[Pariah]

He's not having a problem with slow boots mastertech, the problem occurs before it boots. I had the same problem. When you press the power on button, the system will stay idle for 15-30 seconds, with the monitor off before the initial post screen appears with the video BIOS and then the memory count. After that stage the boot process continues normally. Removing my Audigy got rid of the problem. The card worked fine once the system booted, but the long delay at boot was incredibly annoying so I switched it to my second system. Also try disabling your IDE ports.

 

[mastertech01]

I see, thanks for that clarification. That WOULD definitely be annoying. BTW have you been successful in getting SCSI to boot with IDE disabled? I have never on either board been able to make SCSI bootable with the IDE disabled.

 

[Pariah]

I don't recalling ever trying that. I know that my system wouldn't boot if I jumpered my IDE devices to M/S. Unless I used cable select boot was a no go. I'll try later and let you know.

 

[mastertech01]

Much appreciated..

 

[Pariah]

Booted fine, no problems.

 

[Twinpeaksr]

you are all right. I talked with Tyan tech support also, but here is what i found (at least according to them and my testing). first teh reandom failure to rebot was caused by the fact taht i had dual XP and not MP processors. this is still baffleing since it worked for the last 6 months, but then i did update teh BIOS to 1.04 and that is when it got worse. second, though the BIOS is funky when using SCSI and how entering the BIOS occures after the SCSI scan, along with the BIOS knowing the SCSI i am using, the delay (as was stated theat 15-20 seconds of idle) was, according to tyan, due to using a Matrox Video Card. i am not sure why, but that is what they stated. they also told me that because i used crucial memory, they can not verrify proper opperation. i will have to try the thing with the audigy see if the delay is fixed, but i dropped to one processor (i am quite distraught) and the booting does work. so if any one wants to trade me two XP processors for MP, maybe i can utilize this nice dual board with more than one processor. thanks for the help!

~R~

 

[LordAccord]

did you unlock the XPs or are they the older ones that are already mp unlocked?

LoRdAccord

 

[mastertech01]

Im using a Matrox.. no problems like that