Why in the world would my motherboard be frying XP's????

[JJ650]

I have no idea what the heck is going on, but my Epox 8K7A+ has ate 2....freakin 2 XP1800's. Well, it didn't eat them, but burned them more or less.
I put the first one in and turned the machine on. A second or two after I did, I heard a high pitched electrical noise and the machine automatically turned off. I'm assuming a voltage draw was too high and the PS cut the power. I tried again after a minute or two. Same noise and same reaction. I figured 3rd time is a charm. No noise, the puter stayed on but no POST, no beep. Nothing. I took the chip off and immediately noticed the burned smell. She'd dead Jim.
I'm not too entirely upset since the XP was covered by a warranty.
I figured, maybe a bad chip. It happens. So, I try a spare one I have sitting here. It's pristine, never been used and theoretically will work in my box. Same EXACT thing happens to it. Another dead XP ex-machina. I don't have a 3rd one to try, nor would I do it given my current track record.

Epox 8K7A+: 2
AMD: 0

The previous chip to live inside is an Athlon Tbird "C" 1ghz, overclocked to 1.4 ghz. It still works fine when I put it in. And it'll overclock. Before anyone ask, the bios was put to default settings before I put the XP in.

The various bits and parts of my machine will be listed so any of you post-mortem chip guys might be able to figure out something.

PS: TTGI 320 watt
Mobo: Epox 8K7A+
Ram: Corsair DDr 2400, 256 megs
Vid: Ti4400
Sound: SB X-gamer
HDD: Seagate Barracuda


I'm stumped.

 

[Insidious]

I was under the impression, that if a MoBo would run an Athy 1.4, it would be fine with a Palomino ????

If the above is true, it would seem like the only possibilities are something got hoz0red on the MoBo as you were doing the first swap, or
the HSF was not seated (twice in a row........ seems unlikely)

Did you disassemble your machine for the swap? (possible shorted stand-off, etc.... )

 

[Kartajan]

Power Supply?

Note: The "T-Bred" XP's are NOT on the recommended processor list for the 8k7a+; so that MIGHT have something to do with it. Maybe. The "regular" XP's are, so I guess that it SHOULD be working. Maybe flash the BIOS to the latest one with the Classic Athlon in it? Make sure the bus speed is auto detecting? Give a blood sacrifice to the "Hardware God" ?????

Did you manually up the CPU voltage? Or modify voltage? and forget to put it back? I think the classics run on a higher voltage than the XP's, but I don't know (Stuck w/ Intel CPU's since 1998)

 

[JJ650]

The bios was restet to defaults but maybe I should have lowered the voltage manually in the bios. The board does support the Tbred XP's....all except the 1800. Odd. I'll try again when the replacements get here.
Also, the bios is the latest revision.

 

[AnMig]

Take it from me a expert fryer of amd cpu

by the sound of your story on how quick the cpu fried I believe it is a heatsink seating issue.

are you using a shim? that might get dislodged during heatsink placement?

are you using a heatsink mounted to the mother board? there was some issues with this before, something about washers, but if it was working with tbird before it should work.
I would put some conductive grease put your heatsink with out turning on the computer then remove the heatsink and see if you have a nice equal indentation on your heatsink, it should be a nice rectangular shape.

it takes 2-3 sec to fry a a amd cpu and beleive me I know I have fried 2 tbirds when I was starting out (held the heatsink by hand 2 times )
I have also fried 2 1600xps, first one I removed the heatsink but left the cpu in the socket and I guess my mother board powered on when I moved the mouse or keyboard. The last 1600xp fied when I was careless and accidentally moved the sim upon heatsink placement.

good luck

 

[Insidious]

n/m.....

 

[DeschutesCore]

A bad voltage regulator on the board can do this. We used to have an A7V-133 that would cook anything attached to it. Hard drive, video, modem, chip. All of it was bad the minute we plugged it in.

DC

 

[JJ650]

I don't believe it was a heatsink problem. It was seated correctly, I made sure of it. I use ASII grease on my chips and some was applied to the chip. I will try again and update this when I get a replacement.

EDIT

I have no shim for this XP but one on the "C" Tbird which works fine.

 

[Toro 45]

Odd. I'll try again when the replacements get here.

Your going to put another bird in that cooker?

 

[JJ650]

Ehh, why not? SHAKE 'N' BAKE!!!!

Of course if I shake it the harddrives are toast then................

Maybe I shouldn't totally abuse the warranty.