zenn0913

Hello All!

I have a PC I just put together for my girlfriend and occasionally without warning the computer will just reset and load windows. No error messages or anything it will just reboot.

Here is my components-
Abit AN7 Mobo
AMD Athlon XP 3000+ (200*10.5 OC'd to 200*11 2.2ghz) Just switched from a 2900+ with locked multiplier
2GB Kingston PC3200
40GB Samsung HD IDE (OS is installed on this drive with very few other programs after my last format I noticed that it makes a soft clicking noise now while running but not all the time)
250GB Hitachi Deskstar IDE
500W Ultra X-Finity PSU
PNY Verto GeForce 7600GS

Now, just this morning I set the CPU back to 200*10.5 to see if it stops my crashing problem and when I get home I am going to P95 my system to see if this has fixed it. I think I pick up a virus or something a few days ago which ended in my re-installing WinXP SP2 Media Center Edition. I have ran Symantec Anti-Virus, Ad-Aware Pro, SpyBot S&D, and Windoze Defender and found no problems. If anyone can think of other things that may help me please respond.

Thanks for your help!

Daley347

I'd say that it's a PSU issue, Zenn. However, I would've thought that 500W would be fine.. Wait for some comfirmation from one of the more seasoned techies around here.

zenn0913

I just bought this PSU about 2-3 weeks ago because I was having issuses with my old 450W with my video card. I did the wattage calculator on newegg.com which said I should use atleast 414W but I have 5 LED fans, a Vantec AeroFlow, and a buff video card running so I bought the 500W. I did not have the reboot issues before I did this last install of MCE (The tower had regular XP on it before) I also ran Registry Booster 2 along with the other programs I mentioned above.

Daley347

There's also the possibility of a RAM issue, download memtest and post the results.

zenn0913

this is what I was kind of thinking. Is it possible for a virus to mess up your ram? I know there would be enough onboard there for something to install itself onto. I will do this tonight along with P95. Will I still need a floppy to run this?

Daley347

It is highly unlikely that your RAM has a virus, since everytime you reboot the RAM will "wipe" itself clean, if you like.
However, try scanning for viruses using your resident Anti-Virus software.

Also, try a scan at PandaScan

Post back the results, when complete.

zenn0913

refer to my first post to see which scans I have run already. Im glad to hear what you said about the RAM though Daley!

Daley347

Hmm, it's highly unlikely that it is a virus then, if none of those have picked up anything.

The only things I can think of at this point are;

a) Power Supply failure.
b) RAM failure.
c) Overheating - Try going into your BIOS settings and disabling "Reboot when temperature exceeds "X" degrees" or whatever the setting is.

Sorry I can't be of more help.

zenn0913

I run a consitant 37-39c, but i can test it. I have been running winamp remote all day and have not had trouble with connection (I have it set so it has to be started manually no when windows starts so thats a good sign I still have connection because If it restarted I would not have accsess to my files. Hopefully it may have just been an issue with my overclocking the CPU. I will get more testing time when I get home from work tonight. Will let you guys know about the MemTest results as well as P95. I am only going to let this run for about an hour to see if I get any lock ups or reboots. Will the MemTest 86+ ISO run if I just mount it with PowerISO or UltraISO? The PSU is almost brand new so I hope that isn't my problem. Thanks for giving me some suggestions, Now I have another starting point

Daley347

PowerISO will be fine, as far as I know.

And i'm glad I could be of some help, good luck, Zenn!

zenn0913

Ok, Memtest gave me errors on Test #5 but no others, I ran Stress Prime 2004 which gave me an error after less than a min. I have pics of the MemTest86 errors If you need to know exactly what it says. Here is the info from Stress Prime -

[Type: Blend - stress CPU and RAM Min: 8 Max: 4096 InPlace: No Mem: 1791 Time: 15
CPU: 2094MHz FSB: 200MHz [199MHz x 10.5 est.]
1/25/2008 8:45 PM Beginning a continuous self-test to check your computer.
Press Stop to end this test.
Test 1, 4000 Lucas-Lehmer iterations of M19922945 using 1024K FFT length.
FATAL ERROR: Rounding was 0.5, expected less than 0.4
Hardware failure detected, consult stress.txt file.
Torture Test ran 0 minutes 48 seconds - 1 errors, 0 warnings.
Execution halted.]

zenn0913

Here is the settings in my BIOS as well -

CPU: AMD Athlon XP 3000+
Ext. Clock: 200mhz
Multi. Factor: 10.5
AGP Freq: 66mhz
CPU FSB/DRAM Ratio: (was Auto) now switched to By SPD
CPU Interface: Disabled

Power Supply Controller System Default (User Define also available)

CPU Core: 1.656v
DDR SDRAM: 2.65v
NB Core Voltage: 1.60v
AGP Voltage: 1.55v


Adv. Chipset Features

Enhance PCI Performance: Disabled
CPU Disconnect Fuction: Enabled
Memory Timings: By SPD
8
3
3
3

FSB Spread Spectrum:0.50%
AGP Spread Spectrum: 0.50%
AGP Data Transfer Rate: Auto
AGP Fast Write: Enabled
CPU Thermal Throttling: 0.50%
System BIOS Cacheable: Enabled
Video RAM Cacheable: Enabled

I am currently idle @ 36-37c

Daley347

This deffinately looks to be a RAM failure/issue, as opposed to a PSU failure.

I'd recommend picking up some new RAM, or asking a friend if he has any that you could borrow just to make sure it is the RAM.

zenn0913

Last Night I decided to test each stick. I dont know why this did not occur to me earlier but after doing so each stick passed memtest and I was able to run SP2004 for about 10min without error. I think my board was trying to run the RAM in dual channel mode which was causing my problem. So far so good after the change. Its not like we really needed 2gb of RAM. I just switched the other stick into my secondary tower because it only had 512mb before. Thanks for the help.

2pistolpacker

Hi zenn0913, I believe your instability problems result from simple bios misconfiguration, overclocking without an increase in voltage. Bump your memory voltage up 1 click, and start the core voltage at 1.675, go to the next increment if needed. The Nforce2 chipset sweetspot on memory timings are 2.5-3-3-11. Do not run your memory "by spd", run at 100%. Alot of overclockers bump the memory voltage as high as the bios allows, it has a lifetime warranty and personally I have never had a stick go bad from overvolting. The cpu needs good cooling to overclock, some chips like the Barton 2500 can be OC'd with just an increase in FSB and maybe, just maybe a slight bump in voltage, others need a combination of changes. Just watch your core temps. Not since my last Via chipset board, have I owned a computer that was not overclocked, to me it's just wasted potential. Mike

On edit: dual channel is a good thing, this board will naturally run your memory this way if the memory is in the right slots.

__________________



Speak kindly to me, beloved master. Revel in my unconditional love, and give me every minute that you can spare, for my time with you is short.
--Your faithful dog

zenn0913

when you say "100%" what is the ratio for that? I have many options from 1/1 to 6/6. If you know which settings I need to change please let me know. I switched my timing to 2.5-3-3-11 but I did not change my ram voltage. There are so many settings I don't want to mess something up.

2pistolpacker

Zenn, 100% is 1/1 when you OC the cpu you have to OC the memory, also in advanced chipset features disable "CPU Thermal Throttling". Follow the steps in my last post to try and stabilize your computer. Some cpu's will not overclock without a bump in core voltage and/or memory voltage. I currently have 2 systems that are identical to yours, they have been OC'd like this for 3 years, the only changes that have had to be made were swapping video cards for better gameplay, and one board had a failed NB fan.

This is a good read for anyone who wants understand the basics of overclocking and to get that little bit of extra performance from their systems, be aware that not all chipsets are as easy to overclock as yours is.

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1804&page=2.

__________________



Speak kindly to me, beloved master. Revel in my unconditional love, and give me every minute that you can spare, for my time with you is short.
--Your faithful dog