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John P. Dearing · Guest

Group,

Founf this newsgroup after Googling for some answers for problems I've
also been having with the 7NJL6 motherboard.

I teach an A+ prep class at a local college and we got the Chaintech
motherboards recently and have had nothing but problems with them. Same
problems as earlier reported in this very group. Things like NO POST,
unstable, have to throttle the settings way back to get the system
stable enough to boot, unable to successfully load Windows, etc...

We also got them through Tiger Direct and are in the process right now
of getting them RMA'd and swapping them out with MSI boards.

Bottom line, if you're having *any* problems with this motherboard, get
rid of it right away. Don't waste your time and energy on it. There
seems to be a big bunch of bad boards out there and if you got one of
them, you're scr**ed.

I have some thoughts on the matter.

One big thing I noticed right away is that this motherboard *DOES NOT*
have the second, auxiliarry power connector so common on system boards
for Athlon (and P4) class processors. Every other motherboard that
supports this class of CPU that I've seen has the extra 4 position power
connector in addition to the regular P1 ATX power connector.

My understanding was that when Intel and AMD came out with their newer,
faster CPU's (P4's and Athlon/Duron) that there was a limit to just how
much current could be safely delivered through the ATX's P1 power
connector. The auxiliarry power connector solved that problem by
providing additional power directly where needed.

I'm wondering if this motherboard was originally designed for the older,
slower CPU's that didn't draw that much current. When you put a newer,
faster CPU in, it pulls too much current, causing the system to become
unstable or resulting in the power supply shutting down on overcurrent.

I realize this is a "shot in the dark" as it were, but I just don't
understand why Chaintech left out the extra power connector.

Just my $0.02.

Cheers!

John
--
John P. Dearing
A+, Network+, Server+
To reply: Just drop "YOURPANTS" in my address! 8-)

nthums1 · Forum Regular Joined: 20 Aug 2005 Posts: 47

Gee, I thought I said that, so dito.
Also there are a number of other somewhat unresolved questions, not necessarily problems. But too, it seems many of the problems of putting this board into use are user induced. No heat sink paste is common and some trying to install with an install disk that requires formatting the drive first so it will be recognized. Little gotcha's that just become big headaches.
I'm using a modular PS, and my first install was full of headaches. Likely many cabling related. I coated all the pins with anti-corrosive silicon grease, preformed the cables and with this install everything is much better. About one lock a day which might be sleep related and my USB2 HDD not as fast as I'd like, which may be the drive.
Another headache was the install of ATI 9600 pro. Something about it's media center bar will cause lockups and blue screens, especially with winamp.
Also remaining is the question of which is really slot 0 for the RAM. Other makers of similar design, chipset, etc. , from pictures some have posted for setting up dual channel, apparently use slot 1 and 2 for dual channel. This leaves 0 empty, unless they are numbering the slots out of order. Utilities I've run complain I have RAM in 1 with 0 empty. This doesn't agree with Ctech's manual, so who is wrong. May try moving my stick to see if it boots, but that may not be definitive except for those using other RAM that are having problems using the same config as I. In other words, moving their's might be necessary.
Also one reviewer of the Zenith board found no paste under the north bridge heat sink. Ctech said it wasn't needed. Well, I wouldn't want to hold my finger on it for a long time, and certainly will be checking mine when I open it up. Also I noticed if I held my finger dead center on the sink of the south bridge it was uncomfortable. Almost if it was only making contact at that exact spot and the heat dissipated quickly as you moved from center. I'd bet no paste. I really dislike those who promote glitz. No substance behind it, if you know what I mean.
I've been running for a few days now, and what the heck, let's see if I can crank up some of the speeds beyond optimal. Later.