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Guest · Posted: Fri Nov 25, 2005 8:32 pm Post subject: Chaintech 7NJL6

So there seems to be a really wide spectrum of opinions on this board.
But I have what I think is a unique problem... in that I that I
couldn't find reference to it here. Several actually.

When the system is powered down and unplugged and then reattached and
powered up, the board clicks repeatedly and the primary hard drive has
problems firing up (the rpm drops each time the board clicks... power
issue?) Occasionally it will stall and just give a single beep every 5
seconds. Hitting Reset or doing a quick start solves the problem
though. Once the drive gets full power and Windows loads, its stable.
(I've tried multiple drives and all have the same result.

The second problem is one I just noticed two days ago. I was working on
the pc and had it plugged into a power strip... the same one that runs
two other pc's (perfectly stable.) Neither of the other boxes were
plugged in, and the pc spontaneously rebooted. This happened probably
about eigth times before I plugged it into a UPS. It hasn't had a
problem since. The reboots had no apparent rhyme or reason.

The final problem is completely unrelated I think. With my old Gainward
MX400 64Mb I had absolutely no problems whatsoever. However, I recently
purchased a PNY GeForce 6600 256Mb. At higher game resolution settings
(on the original Half-Life), artifacts appeared intermittantly, but no
system instability. nVidia said this was a driver. On Return to Castle
Wolfenstein, the entire system would freeze. I lowered the settings and
had the same result. Upgraded the video drivers and had the same
result, as well as freezing whenever a video was activated.

Any ideas or direction would be very helpful.

Sys Specs:
Chaintech 7NJL6 (obviously)... think think there's a newer bios ver.
nForce 2 chipset
Athlon XP 3000+
1.5 GB PC3200 (two PNY, one Ultra)
twin Maxtor 60GB 7200's (the master is starting to get louder... used
to be in a mobile pc)
PNY GeForce 6600 256Mb
Windows 2000
ArcticLite silent fans
No ad-ware, viruses, or mal-ware that were detected as of yesterday.

Guy · GURU Joined: 08 Feb 2005 Posts: 171

The motherboard is solid-state; I cannot imagine what would be "clicking" unless it's coming through the case's front speaker.

I recommend that you seriously test the boot drive for impending failure. Listen closely to determine if the clicking is coming from the hard drive.

Another thing to try is re-seating the ATX power connector from the power supply to the board.

How is that Ultra memory stick working out? Do you have it in the middle slot? Try removing it and see if you get better stability with only the two PNY sticks, in slots 0 and 2.
_________________
Guy

Guest · Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2005 10:32 pm Post subject: Re: Chaintech 7NJL6

Think I may have fixed all but one problem...

2 - The Ultra memory is rock-steady. The PNY for some as yet unknown
reason was topping out at 150 F. Heatspreaders are on the way.

3 - nForce drivers were faulty. nVidia released a new version
11/22/05... fixed the video problem.

Back to the first problem...

I know the mobo is solid. The clicking is the power cycling to the
harddrive. It IS the harddrive... but what's weird is, its any
harddrive. The old master is still running loud... but power still
cycles. The new WD has the same problem. So did a new Hitachi. And a
another new Maxtor.

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

Take a look at this link
http://www.overclockers.com/articles696/
With that amount of RAM & speed, it might apply. Also might be indication the PS isn't cutting the load with that much RAM.
Or maybe the MOBO can't handle carrying that much current. I'm not sure anyone has troubleshot it from this angle. I've seen where some claim a swap of everything but MOBO and no problems, but was the problem centered around this issue? FAIK, it might have been a mobo mounting problem they didn't realize and there have been some of those.

Does anyone know if this MObO will take registered ram?
Spec in book says unregistered, parity or non. From the article listed, it seems registered would be better.

Also those current requirements stir questions relating to STR. Like how much current is required in that state. I see my PS stand-by 5V line only has 2A.

Guest · Posted: Tue Dec 06, 2005 10:32 pm Post subject: Re: Chaintech 7NJL6

I've been wondering about the PS myself. The actual currents fall short
of what is spec'd. 380w PS that has only 220w continuous? I expected
more from Raptor.

Additionally, it finally dawned on me that the mobo has no aux power
connector. So the idea that the board may be under powered has
substance. According to the article, the chips I have are the best
possible configuration... all are x16.

Fixes so far:
1 - remounted mobo
2 - reseated cpu (had a bit too much grease)
3 - pulled PNY chips

Ideas to try:
1 - swap in older gpu (w/o fan)
2 - try single PNY chip (problem may arise when dual channel is active)
3 - swap in larger PS

I'll have to try and isolate the problem further before I could tell
you whether the mobo problem is a power issue. As far as the RAM is
concerned, I'm inclined to say unregistered, but I haven't tried
registered in it yet.

Guy · GURU Joined: 08 Feb 2005 Posts: 171

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

Guy,
There is some misrepresentation in that piece. I've used a ton of these molex pins and pins of this size will accomadate up to 16 ga wire which will handle far more than 6A. It would be more in the order of 10A, but I don't know what guage of wire is ran to the connector and of course the runs on the MOBO would be an issue. They are not very thick and I don't know if there are several runs, maybe in different layers of the board from each pin. Also runs inside the mobo rather than on the surface will not dissapate the heat as well.
From the link I posted you can see that carefully choosing your RAM can decrease the current demand. Also I've noted that in the manual it states 2.5 V RAM. Having looked through quite a bit of the stuff, I feel like I'm trying to arrange the alphabet in a bowl of soup. I've seen some saying 2.5, 2.6, 2.5 to 2.8, 2.6 to 2.8, plus some saying 2.5 at pc2800 & 2.6 needed for running at pc3200. So I guess the next step is a response from Chaintech as to how rigid that voltage is. I see in the manual where the cpu core voltage changes with some cpu's, but have no idea how it is accomplished. And have to wonder if voltage is adjusted when you do custom settings in the bios. And the same for RAM voltage. I think it mentioned in my posted link that as the voltage goes up so does the current.

I've often thought those molex pins were elcheapo, but they haven't been used in circuits keeping the plane in the air for a long time. Still fires aren't good. They do come gold plated as well and I would have hoped for at least that on power critical circuits of a computer, even though it doesn't fly.

I had that clacking of the HDD, and tracked it to a power issue. Possibly a short, but no proof of that. But after reseating each connector several times to scrape away any surface oxidation and then lightly coating with silicone grease to prevent any further oxidation, it fired up and had no problems since about 6 months ago. Since you are using two drives, Guest, make sure you have the jumpers correctly installed on the drives also. I think this mobo is also supposed to be able to do cable select.
Find a reference for this brand of bios to learn the meaning of the beep code. Listen carefully to make sure it isn't a string of short beeps packed closely together.
Speed fan will give you temps but nothing else at this time, except data to HDD.
I avoid conductive paste because it is *** near impossible to get the correct amount. Too much and you short pins, not enough and you know. It seems phase change material is highly recommended and supposed to do a better job of filling voids than paste. Not sure that lapping helps as I never tried.
You say you have 3K XP. Is that one with 333 or 400 FSB?
What speeds are you running it and the RAM at?
Dual channel is supposed to be active only when using slot 1 & 3 (or 0 & 2), although I've seen contrary posts without supporting test data.

Guy · GURU Joined: 08 Feb 2005 Posts: 171

This 3000 XP is the 333 MHz version; the RAM is PC 3200, and the board memory frequency setting is 200 MHz. It is 8 ns RAM running with a CAS latency of 3. At 2.5, it becomes unstable.

The FSB is set at 166, and I had to clear the CMOS several times while attempting to overclock the chip to 200.

I have not bothered to lap a heatsink; nothing I have at my workbench is more precise than a manufacturing plant. I am more likely to bevel the edges than make the bottom flatter!
_________________
Guy

uddarts · Guest

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