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Dave · Guest

The Continuing 4PDA2+ nightmare.....

Antec SLK3700BQE case
P4 2.8 ghz
2 - 256 meg PC3200 crucial, dual channel
Zalman CNPS7000Cu cooler/Arctic Silver 5
Antec trupower 430 w psu
Radeon 9600
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz
36 gig Raptors Raid 0
Maxtor slaves
Win2K SP2
No OC, standard timings

As noted in a previous thread, I was having stability problems with my
4PDA2+ machine. BSOD on boot, spontaneous reboots, etc. Turns out
there were failing caps all over that board.

So I bought and installed a new 4PDA2+. The system is still
unstable. No BSOD on boot or spontaneous reboots--now I have
spontaneous shutdowns.

It is not the psu, ram, video card, or drives--all changed out. A
typical crash scenario is to start an AVG scan with Outlook Express,
Firefox, and Agent running--shutdown. But I've had shutdowns with the
machine simply idling with OE, Firefox and Agent running.

I've ghosted back to several installations known to be good with no
change in behavior. Crashes are not restricted necessarily to one or
two running process scenarios, so I don't think it's a software
problem.

I'm suspecting CPU damage from the old bad-cap board, but running CPU
Burn-in and Prime95 simultaneously--100% cpu usage--will not make it
crash.

Disabling the ACPI shutdown temperature function in BIOS seems to have
improved the situation (Faulty temp sensing, which I had on #1
4PDA2+?). Bumping up Vcore and Vdimm 0.1 volts seems to have improved
things a bit more, but hard to tell with a problem such as this. Too
intermittent and unpredictable.

I can only tentatively conclude that my CPU is marginal or the new
mobo is defective. It is tempting to completely scrap the Epox build
and go with another brand mobo at this point. Maybe AMD as well.
Dave
[It's possible that the Zalman/Arctic silver installation is
incorrect, but I doubt it. I've done it too many times.]

dave · Guest

Yeah, I would suspect shutdown temp in bios triggering this. What kind of
temps are you seeing? Is there an updated bios for the motherboard? You
might also try another PSU (3rd).

DaveL

"Dave" <ddhartwick@NO_SPAMearthlink.net> wrote in message
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Zed · Guest

Dave,
30 C at idle, 45-50 at 100%. 70 F ambient. Think it has latest
bios--4/19/04, but think bios is buggy. Maybe a re-flash?

I've had ACPI shutdown temp disabled and it's been fine.

I should buy a new beefy PSU. I'll use it in my next build if I have
to throw this thing out the window. Thanks for your response.
Dave

dave · Guest

A bios either works or it doesn't. No need to reflash. What you might try
is to flash back to a previous bios. But I think this board or it's bios
has a problem with APCI implementation. I think disabling APCI is your work
around.

DaveL

"Zed" <Zed@earthlink.net> wrote in message
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Dave · Guest

Dave,
You're right--it looks like disabling APCI is a work around. Behavior
is improved--no shutdowns since, but I've had a lock-up on boot. Not a
bsod, just a lock midway through boot-up.

Reboot was ok and the machine is definitely useable, but I really
dislike situations like this. I'm loathe to throw any more time or
money into this "aging" machine. The temptation is a new build.

What would you do? New build or continue troubleshooting this thing?
If new, Intel or AMD and what mobo? P965's like Asus P5B-xx or Giga
GA-965P-S3 plus some C2d variant seem popular, but I thought I read
you mentioning AMD socket 939 as the way to currently go in a previous
thread. I've read a ton and it's overwhelming, as usual. Tom's and
Anand, for example, worry too much about OCing, which I think is
nuts.

Too bad, since a fully functional 4pda2+ platform offers more than
enough of everything for me for quite a while. I've got an 8K7A+
machine which with some upgrades (cpu, ram) would be sufficient, but
everythings going sata, PCIe, etc.
Dave

On Tue, 20 Feb 2007 08:18:01 -0800, "dave" <nospam> wrote:

dave · Guest

If I were you I'd still try another PSU. Preferably a non Antec one. There
could be a compatibility issue there. But that would probably be the end of
my troubleshooting. You might try simply replacing the motherboard with
another 875 based board. That way you would not have to reload the hard
drive. Beyond that, you could go hog wild and use this as an opportunity to
make the leap to a Dou Core setup.

DaveL

"Dave" <Zed@earthlink.net> wrote in message
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