BIOS freezing up

[bebop06]

Hey guys, I just built my new system (the one in my sig), flashed the BIOS with a floppy to the 11/14/2005 revision. When I went back into the BIOS to change some settings, it would freeze up on random screens, and the motherboard would beep when I hit any key. A few hours later I read that I was supposed to clear the CMOS, so I unplugged, hit the power switch a few times, changed the jumper setting, took the battery out, changed the jumper back, and put the battery back. Same thing keeps happening, though it doesn't freeze every time--sometimes I spend minutes moving around in the BIOS, and it's totally fine--and sometimes it doesn't freeze for ten or twenty seconds.

 

Last time it froze at the LanParty screen when I hit Delete to enter BIOS. That time it seems that two red LEDs were on (which means that the video card and RAM are fine, but the CPU hasn't been picked up yet?), but maybe it just froze at that point. Normally it beeps once at start up, the red LEDs go down to one, then vanish when Windows boots. This might be unrelated (and normal), but at boot-up I hear a reving up (I think it's the heatsink fan), then it goes quiet, and then starts up again a few seconds later (and remains on).

 

I ran MemTest86 through one pass, and I had no errors.

 

Another strange thing: I've installed Windows XP, and after I restarted following an installation, the computer didn't restart. The power remained on and the fans kept blowing, but the monitor was in power-save. When I manually hit restart on my case, it rebooted. This might be unrelated, but the power LED and HDD LED aren't lighting up on my case: I've checked that I have the lights connected right (I keep the labeled side of the LED connectors facing up), but they remain off.

 

Not sure what I should do. Should I try a different BIOS version? I'm not sure if the original BIOS was freezing--I only looked around for a few seconds before updating. I'm not doing any overclocking or anything (actually I'm running my DDR500 RAM at 200MHz), so I'm not sure what the problem could be.

[red930]

The way the LED Diagnostics works is it would start with all four LEDS on and slowly turn off one by one until all are off. So it actually works the other day around, stating that it's having problems initializing your X1900XT for some reason i think. Do you have all FOUR power connectors connected to your motherboard? Have you checked the 6pin PCI-E power connector if it's connected properly? Okay don't take the battery out and just make sure you have the power cord disconnected and clear then wait for 1min and then put the jumper back to normal. Turn it on and go into the bios and see if the settings were defaulted at all? Tell me what happens...

 

Note:Make sure your memory is getting at leave 2.6v @default as well....

[bebop06]

Yes, all I have all four power connectors on the motherboard, and I have the 6-pin connected to the 1900XT, as well. I'll try changing the jumper to reset the board and tell you what happens.

 

Is there any test I can do to make sure the video card is working? When I'm in Windows, all the lights are off (except the happy orange light)--it was just that one time that it froze on two red LEDs.

 

I'll post back in 30 minutes or so.

[KimTjik]

To backtrace and make sure you got the setup right, you could use Ed Jacobsen's guide as a check list.

 

If you don't find any potential cause of the problem then let's see. About the leds and your video card: when your computer has started to boat a OS this is indicated by all four red leds being off. So that's fine.

 

Edit: (about BIOS) you could try to flash the older 2005/06/23 BIOS, since the main reason for the newer one you're now using isn't relevant, a FX-60 CPU. I can't say if that has anything to do with, but previously I know about one user who encountered problems by using that BIOS without having a FX-60. Of course, I could also be a coincident - I'm not an expert.

[red930]

Well, before i was with ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 using 2x512 OCZ EL DDR400 BH-5 and the OCZ DDR Booster i would get into the Bios and it would freeze because of the Booster voltage fluctuation since i wasn't slightly upping it and accidently went up from 3v to 3.5v and bam! Why don't you run just one stick of memory in the orange slot furthest from the socket and test it with Memtest #5 for at least 25 to 30 times vice versa to see if one of your memory sticks are bad or not? Since there has been incidences where G.SKILL F1's were bad DOA, so i would take that step if i were you, okay?

Another thing take out that SONY DVD-RW and the Sound Blaster to see if that helps just for testing. I would install CPU w/HSF, one stick of memory, PSU hooked up with all four power connectors, along with Video card and one hard drive out of the chassie to see if there is something wrong with those components if you're getting freezes in the Bios or not. Then after a day or two put in the Sound Blaster and see what happens for that day, if nothing, put the Sony DVD-RW back in and so forth. I hope this helps dude....

[bebop06]

No luck. I tried resetting the CMOS with the jumper, and the settings did go to default, but BIOS continued to freeze. I flashed the older BIOS, 6/23/2005 (-3), and still freezes. I disconnected the Audigy card and moved the video card down to the second PCI-E slot (since the 1900XT is so long it was right over the nF4 fan)--still freezes. Again, I had one instance where I was able to move around in BIOS for several minutes and it seemed entirely stable (then I saved and quit). But many times it freezes after 5-10 seconds and beeps when I hit any key. (And just so you know, my temperatures look pretty good: 28-29C CPU idle, 33 for the board and chipset.)

 

I've already run one pass of all tests of MemTest (through the option in the BIOS) with no errors, and I'm currently running 5 passes of Test #7 as suggested. No errors as of now. I have the sticks in the two orange slots, if that matters.

 

What is my next step? I really need to get this stable, since I'm going back to school and a heavy workload in three days. I was hoping to moderately overclock before I have to leave, but at this point I would be happy to get it stable at stock. It seems really odd that it would freeze in BIOS, but never if I don't hit Delete and just boot into Windows--then it's perfectly stable every time.

 

 

Thanks in advance for your help.

[bebop06]

Update: Since I've heard some G.SKILL were coming DOA and generally having issues, I decided to swap them out and put in my old 2x512MB Corsair PC3200--and no freezes! Though in POST it stopped and said it was in Safe Mode.. but it told me to go in and manually set the cpu multiplier, which I did (put it at 9x), and then it booted to Windows.

 

Then I tried to boot a single stick of G.SKILL in slot 4 (orange)--3 red LEDs, and no POST. Then I tried to boot a single stick of Corsair in slot 4--3 red LEDs, no POST! But I'm not sure if this is normal: does 1 stick have to go in slots 1 or 2?

 

Does it sound like my memory is bad? Or what?

[KimTjik]

The basic rule:

1 stick = orange slot most far from the CPU

2 sticks = both orange slots

 

and 3 sticks can't be done...