Possible Cause of System Stability Problem

[poochball]

Hello once again,

 

I have been fighting a losing battle with my DFI motherboard and issues with Blue Screens and Random Reboots (when playing games).

 

I am thinking I have found the cause....

 

I use Corsair Value Select Memory and the CAS is rated at CL2.5

 

I beleive this to be the case as the board runs at CL2.0??? I have set it to this at the moment. On a side note memtest ran for 8 hours without a hitch

 

So buy purchasing the OCZ Platinum Series 2GB Kit Rated at CL2 I reckon I will be on to a winner.

 

What do you think?

[Capt Proton]

The board will run at whatever you set in the BIOS. You can set 2.5, or put on Auto, but you should check using CPU-Z or some other program once in Windows to confirm that the SPD is being read correctly.

I take it from this question, that you are new to this. If you are setting all the timings in the BIOS to auto, you will probably have problems. Your new memory will be better, but you should do some research in the Stock Database for settings others use succesfully for the memory. You wil find even more info at the official OCZ site here.

 

http://www.bleedinedge.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=68

 

Although many examples are for NF4, they will help greatly with the NF3 as well, as the memory controller is on the CPU. There are just some settings you will not have in your BIOS.

[wevsspot]

Excellent suggestions CaptnP. And well researched to boot. Nice job and good advice.

[poochball]

Cheers.

 

The information shall prove useful. I seem to have made my system a little more stable now.

 

I shall wait to purchase my memory and will initially just run it at stock speed so I can understand what I will be doing when I decided to start tweaking.

[wevsspot]

I shall wait to purchase my memory and will initially just run it at stock speed so I can understand what I will be doing when I decided to start tweaking.

 

That is the smart approach. Successful overclocking is a journey not often finished in a single day - or even week - sometimes not even a month.

 

Every change must be stress tested, benchmarked and confirmed stable. Just a little at a time.

[poochball]

Cheers,

 

Unfortunately running at stock is causing headaches. Just had a random reboot this morning about 2 mins after loading Windows.

 

Odd is that just before loading windows after the reboot, an error came up reporting "A Disc Read Error has occurred". Press CTRL-ALT-DELETE to continue.

 

I did this and the system booted up.

 

Man this is giving me a headache!

 

I am guessing my HDD could be at fault? I am running some tests on it.

[poochball]

Well the tests I have performed have not shown anything. Ahhh well good job I like a challange!

[wevsspot]

You aren't going to want to hear this. But if I were you I'd try a different power supply. Now before you go off on me, I'm not saying the power supply you have is bad (but it can easily be checked at idle and under load with a digital multi-meter).

 

It's just that the odd malfunctions you are experiencing would lead me to believe it's a power supply issue. Not your hard drive, (but possibly your RAM), and IMHO more than likely related to a combination between the value RAM AND the current power supply.

[adreno]

In this case there is the possibility of the PSU causing instability, but assuming you are trying to get stock stability I also reccomend you check out a few more things if you are waiting for a new PSU.

 

The nF3 Ultra-D is not an nF4 board, although many here put them in the same light. nf3 Ultra-D is ULTRA quirky, beyond your imagination. Most of the problems people have with this board, are related to undervolting/overvolting in the BIOS, improper CMOS clear procedure, use of SATA RAID array, and using auto for memory timings. PSU can also play a factor

 

Using 2X512Mb corsair value select should not be a problem assuming you have them set up correctly:

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread...=nF3#post257399

 

Here is what I would suggest as some additional things to check out:

 

First off use the following procedure to flash new BIOS. I would reccomend that you start with the 711 official BIOS. Follow the BIOS clear procedure exactly. Since you are using a sandy core you could also try the 824 beta bios at some point as it seems to play well with a sandy cores.

 

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread...lear#post317242

 

Also a few other things to be aware of...

 

This board under-volts VCORE (the CPU core voltage), if you are not using +0.x voltage adjust. If you are it overvolts. Check the table in the tweeks sticky attached, and use the tables to set the proper VCORE. When I started with my 3000+ venice I used the following which gives about 1.4v VCORE on my board.

 

CPU VID Control = 1.425v

CPU Voltage adjusting = +0.1v

 

Check the tweeks sticky as most problems with this board have been solved here, with various degrees of succcess. Search is your friend.

 

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17498

 

- Also check your vdimm as it defaults to 2.6v which in many cases is too low. Bump it up to 2.7v and see if things improve.

- Make sure your SATA drives are on ports 3 or 4. The other SATA drive ports (1&2) are not locked.

- Set your AGP OverClock in MHz = 67 to lock the SATA bus. Otherwise the SATA bus is unlocked.

 

If you are still having trouble then post back your geni bios settings in the format shown in this entry, and I would be glad to pick through them and see what else might need tweeking.

 

http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread...=nF3#post257399

[poochball]

You aren't going to want to hear this. But if I were you I'd try a different power supply. Now before you go off on me, I'm not saying the power supply you have is bad (but it can easily be checked at idle and under load with a digital multi-meter).

 

It's just that the odd malfunctions you are experiencing would lead me to believe it's a power supply issue. Not your hard drive, (but possibly your RAM), and IMHO more than likely related to a combination between the value RAM AND the current power supply.

 

Hi to a certain degree I didn't want to hear this as I have just purchased this PSU which is a Thermaltake TR2 Model

 

These are the ratings at max load:

 

+3.3v +5v +12v1 +12v2 -12v +5VSB

 

30A 28A 14A 15A 0.3A 2.0A

 

However I appreciate you are pointing out possible causes so I thank you for your help. Perhaps I need a better PSU. I made the mistake of thinking "It's Thermaltake it will be good" when perhaps I should have done my homework. Slapped wrists me thinks!

 

I have changed a couple of settings in my BIOS and left my pc running Unreal all night, although the system did not reboot, Unreal Crashed with an Error. The system has not rebooted in 36 hours now which is better than normal. I have also run a 3d mark test and the system did not crash.

 

I beleive I have installed my SATA Cable into port two so will move this to port 3 when I can.

 

My AGP Bus is currently running at 67Mhz.

 

ADRENO

 

Thanks very much for the information you have provided me, it will be most useful and I hope I can make my system more stable. I shall update with any news!

 

Thanks Guys

[adreno]

Is this the PSU you have?

 

http://www.thermaltake.com/product/Power/T...394/w009394.asp

[poochball]

Yep thats the one!