spdiscus Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 This is my first full PC build. I believe everything is connected correctly, but I'm getting random halting/crashing when trying to get to an XP install. Problems: 1) Sometimes I can't get beyond BIOS at all. The system will repeatedly boot, ignoring my keyboard Delete. 2) When it does make it beyond the BIOS boot, it will start the XP install and crash with different warnings (PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA, BAD_POOL_CALLER, IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL). 3) I'd like to flash the BIOS to the newer beta, but the instructions say to boot with the floppy with only those files installed. This is a new system, so I can't even get to DOS to run the flash utility. Keeping the disk in at boot won't let me boot. I think I'm running the 1/25 BIOS, but when the boot actually works I can't get it to stop at the version readout screen. 4) When I'm forced to reboot, for various reasons, the system rarely makes it successfully beyond the nf4 splash screen (it just sits at that screen). I have to power off and wait. From when I do get into BIOS, it does not seem that anything is overheating. I believe the core problem is either the motherboard or the RAM (Ballistix 512 in 2 and 4), but I have no idea of where to start for troubleshooting. Upon a friend's suggestion, I upped the DRAM Voltage from 2.6 to 2.9. With 2.6 I get problem 1 (or worse = nothing happens after system powers up). With 2.9 I get problem 2. If the RAM is unstable, how can I tell if the problem is with my board or with my sticks? Again, this system is part-by-part new, so nothing can be installed until I can get a successful boot. Side question. With one SATA drive, does it matter which SATA connector I use? I have it in slot 1, now, but the BIOS order makes it look like I should be using 3, first. I'm new to this, so there is pretty much nothing I can do without some starting help. PSU is an OCZ PowerStream 520, so I don't think power source is the problem. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Impaqt Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 Try the system with just one stick of ram in SLot 2, if it still fails, swap the sticks..... THis sounds like a bad Ram stick to me.... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
XIII Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 I have a similiar problem, http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5190 I have to use 2.8 or 2.9v to get my RAM to work but I get my system up&running.I'm hoping for a new "official" BIOS to be released soon. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RGone Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 Try this link spdiscus as it was done with PC3200 Crucial Ballistix... You have to turn Bank Interleave off as mine did not want to run Bank Interleave on any newer bios thru the 1/25 I had. RGone... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Smoken Joe Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 Yup same exact problem with my first set of left over ram. When my OCZ platum rev2 came out every thing ran smooth I even reinstalled windows on the first try. I hope this is the fix to a lot of peoples problems. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdiscus Posted February 10, 2005 Posted February 10, 2005 Try this link spdiscus as it was done with PC3200 Crucial Ballistix... You have to turn Bank Interleave off as mine did not want to run Bank Interleave on any newer bios thru the 1/25 I had. RGone... A glimmer of hope! Thanks, RGone. I was able to get to the XP EULA, this time. I canceled the install so I could head off to work, but things are definitely going more smoothly. Dropping back down to 2.6V still hangs at random XP loading point, but I didn't expect everything to work with no new BIOS. Thanks, all, for your help. I'll post tonight on fulll results. While I'm away...any thoughts on which SATA connector? This is a minor query. The boot screen lists the SATA connections in a weird order. I'm just wondering if that's meant to be a suggestion. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdiscus Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 So, I increased the voltage to 2.9 and disabled interleaving. I was able to get just beyond the HDD formatting. After the formatting, the XP dll load has about 100 failed copies. If it does make it beyond the format and initial load, the reboot kills it. It makes it to the XP setup screen, complete with mouse cursor, but everything stops there. I tried your setup, RGone, but that just brought the crash about even earlier. The errors are the same with the RAM being used 1 stick at a time. I saw a thread where someone mentioned running a memtest when his machine wouldn't boot. How could I do that? I don't know if I have two busted sticks, a bad motherboard or just really bad setup ability. Everything should be working...it just doesn't. I'm open to any suggestions for anything that could possibly help. Feel free to wax eloquent about the most obscure troubleshooting possibilities. I want to try everything before I throw this thing out the window. Anyone? I don't think it's the hard drive, because I get similar errors with other drives (salvaged from old machines). One thing I have noticed is that, if I have more than just the SATA drive (2 IDEs), the SATA cannot be formatted by itself. It has to be accompanied by one of the IDE drives (the master). I have the SATA set as first boot HDD, but I don't think the XP install cares about that. This sucks. Any and all help will be appreciated. I'm all ears. Thanks, again. :confused: Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
tiresias Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 I was installing windows2000 yesterday and today but the errors and symptoms were very similar. I solved it here by disabling SSE/SSE2 instruction support in Advanced chipset features in the BIOS. Maybe worth a shot for you? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdiscus Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 I solved it here by disabling SSE/SSE2 instruction support in Advanced chipset features in the BIOS. Maybe worth a shot for you? No luck with that setting. Thanks, though. I'm consistently making it to the post-format driver load. I just get an inordinate amount of fail/skip files, and if it does finish it won't reboot successfully. Does anyone have HDD setting tricks? It would make sense that this is an HDD problem (though, I'm not ruling anything out); I just don't know what kind of problem (cable, BIOS, etc) would span hard drives and IDE/SATA. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RGone Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 Ok here is what I normally see when we all see that fail after fail to copy on most setups regardless of brand of mobo > memory or setting is at fault. Now before you go bail off a bridge if you did every thing exactly as I showed because it IS how I did it and if you have run memtest from a floppy to see if the memory is 'really' good> then I would RMA the board. That is so if you have the 24 pin portion of that power supply hooked up and you have the P4 adapter for added power plugged in near the 24 pin atx connector. Have not had a "close" look at the 520 power supply but you need to read the power cabling instructions from that power supply and do it correctly. I think or rather on some I know you can hook it up wrong and then it is usually too sad. Off the top of my head and having done it with Ballistix and you done the things as stated; I think it is rma time back to the vendor from whom you purchased. RGone... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdiscus Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 There's only one way to connect the PSU cabling to the board, so I don't think that's it. I'll give memtest a shot with the basic 2.9/non-interleaving and with RGone's full setup. I'd rather not RMA, but we'll see. Thanks, everyone. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdiscus Posted February 11, 2005 Posted February 11, 2005 Both sticks: RGone's full settings: the system just shuts down after formatting the drive. Memtest had 22 errors in step 5. 2.9/non-interleaving: step 5 had 833 errors in channel 1. Memtest, one at a time: 2.9/non-interleaving: thousands of errors at step 5, each. RGone's settings: BIOS froze while changing settings. Is this definitely a motherboard problem, then? Is it possible that just the second RAM slot is faulty? I tried just having a stick in the first slot, but that doesn't make it to BIOS, at all. I'm going to try to find a stable system to test my RAM. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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