jarrick

yep, all 3 power leads plugged in. not sure what a PWM is but the chipset and processor are running cool enough (the chipset fan revs up more when i'm running both graphics cards but not constantly) I have noticed that it doesn't freeze up so much anymore though the restart issue is the same. I'll try your suggestions and report soon. I was chatting to another repair shop and the guy recons that most dual core processors require a single 12v rail power supply to work affectively and that they tend to freeze during gaming up otherwise. something to do with voltage stability. anyone else heard about this?

I contacted DFI reps and they said that my PSU, though not one that has been known to cause incompatabilities, is not a recomended one and that I have to try it with a recomended one. This is easy, of course: i just need to cough up about £100 for a new PSU just so i can try out their theory that it might be that that's causing a problem so instead i tried taking it to a repair shop -who told me that there was a fault with the mother board but when i told that to DFI they just said that they are not interested in what 3rd parties (ie repair shops)have to say about it and that i should carry out their instructions of testing it with a recomended psu (prosumptious of them to assume i know how to fit it myself). Well, it makes sence -viewed from a millionare's perspective- but i don't like that attitude. why do the customers have to do the work of testing their product against power supplies? there was no mention of my psu being the wrong one when i bought it so it's not right that they can then decide later that i'm at fault for getting the wrong one. Bit of responsibility should be taken, me thinks. anyway, enough complaining, this sight has oviously dealt with a lot of simptoms of incompatable power supplies so has anyone ever come accross a simptom such as mine?

orrigionally, i had a seasonic 600w. that broke one fine day and as it was still under guarrantee, they sent me the 650w version. this was when i had one graphics card and the old opteron chip. with the new psu, it worked fine. then i got the other graphics card and had a few problems working out how to set it up but it was working fine in the end. then i fit the new chip and that's when it all went to pot.

just reloaded the BIOS agian. no luck there either. I'm all out of ideas here. someone throw me a bone.

oh great.. and i've just discovered that writing over the bootblock with "winflash" is a dooming mistake -anyone know how to undo this?

just tried clearing the CMOS: no difference. I'm going to try reloading the bios like it says in the sticky and clearing the CMOS again.

i don't know anything about CMOS and only heard about it today. Not sure what to do but i'll follow the instructions laid out in the sticky i read earlier. what does "dialing in new timings" mean and how do i do that?

just upgraded my pc from an Opteron 146 (single core) to an athlon 4200 X2 and found that now it freezes up at random moments (whether i'm doing anything intensive or not) but the most anoying thing is that when i press restart, it shuts down and then sticks at the "4 LED" stage (with all the fans revving like mad) before anything comes on the screen. to get out of this, i hold the power button in till it shuts down and then i can immediately start it again and it powers up fine. The same thing happens if i just shut down and then turn it on again and if there's a freeze up, i have to hold in the off button till it shuts down, power on and watch those 4 LED's dispondently, hold in the button and power down again and then power up, before i can get it to work. i thought it may be the BIOS so i updated them via http://us.dfi.com.tw/Support/Download/bios..._FLAG=A&SITE=US and used the "winflash v1.84" to insert the new bios (date: 2006/04/06). unfortunately i didn't know how to use the winflash program propperly, just guessed and updated only the main block at first. but then, after finding it didn't work, pressed the "update all" button and that appeared to update the bootblock and DMI block aswell as the main block. of course it still made no difference and i came here and have just read "The correct way to flash your bios" in one of the sticky's. but i'm wondering if i need to be doing all that clearing CMOS and stuff if i use the winflash program? I've swapped the chips back and forth and the system works fine with the old chip. I've reloaded mobo and graphics drivers. I've tried it with only one graphics card, one HDD and 2 sticks of ram and the new chip; no difference. i've tested the new chip with pcmark 2005, CPU BURN-IN and Orthos Prime 2005: tested fine with no errors. temperatures and voltages: appear to be fine though there is a difference of oppinion depending whether i use Nvidia Monitor, smart guardian or MBM 5 but they all say things are within opperating perameters. the PSU's brand new.. (not that that means much but i'd rather not cough out for another one) any suggestions?

I'll be overclocking the opteron 146 for gaming purposes rather than just to see how much I can get out of it and for the extra cost, is it worth me getting the sli DR or expert? (and no, I'm not an expert) and are they compatable with the opteron and mushkin ram?