Random lockup puzzle....

[PriestJPN]

I've gradually been upgrading my machine for a while and the damn thing keeps locking up; a complete freeze in XP.

I've kinda narrowed it down to either the PSU or the MB, so what I need to know is the following:

1) Is a 300 Watt PSU (Q-Tec ADT-300) enough to drive an Athlon XP 2400+, DVD Drive, 52x CDRW, 640Meg, 6Gig Primary and 80Gig secondary HD and an extra system fan??

2) (Most likely culprit) Are PC-Chips motherboards really crap enough to cause the lock ups? I thought it would be stable enough for everyday use, but maybe I was wrong. Does anyone have experience (be honest!) of using a 810L 7.1a MB?

3) Erm, which one do I replace? I would imagine it would be the MB, but I'd like to know what you folks think.

[CrapshoT]

my daughter had a pc chips 810l motherboard and to be honest it was non stop trouble always crashing slowing down locking up etc.. changed her mobo to a asus a7a 266 and the same set up runs sweet now well it did till i shorted her mobo
change them both really mate youd need a minimum of 350 watts try for a 550 tho and be safe
and get a n-force 2 mobo you can pick them up in the forums for £60 upwards

[acidrainy]

Abit NF7-S and a Q-tec 550w should suffice
Its what i use, ive hardly a bad word against them..

[Trash Man]

A 300W PSU to power all that lot is boderline IMHO and yes PC Chips MB's are pap to say the least.

A quality 350W PSU is more than enough, I am using an Enermax 350W and powering a 2.3Ghz AMD, 3 drives 2 HDD's 5 case fans (all powered by the PSU) But that PSU would set you back more than the Q-Tec 550W jobbie.

[acidrainy]

I would tend to lean between the Q-tec 550w or an Antec (trueblue?) 480w

Enermax just doesn't seem to me to be worth it....
Especially when the q-tec is more stable and hitting all the rails even at full load... I've certainly not seen an enermax to do that (in person).

[Trash Man]

Been using an Enermax for over a year now with no problems what so ever.

[Spritzup]

I just got the Antec Trueblue 480 watt powersupply and I can't complain. Rock solid and it looks good to!!

[PriestJPN]

Thanks for the advice, all of you...

I've just been running a few more tests and its definately locking up under heavy cpu usage; DVD2SVCD, FlaskMPG and the UD.com client all cause the same result - guaranteed lock up after a while...

Is there such a thing as a good, stable all in one MB with built in video, sound and lan? Bit strapped for cash atm, you see...

[acidrainy]

hmmm, although Ive never seen or used one, I suppose the Abit NF7-M would be a good choice for the like.....

EDIT: saying that you could probably get a NF7-S and a GF4Ti4200 for the same price these days.... :/

[St3v3]

yeah, to put it simple, PC Chips suck.

If you are on the lookout for good mobo manufacturers, I reccomend Asus and Abit.

A good cheap mobo with everything onboard is the Asus A7N266-VM, which you can pick up for about £40

A lot better than the PC Chips one I can garuntee you.

[Ben Rogers]

Yes the Asus A7N266-VM is a very good board for the money. Only got one of them but its 100% stable and runs SETI 24/7 without any problems.

PriestJPN - has your pc just started to lock up? since you added some hardware or has it done it for ages?

Firstly the 7.1a doesn't "officially" support any T'bred B CPU, can cause cold boot problems, but once it's running the CPU shouldn't be the issue here.

Have a look at the hardware monitoring page in the BIOS and see what the voltages are at.

If the voltages look ok try leaving just one stick of RAM in the system and see if it still locks up, if it does try another stick on it's own.

[PriestJPN]

I used to have a Duron 1300 in the machine, and even then it froze up occaisionally, even in times of low CPU usage IIRC...

As for the A7N266-VM, I'll try and get my hands on one in the next week or two. Thanks for the recommendations, all of you - much appreciated. ^_^

[Zak33]

SLOW DOWN......woooahh.....

Try this first

http://www.memtest86.com/

you have to run it off a floppy but its worth it....

just in case you have a crap stick of memory....thereslots of it around

[PriestJPN]

OK, downloaded memtest86 last night and set it running. Many times. Froze up every time I ran it...

It didn't report any memory errors, but everything locked repeatedly. Once at 19mins, again at 54mins and then again after only 13seconds. Tested with 1 stick of ram at a time and then with both. Same results...

It seems that anything that constitutes hard work for my machine causes it to flake out and freeze up. No garbled screens, no BSOD... Powered up this morning and it finally POSTed on the third attempt. My only question now is what the heck do I do with this scum-sucking motherboard once I've fitted the new one? :/

[Ben Rogers]

Originally posted by PriestJPN
OK, downloaded memtest86 last night and set it running. Many times. Froze up every time I ran it...

It didn't report any memory errors, but everything locked repeatedly. Once at 19mins, again at 54mins and then again after only 13seconds. Tested with 1 stick of ram at a time and then with both. Same results...

It seems that anything that constitutes hard work for my machine causes it to flake out and freeze up. No garbled screens, no BSOD... Powered up this morning and it finally POSTed on the third attempt. My only question now is what the heck do I do with this scum-sucking motherboard once I've fitted the new one? :/

Have a look at the voltages in the BIOS mate. It sounds like it could be a PSU problem now that even memtest86 can't run.

Bet there is nothing actually wrong with the motherboard itself.

BTW, the problem with it not posting everytime is down to the t'bred b processor.

[PriestJPN]

OK, here's my system's voltages as read in the bios...

VCore = 1.632v
2.5v = 2.480v
3.3v = 3.328v
5.0v = 4.919v
+12v = 12.416v
-12v = 11.803v
SB3v = 3.184v
SB5v = 4.865v

How does that seem to you guys?? Acceptable or not?